What if Jakob Nielsen had a blog?

Jakob Nielsen Film Reviewing Method

He isn't usually known as a film buff, but Jakob Nielsen has been reviewing films for quite a while now:

Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.tv
Path: sparky!uunet!walter!hip10.bellcore.com!nielsen
From: Jakob Nielsen <niel...@bellcore.com>
Subject: Re: Time Trax
Message-ID: <1993Jan21.185126.27016@walter.bellcore.com>
X-Xxmessage-Id: <A78459A5F4010...@hip10.bellcore.com>
X-Xxdate: Thu, 21 Jan 93 18:46:13 GMT
Sender: n...@walter.bellcore.com
Nntp-Posting-Host: hip10.bellcore.com
Organization: Bellcore - Bell Communications Research
X-Useragent: Nuntius v1.1.1d17
References: <1993Jan21.112231.6098@sol.UVic.CA> <1993Jan21.181355.23099@cs.tulane.edu>
Distribution: na
Date: Thu, 21 Jan 93 18:51:26 GMT
Lines: 17

In article <1993Jan21.112231.6...@sol.UVic.CA> Michael McAleese,
mmcal...@cs16.UVic.CA writes:
>    After viewing the two hour debut movie of Time Trax, I have to give
> it the old thumbs down. It wasn't exactly that it was bad... it just 
> wasn't good.

There were also several errors showing lack of care in production. The
worst (given its prominence) was probably the sign saying "Smithsonian
Institute" when in fact it is called the "Smithsonian Institution". Another
error (that admittedly might only be caught by a Scandinavian) is the scene
where somebody gets the Nobel prize in physics and the diploma reads
"Awarded by the Norwegian Nobel committee." The Norwegian Nobel committee
only awards the peace price, whereas the other prizes are awarded by the
*Swedish* Nobel committee.
--
Jakob Nielsen, niel...@bellcore.com, fax (201)  829-2645
Bellcore, MRE 2P-370, 445 South St., Morristown, NJ 09792-1910, USA

He also reveals how he selects films for his viewing pleasure:

Path: gmdzi!unido!mcsun!uunet!wuarchive!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!ub!rutgers!bellcore-2!bellcore!nielsen
From: niel...@flash.bellcore.com (Jakob Nielsen)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.nordic
Subject: Re: TV/radio
Message-ID: <NIELSEN.90Oct26132631@breeze.flash.bellcore.com>
Date: 26 Oct 90 17:26:31 GMT
References: <1990Oct23.211038.23224@ida.liu.se>
Sender: n...@bellcore.bellcore.com
Organization: /u/nielsen/.organization
Lines: 15
Posted: Fri Oct 26 18:26:31 1990
In-reply-to: uda@IDA.LiU.SE's message of 23 Oct 90 21:10:38 GMT

In fact, one can do even better with American TV than mentioned
by most posters if one has a VCR. Many of the better movies
are shown after midnight (ideal for hackers :-) and I have
collected about 10 films on tape during a period of about 3
months which I have simply not had time to watch. (this is in
addition to whatever films and shows I saw in realtime or soon
after they were broadcast).

When I lived in Denmark, my algorithm for whether it was worth
taping a film from TV was whether it had at least two stars in
Halliwel's film guide (scale of 0-4 stars). Now I don't even tape
all the three-star films.
--
Jakob Nielsen, Bellcore MRE-2P370, 445 South St, Morristown, NJ 07962-1910, USA
niel...@bellcore.com, Tel. (201) 829-4731(w)/538-7254(h), Fax (201) 538-9093.

Jakob Nielson's Dance Party USA

Dance Party via OK\Cancel

7 on the Ugly Scale

Kevin and Tom have published an OK/Cancel strip called "7 on the Ugly Scale" that cast some aspersions the design of useit.com

I dare them to put that title on a t-shirt.

Why Ajax Sucks (Most of the time)

"Why Ajax Sucks" is possibly the most famous spoof alertbox of recent times.

The original spoof has a disclaimer at the bottom stating that it was a spoof article that had been based on "Why Frames Suck", but so many people obviously didn't read to the bottom so I added the disclaimer at the top of the article as well.

Design Eye for the Usability Guy

While we're at it we need to do something about the readability of the page. It's not horrible, just a bit sprawling and a bit awkward. (Ok... it's horrible.) Andrei's rewrite took care of some of that clunkiness. I'm going to take care of the rest. I don't want to go overboard, considering Nielsen's audience, but let's liven it up a tad, shall we? Go with a centered, flexible layout constructed with ems. Set the outer wrap to 35ems and then set the width of the content area itself to 31ems. This should allow for an almost ideal line-length for readability at any font size. Of course all text will be set to percentages so the user can override if needed.

http://www.designbyfire.com/000094.html

An open letter to Jakob Nielsen

I have a suggestion that I hope you take to heart. Prove to the world that you understand what it takes to provide the world with good design. Prove that you understand that good design, especially as it pertains to the field of high-technology product design, is also about nuts and bolts, honest, straight-forward usability. Prove to the designers out there you understand the principles of good design by tackling your own little spot on the world wide web.

Redesign UseIt.com with your own two hands. Do the work yourself. Make it readable. Make it pleasing to the eye. Fill it with content that inspires people to do better in their own work. Take the time to employ some basic typography principles. I'll even let you borrow my copy of Elements of Typographic Style by Robert Bringhurst. Create a pleasing color palette. Create some simple, yet elegant informational graphics. Go take a few photos.

Do all of this and make your own web site usable. It is possible. In fact, for someone who is at your stage in their career, I would claim it is required.

Respectfully,
Andrei Michael Herasimchuk

http://www.designbyfire.com/000068.html

An open letter to Jakob Nielsen

I have a suggestion that I hope you take to heart. Prove to the world that you understand what it takes to provide the world with good design. Prove that you understand that good design, especially as it pertains to the field of high-technology product design, is also about nuts and bolts, honest, straight-forward usability. Prove to the designers out there you understand the principles of good design by tackling your own little spot on the world wide web.

Redesign UseIt.com with your own two hands. Do the work yourself. Make it readable. Make it pleasing to the eye. Fill it with content that inspires people to do better in their own work. Take the time to employ some basic typography principles. I'll even let you borrow my copy of Elements of Typographic Style by Robert Bringhurst. Create a pleasing color palette. Create some simple, yet elegant informational graphics. Go take a few photos.

Do all of this and make your own web site usable. It is possible. In fact, for someone who is at your stage in their career, I would claim it is required.

http://www.designbyfire.com/000068.html

The ReUSEIT Contest

In the fall of 2003, Built for the Future sponsored a contest to redesign Jakob Nielsen's USEIT.com web site using CSS and web standards. The goal was to create a more aesthetically-pleasing site design while maintaining or improving upon the useability of the existing site.

The contest created a tremendous amount of buzz in the useability/accessibility/web standards circles, as well as no small amount of controversy. The top three entries, judged by a panel of A-List web celebrities, each walked away with a basketload of goodies provided to us by a number of incredible sponsors.

Built for the Future is proud to present to you the ReUSEIT Contest entries, as well as other tidbits and information regarding this contest.

http://www.builtforthefuture.com/reuseit.php

Jakob Nielsen Declares the Letter "C" Unusable

Software usability expert Jakob Nielsen made a surprise announcement on his website useit.com this week that he will be branching out from website/software usability and now be including lingual and cultural usability into his studies.

The announcement included Nielsen's first victim in what will be a constant assessment of life and language in America.

"The letter 'C' is 95% bad," states Nielsen's latest bi-weekly newsletter which is entitled "Stop Being Stupid."

"As I sat down to re-evaluate the English language, I was struck by the letter 'C' and its basic lack of function in the language," writes Nielsen. "The sheer uselessness of a letter which just mimics the sound of not one but two different consonants is staggering. It only causes confusion and is probably costing companies millions every year."

US Press News