Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Yours vs. Mine

dcurt.is

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 106 posts

Re: Yours vs. Mine

#71

Post by fudged71 »

jameshart wrote: post #57
scottjackson wrote: post #22

From the section of the iOS HIG about writing alert copy: > Avoid using “you,” “your,” “me,” and “my” as much as possible. Sometimes, text that identifies people directly can be ambiguous and can even be interpreted as an insult.

Yet Siri calls me 'you', and refers to herself as 'I'. Rules are made to be broken. Actually, on a recent road trip, I found myself asking Siri for an update on my progress by asking: "What's our ETA?". While she gave me the right answer, I kind of wish she'd responded by saying when "we" would arrive. An interface that is actually in it together with me - that would be a step forward.

Siri is not an app. Siri was built to be a personal assistant, and as such, it was designed to have a personal connection with the user, making the 'you' and 'I' very important. Interesting point about 'we', though.

Re: Yours vs. Mine

#72

Post by trafficlight »

nwh wrote: post #39
cantlin wrote: post #19

Interfaces and marketing that use "my" always irk me by, for lack of a better phrase, coming on too strong . I'm all too aware of the human hands that typed out that button label - it seems damned impudent of them to be assuming my voice. It implies a certain intimacy. My cart sounds like an appropriate label for something I've filled, but so long as it's empty trying to foist it off as mine just comes across as a de…

> I think marketeers leveraging "my" tend to envision that we will come to think of their product as like some treasured childhood teddy bear that we hug firmly to our bosoms each night. I'm not sure if it is as pronounced anywhere else, but my area has a lot of shops that use the prefix in their name. My Chemist My Hairdresser My Bookstore My House All places I walk past regularly, and they're all equally as awkward…

Interesting. I don't think this is a thing at all where I live. Where do you live?

Re: Yours vs. Mine

#73

Post by potatolicious »

Swizec wrote: post #31
acavailhez wrote: post #23

In foreign languages with a polite form of "You" (such as French or German), there is an additional question: should a website use the polite of familiar form. And it's widely accepted that a website should use the polite form.

Is it really widely accepted? I'm still weirded out when people use the polite form. Let alone computers, that's just silly. Why would a computer/website be polite to me? They have no concept of these things. Just using polite forms doesn't mean you're being polite, you have to mean it. A computer is as of yet incapable of having intentions.

> "Why would a computer/website be polite to me?"

The computer isn't being polite to you, the company whose website you are on, is. In the same way your computer isn't being casual and friendly with you - the person who wrote you the email is.

Whether it's an app or a website, it's all just a conduit - and I don't think it's farfetched to say that by and large companies use polite forms when referring to their (potential) customers.

Re: Yours vs. Mine

#74

Post by vitalique »

lotharbot wrote: post #59
andrenotgiant wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anecdotally, I have run into this with Google Products (Mail & Voice): The "Archive" button is problematic because you can almost always navigate to the noun Archive folder, or verb Archive an item.

how about "view archive" and "send to archive"?

This is the proper approach, I suppose. I don't use images for button labels in Gmail's interface myself, but I'm pretty sure that properly designed icons + tooltips with verbs (for both icons and textual labels) can be used quite effectively to differentiate between verbs and nouns: 'arrows' icons as verbs for moving stuff, 'boxes' images as nouns for storage places, 'tools' as verbs for some particular actions associated with those particular tools, etc. - just your usual common sense UI stuff.

Switched Gmail settings to icons for buttons just to check if this is being used here and immediately notice annoying inconsistency in Gmail's UI: Archive button has an icon of a storage box with an arrow (good choice), but has ambiguous tooltip saying 'Archive', whilst Delete button has an icon of just a trash bin with a proper action-tooltip 'Delete'. 'Report spam' has the worst icon by far, I think. Then again - manila folder icon for moving to label (which is a bit unclear) - it acts very much like the 'archive' action, but somehow doesn't have an arrow. Labels button tooltip - 'Labels' - also lacks the word 'apply/attach/add'. I understand that you can get accustomed to almost anything, but this doesn't mean you have to fight your way through UI.

I thought a bit more about this and now I think that a verb is more or less mandatory for buttons of actions, i.e. for buttons that change some objects properties or performs actions on the objects ('Apply labels', 'Move to trash' are probably better than 'Labels', 'Trash'). Verbs are not mandatory for buttons that just change your position inside the system ('Go to inbox' is probably worse than 'Inbox').

Re: Yours vs. Mine

#75

Post by snilan »

I see it as a conversation happening both ways. It just depends on who is the initiator of the conversation.

Consider for example the following two imagined scenarios:

In order to send a new tweet:

1) You click a button that says "Send My Tweet".

2) You click a button that says "Send Your Tweet".

In the first case, you are telling Twitter to send the tweet you just wrote. The power lies with Twitter to send it.

In the second case, Twitter is telling you to send the tweet. In this case, the user has all the power.

.

.

It's interesting to compare Facebook's approach with Twitter's:

Facebook is a bit of an oddball in addressing the user. Facebook usually addresses the user as "you", but it sometimes refers to the user in the third person. On the home screen, it asks "How's are you doing, Sean?" and displays the link to your profile as just your name. On your actual profile page, if you hover over the Activity Log button, it will say "See your activity on Facebook". But then when you go to privacy settings, it says "Who can see my stuff?". This makes a ton of sense. By using "my" instead of "your", Facebook is making the user feel like they have control of their stuff.

Twitter is pretty squarely in the "Me" camp, as evidenced by the link to your profile on the top of the page.

If the website has something informational to tell the user, like a notification, they will always refer to the user as "you".

For example: "Bill just retweeted you", "Bill just liked your status", "Your page is undergoing maintenance".

When you're changing account settings, the website will invariably refer to the user as "you". You are the one who actually needs to perform an action.

For example: "Change your password", "Update your email".

Re: Yours vs. Mine

#76

Post by mbrock »

mhb wrote: post #46

Somewhat topical pedantry: The incorrect non-reflexive use of myself to avoid the potentially incorrect choice of I vs. me. As in: ... rather than the interface being an extension of myself.

Maybe he just meant "an extension of my self."

Re: Yours vs. Mine

#77

Post by benihana »

thejerz wrote: post #58
scottmagdalein wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where this simplicity breaks down is when you have two kinds of a thing. For example, a user may have documents shared by a group and then documents that are yours/mine. Honestly, I still feel it's an overwrought discussion about something that ultimately doesn't effect the user enough to change their general perception of the product.

So, call the one Documents, and call the other Shared Documents. This ≠ rocket science.

Why are you so dismissive of this in such a condescending manner? On hacker news of all places, a site where people go for discussion of articles?

Re: Yours vs. Mine

#78

Post by e_proxus »

snilan wrote: post #75

I see it as a conversation happening both ways. It just depends on who is the initiator of the conversation. Consider for example the following two imagined scenarios: In order to send a new tweet: 1) You click a button that says "Send My Tweet". 2) You click a button that says "Send Your Tweet". In the first case, you are telling Twitter to send the tweet you just wrote. The power lies with Twitter to send it. In th…

I think there's also a difference regarding publicity of the material.

Using "your" is more appropriate for things that already are, or are expected to become, public as a part of the standard workflow (think photo sharing application).

Using "my" works better for things that are private and sensitive, like "My settings" or "My reading list" is often something that should not be shared, or only explicitly shared.

Re: Yours vs. Mine

#79

Post by Felix21 »

I DON'T agree with this conclusion.

You can easily just test both (with Neither as your control) and survey your users to find out which group is more satisfied with your UI.

When it comes to what customers want or will like, what you "think" is almost always wrong, so stop thinking and start testing.

Re: Yours vs. Mine

#80

Post by DoubleCluster »

OK, I'm going to pitch in:

The button should be called "My Settings" (or just "Settings") because it's a command I'm shouting at the program. Compare with "Save"/"Open"/"Like". I want to open MY settings. If the settings can't be loaded the program should tell me: "There was an error loading your settings", because the program is talking to me. The documentation could tell me the following: "To open your settings, click the My Settings button". So yes, I favor the conversation pattern. Just pretend you're talking to a human or to a computer with speech recognition.

Post reply on HN