4 ms·

The tiny Mona Lisa faces in the articles are hyperlinks to additional pages: https://www.pbs.org/treasuresoftheworld/a_nav/mona_nav/mnav_level_1/5return_monafrm

by ashwch 3y ago

The tiny Mona Lisa faces in the articles are hyperlinks to additional pages: https://www.pbs.org/treasuresoftheworld/a_nav/mona_nav/mnav_level_1/5return_monafrm.html https://www.pbs.org/treasuresoftheworld/a_nav/mona_nav/mnav_...

irrational 3y ago
How did you even know that? That honestly would not have occurred to me. What terrible UX.
- bryanrasmussen 3y ago
  I went and looked, very Web 1.0 this, so maybe that's why it looks so obvious to me that they're links as this is how things would have looked if you were a cool website in 2000, but also they have no obvious function other than being links, given that they are so very small, they always show the same image and they have ugly border around them.
  - antonvs 3y ago
    That's a poor ux even for web 1.0. It's a lazy way of writing without concern for whether your readers are familiar with the context you're already familiar with.
    - bryanrasmussen 3y ago
      Our opinions vary on this - I think it's a medium UX for web 1.0.
      - twelve40 3y ago
        always happy to run into a true web 1.0 connoisseur lol
    - TaylorAlexander 3y ago
      Interestingly it was immediately scannable to me as links. I was an avid web user at the time (I was 15!) and I guess that stuck in my mind.
      - irrational 3y ago
        I've started using the web in 1996 when I was in my early 20s, but, on my phone, the border around the images was so incredibly small that I couldn't see it until I went back and looked very closely.
    - throwawaylinux 3y ago
      It actually wasn't bad in its time, and it's not about the technology its the conventions. Those purple/blue borders were immediately recognizable as links. A lot of people today wouldn't understand it, but a lot of people wouldn't understand Shakespeare today either. It's just a product of its time.
      - irrational 3y ago
        I think the issue is, it wasn’t designed for mobile devices. The images are so tiny on my phone that I didn’t even see a colored border around them until someone mentioned them and I went back and looked again. I could just barely make out the border if I squinted.
      - antonvs 3y ago
        The issue is not whether someone knows the links are clickable or not. The issues were raised upthread: > They lay out the theft, public reaction, some art history, then not a single word on how it resloved, who actually took it and how it was found. The only hint was "an antique dealer got a letter". It's lazy to not include enough information to make a coherent article. Links in this context are for further information, not for basic information needed to understand the article.
        zogrodea 3y ago
        Thar was the original complaint (and a valid one) at the start of this comment chain, but a further complaint was given about the UX, stating that it had terrible design as links were hard to recognise as links. "How did you even know that? That honestly would not have occurred to me. What terrible UX." That's why you're seeing discussion about UX right now. A different subject is in focus.
    - scbrg 3y ago
      This is why I never got into books. There's a few hundred words, and then they just stop! Sometimes in the middle of a sentence! I've never figured out where they hide the scroll wheel so I can get to the rest of the text. All media come with some conventions that people are simply expected to know. In the late 90-ies, a blueish border around an image was an indication that it was a clickable link. Nobody ever bothered pointing out that this image can be clicked. Perhaps lazy, I don't know, but then the entire web was guilty.
      - irrational 3y ago
        I’m on a phone. I honestly couldn’t even see the border around the image until I went back and looked super close again. It is very hard to make out. Probably because the images are so tiny.
        scbrg 3y ago
        Sure. You're on a device that had its first incarnation launched seven years after this web page was made. The site was made in the era of 800x600 CRT monitors. There was no way in hell people could miss that border. The web designer didn't account for a world that wouldn't exist for another decade. Nobody expected people to run around with supercomputers in their pockets, equipped with screens with a pixel density more than an order of magnitude higher than was common place at the time, on a screen an order of magnitude smaller. How many people today take common usage patterns of the 2030-ies into account when they're designing things? Any web pages optimized to be consumed by AI:s running on quantum computers embedded in people's underwear? If not, what's their excuse?
      - antonvs 3y ago
        The issue is not whether someone knows the links are clickable or not. The issues were raised upthread: > They lay out the theft, public reaction, some art history, then not a single word on how it resloved, who actually took it and how it was found. The only hint was "an antique dealer got a letter". It's lazy to not include enough information to make a coherent article. Links in this context are for further information, not for basic information needed to understand the article.
- croisillon 3y ago
  (some of) those links are also as plain text on the left hand menu

by ashwch 3y ago

irrational 3y ago

How did you even know that? That honestly would not have occurred to me. What terrible UX.

bryanrasmussen 3y ago
I went and looked, very Web 1.0 this, so maybe that's why it looks so obvious to me that they're links as this is how things would have looked if you were a cool website in 2000, but also they have no obvious function other than being links, given that they are so very small, they always show the same image and they have ugly border around them.
- antonvs 3y ago
  That's a poor ux even for web 1.0. It's a lazy way of writing without concern for whether your readers are familiar with the context you're already familiar with.
  - bryanrasmussen 3y ago
    Our opinions vary on this - I think it's a medium UX for web 1.0.
    - twelve40 3y ago
      always happy to run into a true web 1.0 connoisseur lol
  - TaylorAlexander 3y ago
    Interestingly it was immediately scannable to me as links. I was an avid web user at the time (I was 15!) and I guess that stuck in my mind.
    - irrational 3y ago
      I've started using the web in 1996 when I was in my early 20s, but, on my phone, the border around the images was so incredibly small that I couldn't see it until I went back and looked very closely.
  - throwawaylinux 3y ago
    It actually wasn't bad in its time, and it's not about the technology its the conventions. Those purple/blue borders were immediately recognizable as links. A lot of people today wouldn't understand it, but a lot of people wouldn't understand Shakespeare today either. It's just a product of its time.
    - irrational 3y ago
      I think the issue is, it wasn’t designed for mobile devices. The images are so tiny on my phone that I didn’t even see a colored border around them until someone mentioned them and I went back and looked again. I could just barely make out the border if I squinted.
    - antonvs 3y ago
      The issue is not whether someone knows the links are clickable or not. The issues were raised upthread: > They lay out the theft, public reaction, some art history, then not a single word on how it resloved, who actually took it and how it was found. The only hint was "an antique dealer got a letter". It's lazy to not include enough information to make a coherent article. Links in this context are for further information, not for basic information needed to understand the article.
      - zogrodea 3y ago
        Thar was the original complaint (and a valid one) at the start of this comment chain, but a further complaint was given about the UX, stating that it had terrible design as links were hard to recognise as links. "How did you even know that? That honestly would not have occurred to me. What terrible UX." That's why you're seeing discussion about UX right now. A different subject is in focus.
  - scbrg 3y ago
    This is why I never got into books. There's a few hundred words, and then they just stop! Sometimes in the middle of a sentence! I've never figured out where they hide the scroll wheel so I can get to the rest of the text. All media come with some conventions that people are simply expected to know. In the late 90-ies, a blueish border around an image was an indication that it was a clickable link. Nobody ever bothered pointing out that this image can be clicked. Perhaps lazy, I don't know, but then the entire web was guilty.
    - irrational 3y ago
      I’m on a phone. I honestly couldn’t even see the border around the image until I went back and looked super close again. It is very hard to make out. Probably because the images are so tiny.
      - scbrg 3y ago
        Sure. You're on a device that had its first incarnation launched seven years after this web page was made. The site was made in the era of 800x600 CRT monitors. There was no way in hell people could miss that border. The web designer didn't account for a world that wouldn't exist for another decade. Nobody expected people to run around with supercomputers in their pockets, equipped with screens with a pixel density more than an order of magnitude higher than was common place at the time, on a screen an order of magnitude smaller. How many people today take common usage patterns of the 2030-ies into account when they're designing things? Any web pages optimized to be consumed by AI:s running on quantum computers embedded in people's underwear? If not, what's their excuse?
    - antonvs 3y ago
      The issue is not whether someone knows the links are clickable or not. The issues were raised upthread: > They lay out the theft, public reaction, some art history, then not a single word on how it resloved, who actually took it and how it was found. The only hint was "an antique dealer got a letter". It's lazy to not include enough information to make a coherent article. Links in this context are for further information, not for basic information needed to understand the article.
croisillon 3y ago
(some of) those links are also as plain text on the left hand menu