Re: [tlug] [OT] What's up with online Japanese<->Japanese dictionaries?

[Martin Killmann <martin@example.com>]

On Tue, 15 Jun 2010 11:47:35 +0900 
"Stephen J. Turnbull" <stephen@example.com> wrote:

> By the way, I've recently had the opportunity to talk to a number of
> Japanese webmasters, site developers, and users about it.  The
> universal conclusion is that compared to US site layouts they find
> Japanese sites inconvenient, but they're sure that "the average
> Japanese" prefers things the way they are.  Go figure....

It's ignorance of basic usability guidelines, and lack of a "keep it
simple" principle.

Part of the problem is that Japanese Web design is removed from the rest
of the world by a language barrier. Most Japanese designers don't speak
English very well, so new ideas and techniques have a 2-3 year delay
until they become widespread in Japanese blogs. In some aspects, the
Japanese Web is hopelessly locked in the 90ies, with tiny fonts and
target="_blank". And animated flash banners, who doesn't love these.

The very horror are private blogs and websites, where you can still see
frames, colored wallpapers, hit counters, small animated gifs...

But part of it is also user conditioning. Japan is one of the few
countries where a cluttered portal like www.yahoo.co.jp is more popular
than the clean www.google.com interface.

Martin