End of Web Design

Jakob Nielsen · 22 Jul 2000

Jakob Nielsen did not write this page.

Every claim below was made in this piece, quoted word for word and numbered in the order the piece makes them, so you can read it there rather than take our word for it. The sentence above each quote is our reading of the claim, not their wording. Each quote was checked against a stored copy of the page at build time; where the two differ, the quote is the fact.

Our reading
Users spend most of their time on other sites, so they prefer yours to work the same way as the sites they already know.
Mental modelConventions (Jakob's law)

Their wordsUsers spend most of their time on other sites. This means that users prefer your site to work the same way as all the other sites they already know.
Our reading
A feature that works the same everywhere needs no teaching: a first-time visitor can use it by transferring what they learned on other sites.
Mental modelConventions (Jakob's law)

Their wordsOn the contrary, a first-time visitor to a site will be able to use expert features without having to learn the site because he or she can transfer learning from other sites.

Keep reading

The other pieces are the ones whose claims are worded most like this one's. That measures language, not agreement: they may argue the opposite.