smitty777's Journal: Nielsen's Usability Heresy

My latest rant: Jakob Nielsen's lastest version of Alertbox discusses usability for the masses. During my ~1.5 decades as a professional usability expert, I've seen quite a wide variety of user interface screens, ranging from perfect elegance to mind numbingly contorted and ugly. I've also worked with many self professed "experts" - many of which are developers that have had no formal training and only a passing interest in good UI design. On the plus side, Jakob does have a point that it is spreading the gospel of usability and getting it infused into many more projects. On the other hand, most of the mind numbingly contorted designs I've seen are the result of the "experts".

So, what do you think Slashdot? Is this a good idea? What are your experiences with trained vs untrained usability professionals?