[WikiEN-l] Updated new search interface on the prototype

[William Pietri]

On 05/20/2010 01:13 AM, Charles Matthews wrote:
> Ah, but it would be "confusing" to be out of step with other websites,
> wouldn't it? Never mind that Wikipedia is sui generis and well known in
> its own terms, it would be "confusing" not to conform to other sites in
> having design imposed, not bubbling up from the community of editors
> (who admittedly only make the site what it is).

I hate to tell you this, but people working on every site believe theirs 
is so special that it should be an exception the rules.

But however awesome a site is, regular users spend most of their time on 
other sites. That's true even for a high-traffic site like ours. So we 
should only deviate from conventions or make innovative design choices 
when there is such a clear benefit to users that it outweighs the cost 
to our users.

The community of editors definitely make this place what it is, but our 
shared goal is to serve readers, and I think that should be paramount in 
our minds. Especially in situations like interface design, where a 
classic and incredibly common mistake is for internal stakeholders to 
make self-serving choices.

That's not to say that we shouldn't also design for expert users. For 
example, I agree with others that there should be some way for experts 
to easily do a text search without having to make the extra click. But 
assuming a 99:1 novice to expert ratio for our traffic, the current 
approach must have saved an awful lot of extra clicks from novices.

William