Re: [Usability]List policy, usability leadership, mission statement [Was: "widget"]

[Maciej Stachowiak <mjs noisehavoc org>]

On 31Jul2002 12:44PM (+1000), Jeff Waugh wrote:
> <quote who="Luis Villa">
> 
> > His point was that all of us on this list have seen a lot of pointless,
> > wasteful uses of bits, but that this discussion may be the least useful
> > and most wasteful of them all.
> 
> It's disappointing that usability@ and the usability team is suffering from
> the same woes that the hitsquad did:
> 
>   - Clear, transparent leadership
>   
>   - Usability team mission statement
>   
>   - Lack of list policy and standards for behaviour, etc.
> 
> Until those are resolved, this list can be pretty much relegated to a high
> quality entropy source.

It seems to me, from the vantage point of a mostly-outsider who sees
only the results, not the process, that the GNOME usability group has
done a lot more concrete, useful things to improve usability than the
old hitsquad ever did. GNOME 2.0 is more consistent and more
streamlined than 1.x, and much of this can be credited to the
usability group, in my opinion.

It is true that this list sometimes has lengthy, vaguely pointless
discussions, but that is kind of invitable in the context of UI
discussions. Really, it can only be stopped by dictatorial fiat, and
even then it will tend to keep popping up.

I think the things you mention are all good, but have no opinion on
whether they exist right now or not.

Regards,

Maciej