Users surprising designers (again)
Usability popped up in a recent Twit where Jason Calacanis described some interesting findings at the Mahalo usability lab. When using Ask.com, their test users perceived ads as actual content. This genuinely surprised me. Apparently, though, the shading was subtle enough and the font-size of the Sponsored Results was small and far enough out of the way that the distinction was all but invisible. Once again, I guess we see the value of that classic usability mantra: test, test, and test again.