[thelist] RE: checked vs. unchecked boxes

[Scott Dexter]

--- Sarah Sweeney <mr.sanders at designshift.com> wrote:

> > Let's say you want to give the user the option to receive a copy
> of the
> > information upon receipt and history has shown that 99.9% of
> people want a
> > receipt.  You have a couple options:
> 
> Question: how do you determine that 99.9% of people want a receipt?
> Was 
> it simply a matter of having a pre-checked checkbox which most
> people 
> left checked "by simple oversight"?

Oh come on, surely this isn't that difficult a concept to grasp. It's
called /data/. Through your user tracking (whether it be order data,
site usage, or something else --you DO have user tracking, right?)
You see that 99% of your users did indeed check that checkbox, which
you initially left un-preselected for them. So you do them a favor,
give them a warm fuzzy, help their day out, make their
clicking-everything-in-sight experience a little smoother. You check
the box for them. If doing this really keeps you awake at night,
maybe it's time to go do something else.

You don't design for the 1%. I'm sorry, you just don't.