Life is governed by rules.

I live two blocks away from New Zealand’s busiest pedestrian street, Lambton
Quay. After a little observation, it’s obvious to see that the way we walk down
the street is governed by a set of rules. Walk on the left. Always be
purposeful, even if you’re slow. Stay a respectful distance from the rest of the
foot traffic.

But what happens when the rules of life conflict, or people differ in their
opinion of what the rules are? It doesn’t take long for right driving foreigners
walking down a busy New Zealand street to realise that going against the flow is
not very efficient.

And that’s a problem with the Internet. Because the technology is so immature,
definite rules have not yet emerged. There are a few obvious DOs and DON’Ts, but
there is a also a lot of ambiguity in the social and design conventions.

Last Friday I broke the rules.

I sent out an email to 50 people inviting them to drinks. It’s my modus operandi
to put email addresses for personal invitations on the TO rather than the BCC
line. This way everyone knows who else is coming. My logic is that individuals
can decide if they want to come based on their own preferences: the people they
know on the list, the number invited, even the mix of female and male! I
appreciate that some people don’t want their email address given out to anyone
they don’t know, but I still figure that the tradeoff is worth it. Besides, none
of my friends are spammers (or so I thought).

Now, normally I don’t receive any fallout from my tip toeing on the line of
netiquette. However, on this particular afternoon, the rules were broken. One of
my friends used the list to send out an email asking for flatmates. She spammed
my friends! Naturally, I copped a bit of flack, because the breaking of the
rules started with me. Fair enough, too.

So although the web isn’t that old, there are definitely some things that you
don’t do. Rules for usability on the web are starting to get more established
too, as the body of research increases and we figure out what works and what
doesn’t. A good example is that we’re starting to see established locations for
navigation elements. People are starting to figure out whether to walk on the
right or the left.

Trent

My flatmate likes to accuse me of being dumb at using technology on purpose. There is a certain truth in that - I would prefer not to have to learn how to connect up all the cords snaking out of the back of the TV and VCR. Plus, as a usability engineer, what would I have to complain about if I found everything usable? Still, I was pleased to read the other day that the late Michael Dertouzos, the former director of the computer science lab at MIT, also struggles with technology.
                                                                                                                                                                                                                                       
"Several colleagues from the MIT Laboratory for Computer Science and I are flying to Taiwan. I have been trying for three hours to make my new laptop work with one of these "smart cards" that plug into the machine and download my personal calendar. When the card software is happy, the operating system complains, and vice versa. Irritated, I turn to Tim Berners-Lee, sitting next to me, who graciously offers to asist. After an hour the inventor of the Web admits that the task is beyond his capabilities. I turn to Ron Rivest, inventor of RSA public key cryptograhpy, and ask him to help. He declines, exhibiting his wisdom. A young faculty member behind us speaks up: "You guys are too old. Let me do it." He gives up after an hour and a half. So I go back to my "expert" approach of typing random entries into the various wizards and lizards that keep popping up on the screen. After two more hours, and two batteries, I make it work, by sheer accident and without remembering how."
              - from the book The Unfinshed Revolution

Trent