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At last,
the contents of Aardvark's "million-dollar ideas" notebook
are revealed for all to see!
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The Automobile Association has launched a new
online shopping site -- and I've
got to say they really shouldn't have bothered!
What a bloody mess!
Not only is the concept of a virtualised shopping mall one of the most dated
and flawed models on the Web, but in this case the implementation just plain
sucks.
And just what is this site really -- little more than a badly designed set of
icons and links to other shopping sites?
I really can't believe that it took four months to build this monstrosity as claimed in
this Infotech story.
What's even more astonishing is that (according to the story) the companies
featured on this site are prepared to pay money for the privilege!
Let's examine the problems:
- From the time you click on a link or key in the URL it takes nearly
two minutes to load the main page if you're on a 33.6K modem! This is
mainly because there are an incredible 166 graphic elements involved!
I really pity any of the AA's country users who might be stuck on a 14.4K
modem -- it's going to take them an incredible 3 minutes or more to load
this page! Even on a 128Kbps ISDN or DSL connection it's going to take
a full 30 seconds -- totally unacceptable when numerous surveys indicate
that websurfers usually click-away if a page hasn't loaded within 10-20 seconds.
- But wait -- there's more (waiting that is). The other "levels" in this
site contain a similar plethora of graphics which also take an eternity
to load. In fact, this site has so many graphics that it's likely to overwhelm
the cache of some web-browsers meaning that when you click away to visit other
sites, they too will load more slowly because their cached graphics have been
purged from your system to make space.
- Sideways scrolling is required. This is a big no-no. Although the site
uses some "far too clever" Javascript code to look and see what screen resolution
you're running, it seems to assume that your browser window is maximised. Guess
what folks -- those of us with hi-res screens almost never run our windows maximised --
that's why we have 17-21" screens and high-res. Duh!
- The mis-use of frames means that if you find something interesting
on one of the linked sites -- then you can't easily bookmark it for a
return visit later. Frames are a very useful webpage construct -- but
if you're going to be linking to other sites it's courteous to the user
and the site-owner if you either load that site into the main browser window
or spawn a new browser window.
- Where's the value? Web surfers can get a far more pleasing experience
and vastly greater range of options simply by visiting any of our numerous
local portal sites and clicking on the "shopping" links.
If, as the AA claim, they have been "inundated with offers from all sorts of
companies" then I have to say that I have over-estimated the Net-savvy and
IQ of the average Kiwi business when it comes to e-commerce.
I"m sorry but this site is perhaps the biggest, ugliest, most ergonomically
disastrous site to have hit the local Web in quite some time.
But hey -- maybe businesses will flock to this site and spend money to have
their logo and a link added to those already there. Maybe the AA will make
a fortune from selling placements on these ugly bloated pages. Maybe
I'm completely wrong and will be left with egg all over my face.
But then again -- since even slick, smart and very intelligent implementations
of this virtual-mall concept have proven to be an almost total waste of
time -- I can't for the life of me think of any reason why this one would
succeed.
If this site is a result of the "cheerleading, rah-rah" activities of the
recent Government e-commerce summit then I think something was woefully
wrong with the material presented and we ought to be worried that perhaps
others are busy wasting money on similar follies.
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