The problem with interface design in libraries is that we don't go about it as if it really mattered. If we cared, we'd pay more attention to people like Marissa Mayer, interface designer at Google, when she says, "Google should be 'what you want, when you want it.' As opposed to 'everything you could ever want, even when you don't.'"
How is that fur a concept? Meanwhile in Libraryland, the murmuring continues about "Google-ization" and the dangers of appealing to the lowest common denominator. You'd think taking care of our users--our customers--in a manner in which they are accustomed to is beneath us. This is a recipe for going out of business.
Everyone talks about user-friendly design, yet bad design happens. Why? Information architect Jesse James Garrett lists this as the most common misconception: "We know our users--they're just like us."
Not so, say Jerilyn Veldof and Karen Beavers, two librarians testing the effectiveness of online instructional material in Minnesota. "Librarians," they report, "need to be more conscious that their own mental models are not the only ones." They conclude that "students view the research process as something to hurry through in order to get to an end--the articles and books required for their project."
They're busy
Klein, Leo Robert. "The expert user is dead: we must design library web sites to welcome all users." Library Journal, vol. 128, no. 17, 15 Oct. 2003, p. S36 [link]
