Amazon tests a more “in your face” approach
April 14th, 2005 by Bill
Most people don’t like change - I certainly don’t. Even when it’s good, I tend to resist it. So when I saw what they’re testing out on Amazon.com books I found it really annoying. (A look at the same example on their Canadian site, Amazon.ca books, shows generally what it was like before.)
This isn’t a small change - it’s a big one. The orientation of the page has been flipped. Now, that may be a better orientation in the long haul but, having become so use to the previous orientation, I find this very awkward and irritating. As Seth Godin says, "It’s sort of like trying to write left handed …"
While the orientation is something I may get use to, this reworking seems to be more about a change designed for Amazon rather than me, the Amazon customer. It puts the purchasing function much more in your face while placing most of what I found useful on Amazon (background information, reviews etc.) down and largely off the screen.
I’ve no idea if they’ll stick with this change. It’s likely one of those things they keep up a day or two to get some sense of how users respond to it. But it may be permanent - you never know. The orientation bothers me less than the "in your face" feeling. To me, the brick-and-mortar equivalent would be an annoying salesman following you around the store continually saying, "And would you like to buy this?"
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