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The User is Drunk

squareweave
Talks
YouTube
4 HN users recommended this talk3 months2014–2021 score 3.5
Years with an HN recommendation, 2007–2026

HN users recommend it as a memorable, short way to build empathy for users' confusing mistakes and to design for distraction.

A short talk by Will Dayble of Squareweave arguing that you should design software as if the user were drunk: distracted, impaired in attention and vision, and prone to misreading. It is a user experience talk built around that framing.

“There's a great short talk called "the user is drunk” (HN, 2021)

1 strong recommendations · 3 recommendations · Talks

4 Hacker News comments

From the HN archive; up to 20 kept per video, favoring different commenters. Recommendations first.

@mrtksn Jul 2014 Strongly recommends
on HN thread Show HN: DrunkUserTesting – How does your site perform in the wild?
Somebody took "the user is drunk" UI design method quite literally :) Here is a video about the "the user is drunk" idea: [this video] Basically, the idea is about assuming that your user has an attention and a vision of a drunk person, not designing a UI for literally drunk people. I highly recommend the video.
Explains designing for users with a drunk person's attention and vision.
@ignostic Jul 2014 Recommends
on HN thread Need feedback on Kickstarter landing page
Read more
-Design quality is good, but you should re-evaluate that top image. Does a tar-covered hand say "High quality leather" to most people? Not to me, especially because I can't see the object. -Headline #1 should tell me what you're doing. Don't assume I know what your deal is about. You could almost switch the first and second. -CTA is way too far below the fold. I should immediately know what you want me to do. Donate? Subscribe? Drop it beneath "You are about to challange [sic] the status quo". -Challenge, not "challange". Might want to look over your page for spelling and grammar... This might be helpful: [this video]
Helpful for designing for distracted users.
@fireworks10 Mar 2015 Recommends
on HN thread The User Is Drunk
"The User is Drunk" is explained better in video by Will Dayble of Squareweave: [this video] Also, OP's post seems more like "The UX Consultant is Drunk".
Explains The User is Drunk better than the article.
@Geeflow Feb 2021 Recommends
on HN thread Always Use “Buttons” for Size Selection
Read more
I wouldn't be much surprised. The amount of things people do _not_ notice is staggering. When I do usability tests there's almost always something that doesn't get noticed although I thought it obvious and/or important. Personal anecdote: I managed to buy paper for my printer and only noticed upon arrival that it was the wrong size. The product photo looked right to be. I did not bother to check the details - or even the product title. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ Also, regarding "if the person isn't drunk": There's a great short talk called "the user is drunk" which makes one much more sympathetic to such seemingly unexplainable comprehension fails that sometimes drive product designers mad: [this video]
Builds sympathy for users' seemingly inexplicable comprehension failures.

Video list and Hacker News comment labels from HackerTube (prompted by @karpathy), released under ODC-By 1.0, built on the open-index/hacker-news archive. Hacker News data is provided by Y Combinator; comments remain the work of their authors. Video titles, channel names and thumbnails belong to their creators and are shown via YouTube. HackerTube Watch is an unofficial edition. Data export of 2026-10-31.

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