Your page talks
First impressions matter.
They don’t die easy.
And they come fast.
Research shows that readers judge the appeal of a page in as little as 50 milliseconds. Read more…
Get your reader started
How do you engage with a book?
I’ll have a guess:
You look at the cover first.
Then you turn to the back for the reviews.
If it’s a hardcover, the flaps are next.
Why do we read that way?
Because the reading brain is lazy: it wants an easy start. It wants to find out about the book before diving in. And it wants this information without investing energy. Read more…
Tell the user experience
Graphic designers show mockups of single pages.
But are they making connections between those pages?
A blog post by Braden Kowitz recently woke me up to how important that is.
He says that the designer (or rather the whole product development team) has to tell a story – the story of the user experience.
Why facts are not enough
Western thought has long nurtured the idea that humans are at their best when fully rational.
To make the right choices, we must leave our feelings behind and put our brain to work. All it takes is discipline.
It’s the assumption behind classic economics where everyone acts on their rational preferences. It’s also the assumption behind communications with never-ending facts and bullet points. They could come with a warning sign:
Dry information ahead!
Please move into rational mode so you can absorb the information and act on it.
But does it work that way? Read more…
A man takes a stand
The chief of the Austrialian army recently spoke out against the distribution of sexual videos, demeaning women and seemingly filmed inside the army.
I embedded General Morrison’s video below.
With well over a million views, I am not the only one who’s impressed. Read more…