Usability Techniques for Creators of ELiterature
julianne chatelain
release 0.9, march 2000
I prepared these pages for a chat session sponsored by the Electronic Literature Organization. Here are some questions to get us started.
•   To what extent can usability techniques help writers understand what readers experience?
•   Can I run a usability review myself or do I need special training?
•   This is quite a rosy picture you're painting here.
•   I don't have time to chat about this. Can you give me the elevator pitch version?
•   Let's say I try a usability review of my work. What can I personally expect to get out of it?
•   What I'd really like to do is get a sense of my readers' expectations.
•   What is an elevator pitch?
   To what extent can usability techniques help writers understand what readers experience?

I've found that one specific usability technique, observing while the reader experiences your work and "thinks out loud," can be very helpful.

Some folks assume the success of this depends on how articulate your reader is, but in fact, there are usability tricks that can make almost any reader feel comfortable enough to provide a useful reading-reaction. During the reading (or playing or ??) you can prompt the reader for specific information, and afterwards you can ask any questions you want.
   Can I run a usability review myself or do I need special training?

You can definitely apply some of our profession's tricks yourself, with a little practice.

Most importantly, you must have the willpower to move out of your strong creator role (because we know it takes immense determination to wrestle art out of the aether, whether or not your tools are trying to thwart your every move like some of them, naming no names, try to do) and into the enfolding accepting open deliriously-grateful-for-anything-the-reader-says data gathering role. This is what takes practice. Some creators find it comes more easily to them than others.

If you find you just can't do this, but are still interested in feedback, you can have a friend do it for you, and you can manage the reviews of the friend's work in exchange.

Try it now!
   This is quite a rosy picture you're painting here.

To be fair, lots of software/hardware "usability engineering" techniques don't exactly apply to literature. Task analyses and measuring time on task and similar techniques seem to miss the point of literary works (except for those such as Moulthrop's Hegirascope in which reading time is a key element). Readers of literature aren't usually trying to "get something done" in the mechanical sense, unless they're doing "assigned reading," with the completely wrong attitude I might add...

Information foraging studies and certain kinds of heuristic analysis have more application to creative work than the hard measuring approaches do. Those are, sadly enough for our purposes, also the techniques that take the most study and preparation.

So we're left with....am I being naive?...the assumption that readers of eliterature seek an experience above all, and are willing to let your work affect them, at least for the duration of the period that they spend with it. Usability-style observations can help you learn more about exactly what effects your work is having. What you do with the information is up to you as an artist. Once the review is over you should definitely duck back into a phone booth to reveal your strong creator powers.
   I don't have time to chat about this. Can you give me the elevator pitch version?

If you can, approximate the environment in which the reader usually reads. If not, at least get the reader comfortable. Use the magic incantations to lull the reader into the right mood, avoiding words of judgment or even discussion. Shut up while the reader reads, unless you have to (1) urge the reader to think out loud or (2) ask for more data.

To ask for data about links, for example, you might use UIE's link focus questions. Ask the reader, before s/he clicks anywhere, to hover above the link while you ask, "Why are you choosing this link?" Then the reader answers, and then s/he clicks. Then you ask, "Is this what you expected? Why or why not? How do you feel about what happened?" This might sound cumbersome but after only a few links you and the reader will get into a rhythm and together discover some astounding stuff.

Don't twitch or gasp no matter what happens.

Let the reader stop when s/he gets tired or feels the reading is done. Now you can debrief and discuss as much as you want, without worrying about muddying the reader's all-important initial responses.
   Let's say I try a usability review of my work. What can I personally expect to get out of it?

In my experiments with eliterature usability, some of the issues that come up are the same ones that used to come up in the old-style writing groups, as with any reader-reaction feedback. You meant to be ironic but the reader missed it. The brother's name sounded too much like the priest's so the reader (skimming, or perhaps distracted by the heavy foreshadowing) thought they were the same person, which gave the drowning scene a completely different flavor. Whatever...

The #1 new...I mean, unique to eliterature...issue that seems to come up is that readers can't tell the difference between content (in a wide variety of media) and mechanisms such as navigation. You add a beautiful flower as a design element, simply to set a mood, and they try to click on it. Or you meant them to click on each of the rose's petals to spiral through the sections and they completely missed this, and thought your piece had far fewer nodes than it actually has. At the end of the review, you can show them...

Of course, some art deliberately attempts to inspire feelings of frustration, vertigo, and so on. But even in that case it can be reassuring to know your work is having the effect you intended. Usability reviews with just a few readers can complement your guestbook entries, server logs, or reactions from public performances, providing a type of feedback none of the others can provide.

As eliterature gathers steam, more and more often readers will be alone with your work. No one telling them how it's "supposed" to work, no class to discuss it in...and that seductive browser Back button twinkling in the upper left corner of their screens...
   What I'd really like to do is get a sense of my readers' expectations.

So would we all! (I'm writing this stuff too.) Given the state of the web right now, the more a reader experiences online, the more his or her expectations change. Usability reviews are one of the better ways to discover and study readers' expectations - whether you personally prefer to fulfill them or outrage them.

I guess the elevator has gone through the roof by now...
   What is an elevator pitch?

Assume you were going up in an elevator and you had to explain (whatever) before the elevator opened and your querent (as the Tarot books call him or her) stepped out.
If you've read this far, I invite you to skim the more detailed pages:

Thank you to especially to Marjorie Luesebrink / M. D. Coverley, Nick Traenkner, Lawrence Clark, and Deena Larsen who allowed me to observe their application of usability techniques at HTWW events.




Copyright 2000 by Julianne Chatelain - last updated 11 October 2000
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