A co-worker from work sent us a link to a site called "Dontclick". The idea is interesting & refreshing. It's not in my nature to turn down a challenge. So I went there and
tried out their click free environment to read their stories and to see for
myself if I can browse the site without clicking.
I survived the test! I can surf their site without clicking but it was awkward and hard to resist on my part. Having a mouse without any button might help in my future attempts. It was a very interesting experience but I believe it's in our nature to click since the invention of typewriter. Tactile feedback is essential to many of the input devices we use daily, without it we would need to guess if something is on/off, unless we get instant feedback by our other sensory means such as sound or vision. Same thing with the click of a mouse to confirm a selection on a web page.
Another problem with the Dontclick
methodology is how to tell if I want to initiate a link click versus simply
moving the mouse across the screen. They have three ways to tackle the
issue but the glaring problem is any one of the alternative solution creates confusion to the user
than a simple
click. In addition, a button click is always faster than moving your mouse across the link
horizontally, make a circle around the link or rest your mouse pointer
over the link for a given amount of time to confirm a clicking action.
I'm very impress with their idea and concept but I imagined it would find its usefulness in a limited fashion. A potential application for a click free interface maybe in a touch screen kiosk environment. A fun idea nevertheless. Another note is their website is developed using Flash and the medium isn't widely used versus text based built pages in the World Wide Web. Another blockade to become a standard.
Cheers,
Wuju nonono!
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