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Re: "Read more" links in WordPress

for

From: Whitney Quesenbery
Date: Apr 19, 2013 8:47AM

Jared,
I want to push back a little bit on the claim that it's a general usability
problem.

In context, the link is a continuation of the text that was just read,
allowing you to continue reading from the same place, rather than moving on
to a different topic. It's when repeated links are seen out of context, in
a list of links for example, that they become problematic.

Removing the link seems to be more of a usability problem, forcing everyone
to back up to the link on the post title. Not having a link on the title
also seems less than ideal, especially if it's written to provide good
"scent of information." Adding a lot of repetitive words also seems to me
to be a problem for everyone.

I've certainly seen sites where duplicated links were difficult for
everyone - not positioned within the content in a meaningful way, for
example.

But the same problem applies to lots of pages that contain a series of
blocks of information. A trip itinerary, for example, might have a similar
block: identify the activity, then offer options to edit, delete, expand
the block. Wouldn't repeating the title of the activity be annoyingly
repetitive:

Reservation at MyPizza Parlour
6:30pm with May, Joe and Dave
Edit Reservation at MyPizza Parlour
Delete Reservation at MyPizza Parlour
Share Reservation at MyPizza Parlour
See all information about Reservation at MyPizza Parlour

vs.

Reservation at MyPizza Parlour
6:30pm with May, Joe and Dave
Edit | Delete | Share | See all information



On Fri, Apr 19, 2013 at 9:51 AM, Jared Smith < <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:

> On Fri, Apr 19, 2013 at 7:25 AM, Whitney Quesenbery wrote:
>
> > Are there any other ideas/tricks for how to customize this link so that
> it
> > does not repeat AND does not clutter up a the presentation?
>
> If you're not concerned about the usability issue the "Read more" link
> presents for all users, I probably wouldn't do anything special for
> screen reader users. Everyone has to scan or browse previous to the
> link to identify the context of these ambiguous links. If you're
> consistent in your presentation of the previous header and link,
> forcing a screen reader user to press Shift + Tab twice, or jump to
> the previous heading, etc. isn't much more burdensome than forcing a
> sighted user to visually scan previous to link to find what it's
> about. Doing nothing would be a WCAG 2.0 Level AAA violation, but not
> Level AA.
>
> If you want to address only the screen reader issue, I'd add an
> off-screen span to the link that contains the article title:
> <a href="article">Read more<span class="offscreen">: Article
> title</span></a>.
>
> This approach works, but any more I can't help but wonder if hearing
> the extra repeated text (especially when navigating by links) is as
> much of a hassle for screen reader users as simply dealing with the
> ambiguous "Read more" link.
>
> Jared
> > > >



--
Whitney Quesenbery
www.wqusability.com | @whitneyq

Storytelling for User Experience
www.rosenfeldmedia.com/books/storytelling

Global UX: Design and research in a connected world
@globalUX | www.amazon.com/gp/product/012378591X/