Burg Halle
Digital Editorial Course
un
usable
websites

A

[Research]

Accessiblity

B

C

Seifeldeen Elfouly

Click-Depth

Leonardo Alliata

Connectedness

D

[Research]

Dark Patterns

E

[Research]

Erwartungs-
konformität

F

Maria Neri

Frankensteining

G

H

I

J

K

L

Maria Neri

Legibility

Cam Van Pham

Legibility

M

[Research]

Misconvenience

N

Maria Neri

Negative Space

O

P

Hyeona Uhm

Personalization

Q

R

S

[Research]

Simplicity

T

Alexandra Vögtle

Tools

U

[Research]

Usability

[Research]

Use

V

W

X

Y

Z

123

Cam Van Pham

2-Second-Rule

For best usability visit this site on desktop, as most of the glossary entries aren’t optimized for mobile.

If a website is unusable, the content is inaccessible to the user. So usability is something every website needs in some form. There are certain usability rules that one should know, even if it is only to break them. But rather than checking off as many usability guidelines as possible, it could be more useful to ask: For whom and for what purposes should the website be usable?

About

Usability is defined by effectiveness, efficiency, and satisfaction. But what is the relationship between these aspects? Sometimes it can be more efficient for the sake of raising the user’s interest, to make a website more complicated. How much can we ask of the user? And what do they ask of us? Creating unusable websites can be a compromise or an exploration of the relationship between user and designer. It can be a concession that websites are never finished, that errors and bugs are always part of it.

At the same time, making a website “harder to use” affects different users to a different degree. Issues of accessibility, digital literacy, and inclusiveness have to be considered. Not everything has to be for everyone. But it should be an active decision, whether or not a user gets lost on a website, for whom the site is accessible and if we want to fix or feed the bugs.

The course (Un)Usable Websites aims to redefine usability by creating a digital glossary. This consist of small web experiments exploring different terms, which are designed and coded by the students.

Course Website:
www.unusable-websites.katharinanejdl.com

Participants

Alexandra Vögtle
Cam Van Pham
Hyeona Uhm
Leonardo Alliata
Maria Neri
Merle Häußler
Seifeldeen Elfouly

Digital Editorial Course
Burg Halle 2022
Instructor: Katharina Nejdl