News for hackers. Stuff that matters.

A comment on GMail: designer arrogance and the cult of minimalism. Parent comment

Re:GMail: designer arrogance and the cult of minimalism by pcwalton on Friday April 27, 2012 @12:19AM (#3897497)
I'm not sure that the fact that something has been thoroughly A/B tested makes it indefensible. It is possible that overuse of A/B testing results in a local maximum, with sweeping changes needed to reach the global maximum.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:GMail: designer arrogance and the cult of minimalism by adrianhoward on Friday April 27, 2012 @06:17AM (#3898385)
It is possible that overuse of A/B testing results in a local maximum, with sweeping changes needed to reach the global maximum.

That's not overuse - that's just bad use :-) There is nothing to stop people split testing radical redesigns.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:GMail: designer arrogance and the cult of minimalism by alextp on Friday April 27, 2012 @07:00AM (#3898474)
It's actually a more subtle problem: if you test a radical redesign, there's a higher likelihood it will fail even if a subsequent series of small changes to it would have produced something better, just because the incumbent is so well optimized.
[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:GMail: designer arrogance and the cult of minimalism by adrianhoward on Friday April 27, 2012 @07:05AM (#3898486)
So, so right.

What I was trying to say was that the problem isn't with A/B testing - it's with overly simplistic usage and interpretation of A/B testing.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:GMail: designer arrogance and the cult of minimalism by ZeroGravitas on Friday April 27, 2012 @08:09AM (#3898677)
On the other hand, the tendency for users to become attached to existing ways of working also leads to getting stuck in local maximums.
[ Parent | on HN ]