Tikkabik

One thing I'm reminded about every so often when I'm talking with Bonnie is that there are different kinds of computer and technology users. As someone who writes about the Mac for a living, I tend to tinker a lot. I like to find out how things work and figure I can usually put them back together if I take them apart. And because I keep company with other people in the field, a lot of us are the same way.

So it's easy to forget that we're not the same as the general public, and that's why every so often, watching Bonnie work and answering her questions is helpful to keep me grounded in the "real world."

I think she's probably a lot more typical of average users than I am. Once she finds a way of doing something, like opening a document or finding something she needs, she sticks with it, and can actually be uncomfortable when a new way is shown. As a practical example, she's used a Palm OS-based PDA for several years, but only today asked me how to delete applications. The need had never come up for her before, and it was beyond the scope of her use to know how to do it.

When you're designing an application or a Web site, or writing a tutorial or article on a topic you're familiar with, it's easier than it is not to take for granted a certainly level of user knowledge or reader sophistication. And that's a dangerous thing, because you're making a basic assumption about your intended audience that may be totally off the mark.

This isn't a major revelation or a Eureka!-type moment. Just something to consider the next time you're noodling over something you hope will have a wide appeal to "normal" people.