RE: Loosemore's law (was UKNM: Fast-loading sites)

[Steve Johnston]

For this to work, Loosemore's law has to be observable against existing

activity, and not require any special coding to capture it. 


The archetypal web intolerance is, of course, going somewhere or doing

something else. If Miller's 1968 measures (as referenced on Useit.com)

are reliable, then there is a window of opportunity between 1 and 10

seconds in which the user's attention can be maintained before they go

looking for other - potentially distracting - things to do. It does not

require the whole page to have loaded for this to happen, simply enough

to allow a decision to be made, or for there to be something to read or

to look at that might actually keep their attention a little longer, by

restarting the clock. 


For Loosemore's law to hold true, as the speed of connection increases,

there must be a measurable decrease in the window for maintaining

attention because the expectation is set at a higher level. The problem,

as I see it, is that every piece of content has different thresholds for

attention, so attempting to measure intolerance against file sizes or

progress through a page simply wont work.


I am beginning to feel that decision-making is the key. Loosemore's law

- which incidentally needs to be picked up as an MBA or final-year

research project by one of the many students on the list, before it is

ratified - will demonstrate (well, maybe) that there is a progression of

intolerance that is evidenced by a shortening of the time a user is

happy to wait for enough information to make their first decision.

Beyond this time the user may not go somewhere else, but if they do not,

their attitude towards the site (read; company, products, whatever) is

compromised.


So Loosemore is now looking less like a Metcalfe and a Moore and more

like a Boyle. In other words in conditions with constant bytes and a

constant opportunity for decision-making there is an inverse

relationship between speed (S) and tolerance (T). Under ideal conditions

then, ST has a constant value. 


Measuring S (speed): Bits per second?

Measuring T (tolerance):  Seconds to first decision point?


I have a slight feeling of vertigo......whoah, disappearing up my own

****......


I think I'll stop for now...Where's Clay when you need him?


Steve Johnston

steve [dot] johnstonentranet [dot] co [dot] uk

mob: +44 (0)7901 853273

off: +44 (0)1491 878787




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