DTC #3

This was the first time I'd been to Yahoo! in a while, and I immediately remember why: overload. Consider just this 500x500 screenshot of the home page.
In this little snapshot of what Yahoo! greets us with, you have no less than five different elements competing for your attention, none flowing with eachother with any sense of cohesion or visual flow. You have a seemingly random assortment of videos, news links, "Trends" and an ad. Brunett and Marshall are accurate that the goal is to pull users along to the next location, my reaction to Yahoo! is more one of frightened retreat (100). Opening such a noisy website that requires actual effort for me to figure out what is actually being linked to is certainly no invitation to me. Certainly Yahoo! is successful, but when we compare it to Google's home page, maybe we can get an idea for why Google is more successful.
I liked the wording Burnett and Marshall had for one particular feature of a website like Yahoo!, however:

Augmenting these techniques of providing interconnection among users of Yahoo! are teh accordion-like hyperlink extrapolations of stories from a single site. The accordion-efect is not so much driven by linearity, but a wider reach of potential interconnection (101).

I'm focusing on the discussion of what they call "the accordion effect," which is a phenomena I definitely recognize from the internet, something that can keep me on Wikipedia or IMDb or ESPN for hours chasing links. It's not something that I think Yahoo! does particularly well, however.

I see "What Not To Buy At Target." I don't shop at Target, but I'm mildly curious as to what I shouldn't buy there. Now on most websites that would keep me moving, they would have a clear list of related links somewhere. The have "More From CBSMoneyWatch.com," but there are a mere three links, only one of which particularly relevant to the article at hand (and they all take me away from Yahoo!). The links within the text are merely citations, rather than being used for the purpose of creating a next net space to read through. At the bottom, we have the most popular stories on Yahoo!, but they are unrelated to this link. So, once I've gone in to "What Not To Buy At Target," it would only be sheer coincidence that would get me moving along to another website. Other websites provide a wealth of links, either by connecting them to words in the primary text or linking to related websites and stories, but Yahoo! presents me with more of a dead end, making it more likely my mouse pointer will wander towards the URL bar to head towards another website.

Far be it for me to give Yahoo! business advice, but there webpage is and always has been, for me, uninviting and poorly designed in regards to keeping me around if I give it a chance.

Works Cited

1. Burnett, Robert, and Marshall P. David. Web Theory: An Introduction. 1st ed. New York, NY: Routledge, 2003. 81-104. eBook.