Abstract:
This paper critically examines the widely accepted principles of usability in web design. In
particular, it investigates the work of Jakob Nielsen, whose name has become synonymous with
'user-friendliness' as a result of popular applications of his 'ten usability heuristics' and argument
that Flash is '99% bad'. It interrogates the assumptions embedded in his research, especially the
notion that web consumption is predominantly a utilitarian activity.
In an infant discipline such as web design, what are the implications for students and
practitioners' creative output when such ideas become its theoretical canon? What are the
foreseeable consequences when knowledge in the field is disseminated by industry practitioners,
such as Nielsen and other usability experts, to fellow multimedia designers? The paper explores
the possible outcomes of the dot.com industry preaching its own practice, particularly when this
in turn is fed back into the education of prospective web professionals.
What can be borrowed from other design disciplines that can contribute to a rethinking of online
interactions as more than task-driven? For example, in terms of industrial design. a web site can
be considered a product; while architecturally, it can be perceived as a virtual space. It has only
been recently that the concept of 'experience design' has emerged in web design. which suggests
an approach which both contests and extends 'rules' of usability. This seems indicative of broader
disciplinary differences between the abovementioned fields and the design of information
systems, from which the area of usability has developed. The paper attempts to chart the
historical trajectory of ontologies of web design and reconcile these with approaches from other
design disciplines as a way of establishing alternatives to the taken-for-granted mantra that
'usability is king'.
