Janey Lee

Our company, Hanee Designs, is all about usability. We try really hard to put ourselves in the shoes of a website visitor to create an easy to use, deceptively simple interface for all websites, small and large. Usually, our vision is modified by the client which can compromise usability.. but I like to think that the overall product is still usable as well as good looking!

When I crawl the web, I can instantly tell which sites are designed with the end-user in mind.. and which are not. And then there are sites just just don’t seem to have any quality assurance. They seem to be deployed without testing — and clearly, the staff are not using the site and finding/fixing bugs. The worst offenders seem to be some of the most popular sites on the internet? My most hated example? Facebook. I despise Facebook. First, I don’t even understand what it is for. If I am connected to a friend via e-mail, instant messenger, phone, SMS.. then why do I need to send them messages via Facebook? Secondly, If I haven’t communicated with you since we were 12 years old, then are we really “friends”? Sometimes is cool to reconnect with someone from your past, but it creeps me out how people who HATED me in high school now want to friend me on Facebook. Seriously, go away. And last, but not least, who programmed this piece of crap? Half them time I click on something, I get an error message. And the user-designed/programmed apps only make the problem worse. I literally feel like pulling my hair out everytime I try to do something on Facebook. WHY do people like this? Honestly, let me know!

Next on my hitlist — Linked in. I feel transported back to 1999 when I use this site. It seems like I am on a 56k modem again. I understand if they are behind in updating their networks to provide a faster site, but the programing and design doesn’t help. Have these people heard of AJAX? Or checkboxes? It shouldn’t take so many clicks to find and add a contact. In my opinion, Linked in shouldn’t be a time suck like Facebook, MySpace etc. The site could really be streamlined to help busy professionals keep up to date with contacts. Anyway, I am on LinkedIn and am hoping to utilize it more in 2009. So if you are on LinkedIn, please add me. Thank you!