Accessibility rant

[Daniel R. Tobias]

Certain internet users who frequent a site and don't actually bookmark it but
do know the web address for some reason won't actually type in
"www.whatever.com". Ever. Instead they go to a SE and search for "whatever.com"
(or just the whatever part), and click on the top listings.

I don't know an exact % of surfers who do this, but check your logs for SE
keywords containing your actual address.

I've observed, from my own logs, plenty of hits through search engines
from people typing -- not MY address, but some other address that I
happen to mention in the course of my site. Generally it's in my domain
name site, where I'll write something about how stupid I think some
corporation is for using such an idiotic domain name as
WhateverStupidUnnecessaryDomainNameTheyreUsing.com, and when I check my
logs months later there'll be several hits a day to people typing that
domain name, where it turns out my site is better-indexed than the
actual corporate site at that address.

 

[Daniel R. Tobias]

Why can't commericial writers just say "Go to www.example.com"? What's so
difficult about saying the correct thing?

Because ads are written by Marketing Types, and, almost by definition,
Marketing Types are drooling morons. I think a frontal lobotomy is one
of the prerequisites to a degree in marketing.

 

[SeeSchloss]

"Daniel R. Tobias" a écrit :

Speak for yourself... whenever I imagine myself going to a Web
site, it's naturally with my preferred browser, Mozilla.

Of course (FireBird for me) but since we were speaking of
the typical user who can't distinguish between 'click on'
and 'go to', Internet Explorer was the most appropriated
browser in this sentence.

 

[Adrienne]

You are not typical. The people in this forum are not typical web
users.


Most people? Most people? You are trying to think like a typical user,
but keep referring to your personal useage. You are not typical. You
have a better knowledge of how the web works. You distinguish between
"go to" and "click on" They don't.

Actually, that's not true.

Sometimes, people take things literally. If I say "go to www.example.com"
they can look at their browser and see the "Go" button by the address bar
(I'm talking about IE here), so they can figure out to type something there
and GO. However, if I were to say "click on www.example.com" they are
looking at their browser trying to figure out where to click.

I have tutored some people, and they have been confused by something that
said "click on" instead of "go to", in a magazine ad, whatever. These are
the same people who ask where the "any key" is.

 

[Toby A Inkster]

Most people? Most people? You are trying to think like a typical user,
but keep referring to your personal useage. You are not typical. You
have a better knowledge of how the web works. You distinguish between
"go to" and "click on" They don't.

Last night I clicked on the pub for a couple of pints. When it was time to
click back home I decided to walk -- big mistake! It took ages to get back
and by that time I was busting to click on the toilet. After that I got
ready to click on bed. As soon as my head hit the pillow I clicked
straight on sleep.

Yeah, you're right. "Click on" and "go to" are synonymous.

 

[William Tasso]

I just have to say this.

Today I heard a commerical on the radio that said "Click on
www.example.com" ...

Why can't commericial writers just say "Go to www.example.com"?
What's so difficult about saying the correct thing?

local radio round here often suggests their listeners "send an email to
www.example.com"

 

[John C]

local radio round here often suggests their listeners "send an email to
www.example.com"

I frequently hear/see "Visit our website www.oursite.com and click on
[whatever]." The [whatever] is often a link to another site, so that
"clicking on" and "going to" are basically synonymous.

In a world where nobody knows whether their dog should lay down or lie
down, I don't think clicking on or going to really matters much.

 

[=?iso-8859-1?Q?brucie?=]

local radio round here often suggests their listeners "send an email to
www.example.com"

i remember seeing a pic a few years ago of a florists van (i think)
with "visit our website:[aol email address]" on the side. i wouldn't
be surprised if the pic was genuine.

 

[Steve Pugh]

Today I heard a commerical on the radio that said "Click on
www.example.com" (don't remember the name of the real company), and I
thought to myself, how the Hell is someone supposed to click on something
on the radio?

The usage that seems to have infected UK advertising lingo is "Click
onto/on to ..." which is an even uglier variation.

Steve

 

[Daniel R. Tobias]

local radio round here often suggests their listeners "send an email to
www.example.com"

i remember seeing a pic a few years ago of a florists van (i think)
with "visit our website:[aol email address]" on the side. i wouldn't
be surprised if the pic was genuine.

A van that I used to see a lot around where I live had the dubious
address on its side, for some sort of business:

[email protected]

I don't know if they intended this to represent their Web address or
their e-mail address, but it seems dubious as an actual functional
address for either. (Does AOL permit screen names with dots in them so
somebody could actually get "[email protected]" as their address?)

At work, I constantly have to deal with idiot customers who have the
insane compulsion to prefix any e-mail address with "www.", like they
are unclear on the concept of the difference between Web and e-mail
addressing. That's true of their typing their own e-mail address into
an online form (if their address is (e-mail address removed) they'll type
[email protected], so that our mail to them bounces; often they'll
mangle it further like by omitting the .com part, just saying
www.SomeLuser@aol) and their typing anybody else's address for outbound
mail; if they're told to write to (e-mail address removed), they'll
type [email protected] instead (often misspelling
"customer" and/or "service" as well). I notice because I get the
wildcard redirects for mail to unknown addresses at various work-related
domains, and end up having to forward the mail to the place it would
have gone directly if the luser had typed the address right in the first
place.

 

[Nicolai P. Zwar]

Adrienne wrote:

Why can't commericial writers just say "Go to www.example.com"? What's so
difficult about saying the correct thing?

When has advertising ever been about saying the correct thing?

 

[Art Sackett]

FTR I don't see myself clicking on things, either. I don't visualize
anything at all when the television or radio says "click on www dot
something dot com". Instead, I tend to yell at the device issuing the
offensively stupid suggestion.

You are not typical. The people in this forum are not typical web
users.

It's not possible to know how typical or atypical one of us might be
without observing our usage patterns.

You are not typical. You
have a better knowledge of how the web works. You distinguish between
"go to" and "click on" They don't.

"Click on" implies that one has the means to activate an icon or
hyperlink at the moment.

I have spent many hours of my life tutoring new users, so I'm speaking
from experience here. If you tell a user to click on something, he will
look for that something in his browser window, and then on his desktop.
I've never seen a user, when told to click on something, choose to
enter text into the location input ("bar") of his browser.

"Click on" in the context of this discussion is marketdroid blather.
The fact that it's ubiquitous doesn't make it right -- any more than
referring to crackers as hackers makes that usage right. If your news
reader will allow you to, click on the following URL:

http://www.dilbert.com/comics/dilbert/archive/dilbert-20030927.html

 

[Mark Jones]

FTR I don't see myself clicking on things, either. I don't visualize
anything at all when the television or radio says "click on www dot
something dot com". Instead, I tend to yell at the device issuing the
offensively stupid suggestion.


It's not possible to know how typical or atypical one of us might be
without observing our usage patterns.

I hope you are atypical if you yell at the TV for something
that does not matter.

 

[Whitecrest]

But how can you see yourself clicking on a website ??
You imagine the site opened in Internet Explorer, and
yourself randomly clicking on the page ??

Exactly. You can't see anything when listening to a radio ad, so why do
they make elaborate setups for commercials? Because the listener is
using his or her "imagination" to fill in the blanks. So when they hear
"just click on www.site.com" the use their "imagination" and see them
selves clicking on link to the site.

 

[Whitecrest]

FTR I don't see myself clicking on things, either. I don't visualize
anything at all when the television or radio says "click on www dot
something dot com". Instead, I tend to yell at the device issuing the
offensively stupid suggestion.

You need therapy...

It's not possible to know how typical or atypical one of us might be
without observing our usage patterns.

Actually from reading the posts and observing you can tell that the
majority here are not your typical web users.

"Click on" implies that one has the means to activate an icon or
hyperlink at the moment.

I have spent many hours of my life tutoring new users, so I'm speaking
from experience here.

Then you are familiar with telling them the difference between click and
click click....

"Click on" in the context of this discussion is marketdroid blather.
Exactly

The fact that it's ubiquitous doesn't make it right -- any more than
referring to crackers as hackers makes that usage right. If your news
reader will allow you to, click on the following URL:

And it does not make it wrong either.

 

[PeterMcC]

Because ads are written by Marketing Types, and, almost by definition,
Marketing Types are drooling morons. I think a frontal lobotomy is
one of the prerequisites to a degree in marketing.

Just a small niggle - Friday, my daughter handed in her dissertation - the
last piece of work for her marketing MA after a year of intense work during
which she has come to the perspective that her degree will be best used in
the field of consumer rights. I can't speak for the rest of them but I know
of one who isn't a drooling moron.

And now that I've written it, I'm not that happy about "drooling moron"...
Is it "drooling", the inability to swallow all the saliva that one produces,
as sometimes occurs in stroke victims amongst others, or "moron", someone
with a devastating mental incapacity, that you think makes the phrase a
useful insult?

 

[kchayka]

Exactly. You can't see anything when listening to a radio ad, so why do
they make elaborate setups for commercials? Because the listener is
using his or her "imagination" to fill in the blanks. So when they hear
"just click on www.site.com" the use their "imagination" and see them
selves clicking on link to the site.

But where did that link come from in the first place? Or is it expected
to somehow just magically appear on their home page?

 

[Whitecrest]

But where did that link come from in the first place? Or is it expected
to somehow just magically appear on their home page?

It's their "imagination" it does not matter where the link to click on
comes from.

 

[kchayka]

It's their "imagination" it does not matter where the link to click on
comes from.

The point I was trying to make is that there is no link, nor is there
likely to ever be a link. Can't click on what isn't there, even if you
_can_ imagine yourself doing it. Anyone naive enough to take the ad
literally is going to look for a link but never find it. I can picture
thousands of AOL users trying right now...

 

[Whitecrest]

The point I was trying to make is that there is no link, nor is there
likely to ever be a link. Can't click on what isn't there, even if you
_can_ imagine yourself doing it. Anyone naive enough to take the ad
literally is going to look for a link but never find it. I can picture
thousands of AOL users trying right now...

The existence or non existence of the actual or fictional link is
completely irrelevant. The words are not meant to be taken literally.
It is an ad.