LocateTV Blog

Scott Vine’s been blogging about LocateTV over at Information Overlord (including posting a couple of neat embeds, such as House - who doesn’t love Hugh Laurie in grizzled crippled genius mode?) Pushing on through despite the speed issues we’ve been having (thanks for being patient kids), Scott seems to think the site has good potential and makes some interesting comments about what he’d like to see.

One of these centres around the ability to save your searches. This is part of a greater issue about personalisation of the site - perhaps having a login account that would allow a saved search history, or as Scott suggests, a cutomisable splash page on which to arrange all your favourite, dynamically updated results, perhaps with an RSS feed and even Amazon-style recommendations.

All these features seem obvious winners and they are on the roadmap for possible future implementation, but as usual they spark that old debate about clutter and clarity. Scott admits he likes the site’s ’simple and clean’ functionality, and this kind of login-based customisation would move away from that Google model, where people get in, search, and get out, fuss-free.

Of course, there’s no reason why the two templates can’t exist side by side; those who wish to use the site as a clean drop-in search can do so, while those who want a more permanent LocateTV hub can create an account with all their favourite things. The focus at the moment is on getting the basic search experience as easy, rich and reliable as possible, and then we’ll move on to these ideas.

How do other testers see themselves using the site - would greater personalisation annoy or excite you?

Lottie