Google's new "batshit crazy" UX

by MichaelJW • 14 years ago

72 49 14 years ago

jkohlbach• 14 years ago

I sooooo agree.

Although I rarely, if ever click on the logo in gmail, I do believe in the "logo should be a link to the root" convention. Surely that's just UI design 101, right?

The twitter one you mentioned in the article drives me super crazy as well.

archangel_one• 14 years ago

Especially when it used to do it; this certainly caught me by surprise when they made the change.

alexyoung• 14 years ago

Yeah, I consistently forget the fact that Twitter details link is there as well, even though I've had to look for it a few times.

taeric• 14 years ago

The thing that amuses me is it took me a while to find the equivalent of the keyboard shortcut "gh" (go home). I think I finally found if you expand the gmail logo and click gmail under that, it does what I wanted.

I am deeply grateful for the fact that they have not messed with the keyboard shortcuts yet.

zerostar07• 14 years ago

My biggest gripe is that they completely removed the link to "Scholar" from the search menu options, making my omnibar so less useful, and there's no option to reenable it.

JonnieCache• 14 years ago

What is also annoying is when the logo on a company/product's blog goes to the blog index rather than the homepage of the company, leaving me to either manually edit the url or look for the link which is always in a different place with different text.

If your blog exists to drive traffic to your product, why would you not link that big logo in the top left to the product page?

This is second in annoyance only to company blogs that don't have a tagline explaining wtf the product is, leaving me baffled when I click though from here or wherever. Thankfully people seem to have learned from this and you don't often end up dumped, contextless into the middle of some domain-specific screed any more.

davidu2• 14 years ago

I've never understood how any company could let this happen and yet we see it constantly. Perhaps it's because Wordpress or TypePad or Posterous don't let them change the link at the top, but I doubt it.

It definitely ranks as one of the most common Web 101 mistakes out there.

makeramen• 14 years ago

...although sometimes it takes a little batshit crazy to break convention and change things for the better. Really, only time will tell...

I keep getting reminded of Zuckerberg's Startup School interview (http://www.justin.tv/startupschool/b/298808358) where he talks about moving equally too fast and too slow or as Jessica called it "a willingness to break things."

On one hand, I'm slightly frustrated at all these weird changes these established companies are making; but on the other hand I'm excited to see them messing with things that seem so core to their product, it shows that they're still willing to experiment and not getting too comfortable (which I think is more dangerous).

phpnode2• 14 years ago

this is not a change for the better, what possible advantage does it offer?

aevodor2• 14 years ago

With the "Kennedy" UI (codename for the recent cross-product redesign), many Google properties had their own logo replaced by a plain Google one. Now, to differentiate between products such as Google Voice, a red-colored product name is displayed right below the Google logo.

Also, when you do a Google search, the product name is now always "Search", even when you started a search in Google News / Images / Videos / Shopping / Books / Places / Blogs / Discussions / Applications / Recipes or Patentes.

With Kennedy, Google has actually reached its goal of becoming a 'universal search engine' and it can finally show a single interface for (almost) all types of queries (except for Maps, Flights and search for personal/private items like email and documents).

You can still access the specific homepages of Google Images and Google News, but Google is slowly convincing users to initiate all their searches from google.com, without thinking about which engine to use. Thus, every search from news.google.com redirects to classic google.com, with the "news" filter activated.

For personal searches (eg Gmail, Reader, Docs, Voice), Google hasn't completely switched to the "filtered results interface". Most of those apps need their own homepage with a list of items (messages, contacts, documents, voice messages, top stories, feed items). However: - most of them have switched to the plain Google logo with the red-colored product title. You can stay in the app or refresh the item list by clicking on the product title instead of the Google logo, which would lead you to the unexpected Google homepage; - most of those homepage (or "item lists") could be merged with Google+ and the new notification bar on google.com, so you could access all your personal things from a classic search. For social results, it's working pretty well since Google Plus Your World: all social items are shown on-top of other results in a classic search. Soon, every new email, documents update or voice message could appear in the notification bar and search results (just like social items): no need to go to mail.google.com, docs.google.com or voice.google.com.

Now (to answer your question), what result do you expect from a click on the Google logo in Gmail? - To go to you inbox? No, that should be the result of a click on the product title, Gmail. - to go to the Google homepage? No, you're not familiar enough with Kennedy navigation.

So my guess is that Google is trying everything to get you to click on products' title to go to/refresh its homepage. Meanwhile, they prevent you from clicking on the Google logo because you wouldn't understand (yet) why you would be redirected to google.com from Gmail.

If this (presumed) strategy work, you would always go to google.com to interact with any kind of products/items, without having to "navigate". Just search Google or browse your notification stream, whatever the type of content (message, documents, web pages...) and its context (personal, social, public...).

vibrunazo2• 14 years ago

At least on google+ they didn't just remove the ability to reload. They replaced it with the ability to go back to the top of your stream without reloading everything.

Since google+ already loads new posts automatically. This has the same practical effect as before in most cases. But with the advantage of faster loading since it doesn't reload everything because it doesn't need to.

dendory• 14 years ago

How does removing a link help things? It's not like that link used real estate on the page.

davidw• 14 years ago

I always clicked on the gmail logo, and it drives me batty that they changed it. It's just an easier target for the mouse/my eyes than that little reload button, or, even worse, the inbox link.

MichaelJW• 14 years ago

Remind's me of Fitts's Law: http://particletree.com/features/visualizing-fittss-law/

ajarmoniuk• 14 years ago

BTW, does anyone know how to go the next page after the UI change? Buttons just vanished and one can only see up to 50 messages.

EDIT: one has to click on "1-25 of many" and the buttons to change pages appear. Does anyone find it intuitive?

funthree• 14 years ago

Some reasoning: It gets (read:forces) you to use the top bar. For people that always ignored the topbar before; they cannot now. So these users, as well as everyone else who used it only sporadically, are now using it always and thus are more likely to investigate and use other links/apps on the topbar now. These of course include all of the other google services. It's like herding cattle.

jcfrei• 14 years ago

this seems to me as the most plausible explanation. I reckon the average user might use one or two more google products: maps and gmail. he probably accesses gmail via gmail.com and maps via maps.google.com and never even cared about the black top bar.

EDIT: interesting change: on my local google.ch, the top left google icon is clickable but no hover (hand) icon appears.

patio11• 14 years ago

I reckon the average user might use one or two more google products: maps and gmail. he probably accesses gmail via gmail.com and maps via maps.google.com

One has a very... unique experience as to who an average user is if one believes the average user understands subdomains. (Or, increasingly, anything that goes into a URL box other than a search term which may occasionally have a .com in it due to legacy branding.)

bostonvaulter2• 14 years ago

They might even use googlemaps.com instead of maps.google.com

hamletdrc4• 14 years ago

Complaining about broken website conventions while simultaneously breaking them yourself is either ironic or hypocritical, depending on your mood.

The author's webpage has a "x Kudos" vibrating image on the right and side, and if you hover over the image then the page sends a "like" HTTP message to the server. So now hovering my mouse over an element just had me like the author's page. That is way worse than a link with a broken image.

ward• 14 years ago

Also odd: You can keep giving "kudos", refresh the page and repeat, the counter doesn't mind. Can't seem to take your vote(s) away though.

ugh• 14 years ago

That seems kinda’ irrelevant, you know, him not being Google and all. He gets to do batshit crazy things because it’s just his own small website. Batshit crazy things are what make personal websites fun. That doesn’t mean Google should do them, too.

diminish• 14 years ago

the web site appears to be apple-ly designed; however has a lot of design flaws and is disturbing somehow. and the author has weird articles to prove there is a perfect human hand size to hold phones etc etc. ohh we live in the "design ages" dont we....

gjuggler• 14 years ago

I think the logo clicking decision isn't crazy. My interpretation is that Google is "un-training" users from using this valuable piece of screen real estate for a useless no-op function, in anticipation of putting a more useful function in its place.

Does anyone remember a few weeks back, when Google tested a "new way to browse Google's services"? They turned the logo into a button, producing a drop-down menu of services to navigate to.

My guess is that they found the new logo-button didn't work well, mainly because so many users saw the logo as a big button which refreshed the page or went to the inbox.

At the risk of making predictions, I'd guess this recent change is a grace period, designed to get us all used to using other buttons for reaching the inbox. And once people no longer instinctively click the logo-button, they'll introduce the new navigation which makes better use of that valuable screen space.

I could very well be way off the mark here... but it seems pretty clever to me, TBH.

TeMPOraL• 14 years ago

> My interpretation is that Google is "un-training" users from using this valuable piece of screen real estate for a useless no-op function, (...)

It's not an useless no-op function. By going to default/main page of the service it reverts you to a known state, simplifying navigation and enhancing user confidence. I personally rely on this behaviour of main logos and get terribly annoyed if someone breaks my expectation (which, rarely, happens).

quattrofan• 14 years ago

I've got the new Gmail design, when I click the logo it goes back to the Inbox regardless of where I am... so not sure I understand the problem?

jakeonthemove• 14 years ago

Hmm, I NEVER click on a logo to go to the home page... don't know why, I just look for a home button or type the address in the address bar. The logo is just there...

ctdonath• 14 years ago

Working at a large company, I was once informed that the company logo should, on a dynamic user interface, do exactly nothing. Clicking on it was not to go home or help. Much as I disagreed, the powers that be dictated otherwise.

Could be similar reasoning here: lawyers or marketing or some such got involved.

silon3• 14 years ago

It is fine, if it refreshes the current context (in Gmail inbox, for example).

In Gmail, the search bar next to it searches Gmail by default, so that would be consistent and expected. There will be much resistance if that bar starts searching other things.

Permit• 14 years ago

When I click the logo, it takes me back to the Google Homepage. I've refreshed my cache a number of times. Perhaps they've reverted back?

My mouse cursor does not change from default when I hover over it, though.

pdkp• 14 years ago

I think it is only disabled on certain interior pages.

I just logged in and in GMail, clicking on the Google Icon didn't do anything. Worked the same on a few other pages I tried.

Perhaps they haven't rolled out the changes to all pages yet, but seems inconsistent to only disable it on certain interior pages...

lwhi• 14 years ago

When you don't want to be known as 'just a search company' how are you going to tackle that?

Provide a direct link your premier / 'home' product via your logo (reinforcing the idea that you're a one-product company), or encourage users to consider the full range of products by making them choose the one they're most interested in?

It seems sensible to me; there's nothing 'batshit crazy' about it.

redwood2• 14 years ago

I think the bigger problem with Google's UI is that the top links to Google's top-level categories do not keep your search terms. Only the left links do... In other words if I search the web for "Afghanistan" and then realize I actually want news article search results, if I click "News" at the top I have to re-type "Afghanistan". This is terrible.

e.g. from http://www.google.com/#hl=en&gs_nf=1&qe=YWZnaGFuaQ&#...

Link to left: http://www.google.com/search?q=afghanistan&hl=en&biw...

Link at top: http://news.google.com/nwshp?hl=en&tab=wn

Achshar• 14 years ago

But it does work for images, maps and youtube.

redwood2• 14 years ago

Hmm good point, perhaps the news issue is a bug! Nevertheless even more bizarre tho less severe

moocow01• 14 years ago

That functionality -- especially in regard to the news tab -- drives me nuts. Over and over I click the top news tab forgetting I have to click the link on the side and lose the current context of my search.

At first I just assumed it was a bug since the other tabs kept the context of the search. Then after a week of the same, I looked into how to flag the issue so it could be fixed and low and behold I found it was a product feature (or non-feature).

Its such a strange UX decision that I have to assume that it is driven by revenue generation or some other metric rather than good user experience.

davidu2• 14 years ago

I've always assumed the Google News link losing state was a bug. It's a tab bar, and it used to keep state. Now it doesn't.

I suppose they had to do it this way or nobody would ever really see the Google news homepage (as if that matters).

iopuy• 14 years ago

I cannot agree more. Has it always been like this or is this a recent change? I thought I remembered a time in which clicking "News" did keep your old search term but I cannot be sure. In any case, this behavior has been a bane to me since I discovered it.

streptomycin• 14 years ago

I've noticed that the past couple months or so. It used to correctly keep your search term across categories.

doah78• 14 years ago

I thought I was the only one that this change annoyed the hell out of.

gravitronic• 14 years ago

Hyperbolic link,

Half of content is a quote,

This is just blog spam.

Xion• 14 years ago

The first time I needed a permalink to particular tweet, I spent good five minutes looking around for it. Only accidentally I noticed that the timestamp has it, and it didn't strike me as obvious at all.

Having a link which clearly says 'Details' seems much more intuitive in this case. And even if it was indeed Twitter who has started this pattern of linkifying timestamps, now it could be considered as them backing off from confusing UX decision that many sites parroted.

vibrunazo2• 14 years ago

The article is missing an important detail. They didn't just remove the ability to reload. They replaced it with the ability to go back to the top of your stream without reloading everything. (on g+ at least)

Since google+ already loads new posts automatically. In practice this will do almost the same as before, but with less waiting on the client side. Sounds like a smart design choice imo.

agscala• 14 years ago

If that's the case, that makes sense on google+. On GMail though, I personally am used to clicking on the logo to refresh my inbox. Now I have to click on the navigation tab "inbox" to do that. It isn't a big deal really, but I find it odd to completely rip out the previous action only to replace it with no action at all.

AznHisoka• 14 years ago

The most annoying part of Google's UI is changing email settings inside Gmail, and I know I'm not alone in this... On the top right, there's a link for your name, a link for your avatar, and THEN below those the most important one you probably want (that wheel icon): the email settings link. So annoying!

I don't care about changing my Google Plus or account settings if I'm in Gmail. I wanna set up filters or setup aliases. Why is the email settings link not prominently featured? I always end up clicking the wrong link when I want to change email settings. Also, don't get me started on creating a filter. That used to be 1-click and DONE in the old settings, now it's like finding Waldo. Ridiculous.

joeyh• 14 years ago

I had a gift card to burn on googlestore.com last evening. Noticed pages like this one http://imgur.com/6Y1nO which is apparently a failed search for a category, that simulantaneously has 0 matches and six pages. Same thing happens when I click on the big Youtube merch logo at the top of all pages there.

I was clicking around my google profile today (to remove history etc) and found broken links to google products there.

I remember when it was simple and perfect..

ctb9• 14 years ago

This also drove my crazy.

My Temporary Fix: revert to the old school GMail, and select the theme "Preview (dense)".

Google's new "batshit crazy" UX

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