Jake Cercone
MFC 215 – The University at Buffalo
Final Project

Don’t Make Me Think Review
Steve Krug, author of Don’t Make Me Think, understands how to write a book for the common man. He writes his book in the same way he looks for a website to be, focused on accessibility for the common man or woman. His four guiding principles of creating a good website are: Don’t make me think, How we use the web, Billboard design 101, Animal,
vegetable or mineral, and omit needless words.
The first concept in the guiding principles is Don’t make me think. This concept explains how a website should be somewhat self-evident. Making simple buttons that get to the point and having complex self-entering fields that doesn’t take much effort from the viewer is ideal.
The main drive to have a simple webpage is competition. If one is too complex, a simpler page will take its place. It is a classic case of survival of the fittest.
How we really use the web is the second header on the guiding principles. Krug makes an interesting idea in his first fact of life saying that webpages are not meant to be read, they are made to be scanned, meaning that these pages should not have a lot of text separating the main idea from fluff. The second fact of life is that the average viewer is not making optimal choices on the page. The third fact of life the viewer might not figure things out all the way, even if it means that he or she would struggle.
The third principle is Billboard design 101. This principle is the most complex when it comes to design. When looking at a website, Krug says that people do not read webpages, they scan them looking for keywords hardwired into our brains. Webpages should be organized in ways that emphasize key points by bolding, using different font sizes to draw attention to certain lines, keeping paragraphs short and using correct spacing. The book also states that designers should not be afraid to use ordering systems like bullets to organize material.
Animal, vegetable, or mineral, the third guiding principle, specifies how and why viewers make their decisions, even if the decision is mindless. Another term for this principle is clicking efficiency. The viewer should be able to make decisions easily while clicking the least. The example used in the book was the Wall Street Journal forms that are made to be productive without confusing the viewer.

The fifth and final guiding principle is Omit needless words. There is no need for extra words when making a webpage. Adding unnecessary terms does nothing but take up space and even make the viewer disinterested, confused, or overwhelmed. Krug even goes as far as saying instructions and happy talk must die. While these instructions are exaggerations, it brings up a good point that the most unnecessary wording comes from consuming directions and fluffy happy talk. Mastering efficiency in wording is key to make a good webpage.
Krug, while not getting into coding detail, influences the reader of his book to make webpages accessible for everyone. His cool, calm and downright funny quotes makes the common coding beginner feel comfortable as he or she enters the complex world of writing webpages, allowing the reader not to think too much.