Comments on: Minimalism and my ideal news experience

By: Readers want to control information overload « Diversions

Readers want to control information overload « Diversions — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 02:54:31 +0000

[...] is just part of what I was trying to get at earlier with my post on minimalism. Good to see it’s supported by user [...]

By: Andrew

Andrew — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 13:05:04 +0000

That’s an interesting point Ryan and I do think that the TimesPeople bar is a step toward the right direction. However, it’s still relying upon the user to understand what it is and to remember to click that Recommend button.

For it to really take flight I think that it’d have to become a feature that relies only upon the initial user action. In other words, I think a recommendation engine would be far more powerful if after the initial “Yes I would like to enable this feature” it did all of the heavy lifting by indexing content, metadata, etc. and automatically used that to recommend other stories.

Just my take though, Like you said, your mileage may vary, and if the TimesPeople feature works for you than more power to you.

By: Ryan Sholin

Ryan Sholin — Mon, 10 Aug 2009 12:36:16 +0000

From the YMMV file, I actually find the NYTimes.com homepage a pleasant place to hang out and scroll around. Lately, of course, I’m drawn to my TimesPeople bar across the top, so rather than scan the page looking for something interesting, I just pop open the bar and scroll through recommendations from my friends there. It only takes seconds, and I’m deeper into the site, reading more of a story than I would if I had just clicked a headline on the homepage without the recommendation.

Interesting: I think I’m also reading deeper into the story because I want to know if I should mash that Recommend button myself.