What the FAQ?
In Issue No. 303 of A List Apart, for people who make websites, we question the received wisdom about FAQs, and learn that, in the land of the colorblind, contrast is king.
Contrast is King
by LESLIE JENSEN-INMAN
Being colorblind doesn’t mean not seeing color. It means seeing it differently. If colorblindness challenges the colorblind, it also challenges designers. Some of us think designing sites that are colorblind-friendly means sticking with black and white, or close to it. But the opposite is true. Using contrast effectively not only differentiates our site’s design from others, it’s the essential ingredient that can make our content accessible to every viewer, including the colorblind. By understanding contrast, we can create websites that unabashedly revel in color.
Infrequently Asked Questions of FAQs
by R. STEPHEN GRACEY
We take FAQs for granted as part of our sites’ content, but do they really work, or are they a band-aid for poor content? FAQ-hater R. Stephen Gracey explores the history and usability of FAQs. Learn how to collect, track, and analyze real user questions, sales inquiries, and support requests—and use the insights gained thereby to improve your site’s content, not just to write a FAQ. Find out when FAQs are an appropriate part of your content strategy, and discover how to ensure that your FAQ is doing all it should to help your customers.
Illustration © by Kevin Cornell for A List Apart
Filed under: A List Apart, Accessibility, content, content strategy, Design, User Experience, UX
7 Responses to “What the FAQ?”
Comments off.
Will people cease from mumbling “content is king” or “contrast is king.” Nothing is king! My garbage disposal occasionally hiccups better similes.
I’ve also found that sports teams have done a lot of the ground work for you with color schemes that work!
Damon
Bob: I agree. Every thing has its importance. It might be better to say something like: concise, unique content is important.
Hello Mr. Zeldman,
I just thought it might be pertinent if you blogged about the inclusion of Flash by default in ye olde Google Chrome.
Let us know what your thoughts are, not that I can’t guess at them!!! ;-)
Dear Bob, I do agree with you.
Content is king only as far content can take you, after that, experiences matter. We are experiential creatures, perhaps due to our human failings… Still, I think that experiencing information/content, in different ways, will lead to better understanding of experiences and content.
Bob:
You have mistaken a clever play on a cliche for the cliche itself.
“Contrast Is King” is an overt play on the old saw, “Content Is King.” It is also an oblique play on the other old saw, “in the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king.”
In creating her title, Ms Jensen-Inman was showing an understatedly playful and ingenious wit that is characteristic of her work.
Not everybody gets understated cleverness, but that’s okay.
sammyjenkins:
No one here would disagree with you. However it has nothing to do with the the topic. Nobody wrote “Content is King.” Ms Jensen-Inman wrote “Contrast is King” as a title for her article about designing sites that can be viewed effectively by people with varying kinds of colorblindness.
Your comment about Flash and Chrome is as relevant a response to Ms Jensen-Inman’s work as a rant about your dingleberries would be.
Learn to control yourself and to stay on topic if you wish to be regarded as anything other than a low-grade troll.
Jeffery; Fair enough. I do appreciate your good-natured response. When I re-read my post, well, it was irate and shortsighted. I will remove this foot from my mouth so that I can type with full view of the monitor again.