[thelist] vertical scrollbars

[Scott]

Hassan Schroeder wrote:
> On Sat, Apr 27, 2013 at 6:25 AM, Barney Carroll
> <barney.carroll at gmail.com> wrote: 
> 
>> reading further down the page for the rest, what makes you think
>> they'll be more aware of or willing to scroll to the right?
> 
>> On Apr 27, 2013 2:01 PM, "Bob Meetin" <bobm at dottedi.biz> wrote:
>> 
>>> I occasionally run into potential clients who see vertical
>>> scrollbars 
> 
> Eh, wat? Are we talking about vertical or horizontal scrolling?
> 
> Because "to the right" makes me think *horizontal* ...
> 
> --
> Hassan Schroeder ------------------------ hassan.schroeder at gmail.com
> http://about.me/hassanschroeder twitter: @hassan

???

I'm with Hassan. This discussion, so far, is a bit confusing. I mean,
here... "I occasionally run into potential clients who see vertical
scrollbars on some site and like them..." Umm, yes, that would be pretty
much every standard page, no? Then, Barney's response seems to indicate that
"horizontal scrollbars" was the intended meaning.

If so, I agree that using them as a means to keep content "above the fold"
is a bad idea. Mess with user expectations at your peril, and after almost
two decades of vertical scrolling to read page content, users are accustomed
to accessing content that way. Between down-arrow, space bar, scrollbar, and
mouse scroll wheel, there are many very convenient ways to scroll
vertically. Other than the horizontal scrollbar, how many ways are there to
scroll left and right?  

One way to convince him might be to create a single page that works that way
and let him try it out himself. That might get the job done.

All this presumes that we're actually talking about horizontal scrollbars.
If not, then I'm thoroughly confused... ;-)

cheers,
scott