Screenshot: firstmonday.org
Paul F. Marty and Michael B. Twidale describe in their article at firstmonday a method of fast testing the usability of websites with an audience:
“This article documents the authors’ attempt to develop a quick, inexpensive, and reliable method for demonstrating user testing to an audience. The resulting method, Usability@90mph, is simple enough to be conducted at minimal expense, fast enough to be completed in only thirty minutes, comprehensible enough to be presented to audiences numbering in the hundreds, and yet sophisticated enough to produce relevant design recommendations, thereby illustrating for the audience the potential value of user testing in general. In this article, the authors present their user testing demonstration method in detail, analyze results from 44 trials of the method in practice, and discuss lessons learned for demonstrating user testing in front of an audience.
(…)
Each Usability@90mph session is designed to take 30 minutes, although some give and take in this duration is expected. As mentioned above, the goal is to spend ten minutes analyzing the site to be evaluated and determining representative tasks, ten minutes running the tasks with representative users, and ten minutes analyzing the results with the help of the audience. At a minimum, the method requires two evaluators, one representative from the organization that owns the Web site being tested, one or two user testers, and an audience.
(…)
Nevertheless, with these caveats in mind, we believe that Usability@90mph, as a method of raising awareness of and interest in user testing, is replicable by others who have experience with user testing and usability analysis. While the authors have considerable experience in evaluating museum Web sites in particular, this method does not require specific knowledge of particular types of Web sites as much as it requires knowledge of interface design and Web site usability in general. Moreover, the fact that the method requires little advance preparation makes it likely that this approach could be easily adapted for use in other venues or at smaller scales (around a conference table, for example, rather than on a stage). By demonstrating the potential value of user testing to many different types of audiences, we hope to encourage a greater affinity for frequent user testing, and to convince usability educators and evaluators that high-speed demonstration methods like Usability@90mph are worth developing and pursuing.
In conclusion, we believe that high-speed, public demonstrations of user testing are an excellent way of encouraging a “culture of usability.” We feel that the results presented above clearly document the power of Usability@90mph to demonstrate, quickly and easily, the value of user testing. While our personal tests of this method have been extremely encouraging, a far stronger test would lie in the successful replication of this approach by other usability evaluators or educators. One of our main reasons for publishing this paper, therefore, is to invite others to adopt or adapt our method for their own needs, comparing our findings with their own experiences demonstrating user testing as a combination of evaluative and pedagogic techniques. ”
