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The example with the circles is a little misleading. The first task is find the circle, whereas the second task is find the red object, since this is the circle

The example with the circles is a little misleading. The first task is find the circle, whereas the second task is find the red object, since this is the circle. That said, I totally agree with the notion that the color channel can be used in different ways during different tasks. For example, when reviewing a book, highlighting is a useful way to utilize the color channel. But what percent of the time do we spend re-reading text versus reading it the first time? I actually created a startup around and idea I had that makes better use of color during the first reading. [1] My approach improves visual tracking and attention by using subtle color gradients that wrap from the end of one line to the beginning of the next. 1: http://www.beelinereader.com http://www.beelinereader.com

Qwertious 3y ago
"Subtle" Not on the website it isn't.
- gnicholas 3y ago
  You’re right that on the website I use the ‘bright’ color scheme, to make it as obvious as possible what’s happening. The color options within the tools are more subtle (darker red, in particular).
zizee 3y ago
I looked at your marketing. Two bits of feedback: 1. I don't understand how these colour gradients are meant to help. Explain it; 2. Formatting on mobile (Firefox android) is not great.
- gnicholas 3y ago
  Appreciate this. I’m guessing that for you the colors don’t help? For most people that find the colors helpful, it’s pretty immediately apparent.
  - kstenerud 3y ago
    I get the opposite effect. The shifting colors slow me down because I'm expecting them to have some special significance. Once I force myself to ignore the colors, I can read at almost normal speed again (although it takes extra concentration). I wouldn't want to read a whole page like this.
    - Nevermark 3y ago
      Have you ever read a lot of small-font wide-margin text and had momentary trouble with seamlessly traversing focus from the end of one line to the start of the correct next line? I have, and suspect a lot of people have. Very minor issue, but the fact it happens suggests there is some small cognitive load that could be alleviated in general. I do suspect that the optimal type of visual affordance may vary from person to person.
sp332 3y ago
The point is to have the computer highlight the circle in red. That makes fun ndint the circle easier.
Semaphor 3y ago
Is this supposed to help focus and get deeper understanding of long texts? Because it’s slowing me way down, changing my extremely fast reading mode that often looks forward a bit for improved context, to a more word-by-word style of reading.
- gnicholas 3y ago
  Yeah, it's not for skimming — more for 'close reading'. It's definitely not for people who speed-read/skim by moving vertically down the page. But it can speed up close reading (where you're reading every word), and it also turns out to be helpful for certain learning disabilities (dyslexia, ADHD, etc).
  - Terretta 3y ago
    The person you're replying to is not describing skimming, they're describing reading instead of "sounding it out". Your technique seems able to help people who likely learned to read with a ruler hiding upcoming lines, or with a finger pointing at the word they say aloud, and people who read with subvocalization. Such readers generally process text at not much higher rates than speech, and often prefer audio books or YouTube which add visuals or emotion since reading holds no particular advantage. Other readers take in chunks of meaning, mapping from word form sequences to concepts without going through phonics. It's not skimming. (It's possible it's the same pathway but subconscious instead of aware of the tracking and subvocalization.) These readers can still play back the individual words, with the same recall accuracy as the word by word or sound by sound readers. For these folks, audio books and YouTube are an excruciatingly slow way to transfer information. These faster readers are "close reading", not skimming. They are reading every word, but mapping word shapes into phrases at a time (perhaps similar to how LLMs can correctly answer completely typo-garbled questions). The difference between these methods of reading is at least 4x and often 10x or more speed with the same or better concept learning and recall. Your method is clearly (pun intended) able to assist those who would 'need' the ruler or fingertip to go sound by sound or word by word, with crossing end of line to start of next. (Likely similar reasons some folks read web pages successively highlighting lines with their mouse; your approach would likely help them too.) But as you're seeing in these comments, it generally brings sequence absorbers to a crashing slowdown.
leptons 3y ago
>The example with the circles is a little misleading. The first task is find the circle, whereas the second task is find the red object, since this is the circle. I think you completely missed the point of the square/circle example. The red circle is just a circle with syntax highlighting. The task is still to find the circle, but you are supposed to know in advance that the syntax highlight color for "a circle" is red. The first circle is shown without syntax highlighting, the second circle is shown with syntax highlighting. "Square" and "circle" is the syntax, red is the highlighting. The point of the first example is to show how much easier it is to spot the circle when it takes advantage of syntax highlighting. It's a very good example of why syntax highlighting helps with these kinds of tasks. The squares could be blue, black, yellow or white and it would still be easier to spot the circle because it's highlighted in red. It doesn't even matter what color the circle was highlighted with, so long as it's different than the syntax highlighting of the squares.
sshine 3y ago
The colours are completely distracting me. My mind keeps trying to associate meaning with why some words are highlighted and others are not. Since there is no particular reason, my mind came up with an alternation in recital: redder words are spoken more loudly, and bluer words are spoken with a higher pitch. Somehow, it is still easier to listen to an oscillating rollercoaster of an internal monologue than constantly seeking a reason behind the highlights. Maybe the colours help if a text is really boring.
arccy 3y ago
definitely forces you to slow down and try to read the words (and end up feeling annoyed it didn't highlight importance as you'd usually expect), but i kept getting 2000s / 2010s word art and powerpoint effects vibes from the gradients.

Qwertious 3y ago

"Subtle" Not on the website it isn't.

gnicholas 3y ago
You’re right that on the website I use the ‘bright’ color scheme, to make it as obvious as possible what’s happening. The color options within the tools are more subtle (darker red, in particular).

zizee 3y ago

I looked at your marketing. Two bits of feedback: 1. I don't understand how these colour gradients are meant to help. Explain it; 2. Formatting on mobile (Firefox android) is not great.

gnicholas 3y ago
Appreciate this. I’m guessing that for you the colors don’t help? For most people that find the colors helpful, it’s pretty immediately apparent.
- kstenerud 3y ago
  I get the opposite effect. The shifting colors slow me down because I'm expecting them to have some special significance. Once I force myself to ignore the colors, I can read at almost normal speed again (although it takes extra concentration). I wouldn't want to read a whole page like this.
  - Nevermark 3y ago
    Have you ever read a lot of small-font wide-margin text and had momentary trouble with seamlessly traversing focus from the end of one line to the start of the correct next line? I have, and suspect a lot of people have. Very minor issue, but the fact it happens suggests there is some small cognitive load that could be alleviated in general. I do suspect that the optimal type of visual affordance may vary from person to person.

sp332 3y ago

The point is to have the computer highlight the circle in red. That makes fun ndint the circle easier.

Semaphor 3y ago

Is this supposed to help focus and get deeper understanding of long texts? Because it’s slowing me way down, changing my extremely fast reading mode that often looks forward a bit for improved context, to a more word-by-word style of reading.

gnicholas 3y ago
Yeah, it's not for skimming — more for 'close reading'. It's definitely not for people who speed-read/skim by moving vertically down the page. But it can speed up close reading (where you're reading every word), and it also turns out to be helpful for certain learning disabilities (dyslexia, ADHD, etc).
- Terretta 3y ago
  The person you're replying to is not describing skimming, they're describing reading instead of "sounding it out". Your technique seems able to help people who likely learned to read with a ruler hiding upcoming lines, or with a finger pointing at the word they say aloud, and people who read with subvocalization. Such readers generally process text at not much higher rates than speech, and often prefer audio books or YouTube which add visuals or emotion since reading holds no particular advantage. Other readers take in chunks of meaning, mapping from word form sequences to concepts without going through phonics. It's not skimming. (It's possible it's the same pathway but subconscious instead of aware of the tracking and subvocalization.) These readers can still play back the individual words, with the same recall accuracy as the word by word or sound by sound readers. For these folks, audio books and YouTube are an excruciatingly slow way to transfer information. These faster readers are "close reading", not skimming. They are reading every word, but mapping word shapes into phrases at a time (perhaps similar to how LLMs can correctly answer completely typo-garbled questions). The difference between these methods of reading is at least 4x and often 10x or more speed with the same or better concept learning and recall. Your method is clearly (pun intended) able to assist those who would 'need' the ruler or fingertip to go sound by sound or word by word, with crossing end of line to start of next. (Likely similar reasons some folks read web pages successively highlighting lines with their mouse; your approach would likely help them too.) But as you're seeing in these comments, it generally brings sequence absorbers to a crashing slowdown.

leptons 3y ago

>The example with the circles is a little misleading. The first task is find the circle, whereas the second task is find the red object, since this is the circle. I think you completely missed the point of the square/circle example. The red circle is just a circle with syntax highlighting. The task is still to find the circle, but you are supposed to know in advance that the syntax highlight color for "a circle" is red. The first circle is shown without syntax highlighting, the second circle is shown with syntax highlighting. "Square" and "circle" is the syntax, red is the highlighting. The point of the first example is to show how much easier it is to spot the circle when it takes advantage of syntax highlighting. It's a very good example of why syntax highlighting helps with these kinds of tasks. The squares could be blue, black, yellow or white and it would still be easier to spot the circle because it's highlighted in red. It doesn't even matter what color the circle was highlighted with, so long as it's different than the syntax highlighting of the squares.

sshine 3y ago

The colours are completely distracting me. My mind keeps trying to associate meaning with why some words are highlighted and others are not. Since there is no particular reason, my mind came up with an alternation in recital: redder words are spoken more loudly, and bluer words are spoken with a higher pitch. Somehow, it is still easier to listen to an oscillating rollercoaster of an internal monologue than constantly seeking a reason behind the highlights. Maybe the colours help if a text is really boring.

arccy 3y ago

definitely forces you to slow down and try to read the words (and end up feeling annoyed it didn't highlight importance as you'd usually expect), but i kept getting 2000s / 2010s word art and powerpoint effects vibes from the gradients.