Re: current example for Re: Cognitive Disability

At 21:48 +0000 08/11/2001, Jonathan Chetwynd wrote:
>many pages have a totally spurious banner
>You have 1 email
>or similar.
>
>My students assume this is TRUE, and have difficulty believing me.
>[snip]
>They often have a dozen windows open, and don't realise....

At 16:58 -0500 08/11/2001, Joel Ward wrote:
>I've always wondered if those faux "You have 1 email waiting" pop-up and
>banner ads actually worked.
>
>The question is: Are they successful in grabbing new customers, or merely
>frustrating users?
>
>How do your students respond when they click on the fake "Ok" button?

Heh! I teach a large number of adult new users - general public who 
don't declare themselves as having any special abilities or 
disabilities - and Jonathan's statements above are exactly true for 
that group. Those false "windows"  work almost every time for a lot 
of them. Generally most of my students don't have a clue about having 
large numbers of windows open and when new windows do pop open 
uninvited they get very confused.

I have an article in the current issue of Digital Web which talks 
more about my experience with new users and how bewildered they get:

<http://www.digital-web.com/tutorials/>

Digital Web Magazine - Tutorial: What's happening? A new look at Web pages




Cheers,

Miraz

-- 
Personal site: <http://www.miraz.info> - blog, photos and other 
assorted experiments

Received on Friday, 9 November 2001 13:22:01 UTC