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When I left the journalism industry two years ago not many people were thinking about the usability of their websites. Within the past few weeks I have seen a few things that make me believe that maybe they are starting to come around.

With the spike in online newspaper readership last year, thinking about the user seems to have started to become a priority.

A few weeks ago the Atlanta Journal Constitution posted a job to the CHI jobs list seeking Usability Engineer/Analyst. I also found it interesting that they posted to the CHI jobs listserv and not the typical places you would post journalism jobs. The CHI jobs listserv is one of the locations for people who are interested in the area of user centered design and usability to look for jobs.

I have seen some papers that have done some usability testing on their own without a position like this. A recent online journalism review article talked about a small paper in Alabama that conducted usability testing on their website. This article reminded me of some of the papers I read from the mid to late 90 that discuss usability testing like this on software and other websites outside of the journalism industry.

This is a very positive step for the industry as a whole. Hopefully usability testing will lead to user centered design techniques throughout the industry.

This made me laugh today "Manatee Gang Gunfire Worries Local Deputies". Taken out of context it sounds like a gang of sea cows firing guns. Take a minute to picture that in your head.

If you are from the Tampa Bay area you would know that there is a county called Manatee so that is what it is really about. But it is still an amusing picture.

Another blog let me know that Times Select is now free for students and faculty with a .edu e-mail address. This service is normally about $50 per year.

Times select is essentially access to columnists, NYTimes online archives, customized e-mail alerts among other things. See here for a full list.

The trouble starts after you have submitted and verified your university address.

The verification link takes you to this page. Can you figure out quickly how to create an account?

I have a NYT account but it doesn't use my .edu address. At first I thought about logging in using that account but that wouldn't make sense. The box on the left says "Upgrade to Times Select". I don't think I want to do that since I already have free Times Select I think. The button on the left says upgrade and not register so I am not sure what to do. I check my verification e-mail for a password but I don't see one. I spend a little more time staring at it and then decide to just click the login button on the right. Hoping for a good error message.

This time I get some helpful red text that tells me to register by clicking on the button on the left. I then see in small gray type "Not a NYTimes.com member yet?". Now I understand what to do and was able to register for the service.

I created a registration system based off of the NYTimes.com design a few years ago so I know it wasn't this confusing previously.

The key things wrong here are: labeling the button upgrade instead of register, making upgrade to Times Select the largest things on the left and overshadowing the only hint that you should use this link to register.

How this could be fixed: go back to having people register and then make your Times Select pitch on the registration page, another option is to make it smaller than the "Not a NYTimes.com member yet?" text.

I wonder if anyone else has run into this issue.

Many news sites use some sort of list of article related to the story you are reading. This information gives the reader more background on the current story and keeps them on the site longer.

CNET has a new graphical way of doing this that I saw today on this story http://msn-cnet.com.com/Sun+servers+heading+back+to+Intel+chips/2100-1010_3-6151872.html?part=msn-cnet&subj=ns_2510&tag=mymsn.

This is the map off of that story.

When you mouse over one of the items it gives you the options of putting it in the center or reading the story. Interwoven in red and green they have placed overarching topics and companies that are involved or related to the story. Clicking on an item re centers it and takes you to the story.

This is a really interesting way to graphically represent how all of the stories link together using something more visually pleasing than a list.