

Even a URL tells a story - arepb
http://reillybrennan.com/post/7686471401/even-a-url-tells-a-story

======
patio11
This story is pretty short: the Sony page is an Enterprise Java (TM) shopping
cart, not a brochureware page in a CMS.

Apple also is a heavy user of Enterprise Java. Try finding pages where they
can take input.

That said, yeah, given the choice I would a) devote engineering resources to
getting human-readable URLs (SEO and UX benefits for reasonably little work)
and b) prefer frameworks which make that the default because they are likely
clueful in other ways, too.

------
wulczer
I'd say that the URL for Apple iPod is:

    
    
      http://google.com/search?q=apple%20ipod
    

and for Sony Walkman:

    
    
      http://google.com/search?q=sony20walkman
    

Really, I see people going to their GMail by typing "gmail" in Google. And ask
100 strangers on the street how important the tidyness of the text in their
browser's address bar is to them.

~~~
simonw
Yup... and unfortunately for Sony, the top hit for "sony walkman" is
Wikipedia. If their URLs didn't completely suck maybe they would have better
luck with their SEO.

~~~
wulczer
I think it's Wikipedia because "walkman" has a much longer history as a brand
name, from cassette players to cell phones.

I remember times where back where I lived "walkman" was a plain noun meaning
"any kind of portable cassette player".

~~~
lachenmayer
Well, in a way the same thing is true with "iPod" now: It's used to refer to
"any kind of MP3 player". But search for "ipod" on Google, and the Wikipedia
page telling you all about the history of the iPod is not the first result,
it's a page where you can actually _buy_ one. Several pages, actually.

~~~
innes
Hmmm. I don't believe people use the term 'iPod' to refer to any old MP3
player.

~~~
JacobAldridge
Some do (my parents for example), and I suspect even among those who recognise
different brands, there's decreasing awareness of what MP3 is. It's not
uncommon for a brand to become synonomous over time - Walkman was an earlier
example in this thread, but others include Liquid Paper, Roller Blades, and
even Biros. Dangerous territory, because in the instance where it does become
generic your trademark protection disappears (see also the battle Xerox
continues to wage in that regard).

~~~
montibbalt
Also, Kleenex. Possibly the "Duck" brand of tape as well since people seem to
have trouble saying duct tape.

~~~
jokermatt999
Actually duct tape vs duck tape isn't all that clear.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duct_tape#Etymology>

Duck Tape is trademarked, but it's possible that was the original term for it.
It's weird.

------
beaumartinez
Sony's mixing the store with the product information page, resulting in such
an ugly URL. Regarding stores, however, Apple isn't entirely innocent
either—what about URLs like this[1]?

Sony UK's is just a product information page, and it has a much cleaner URL[2]
(albeit not as clean as Apple's).

[1]
[http://store.apple.com/us/browse/home/shop_ipod/family/ipod_...](http://store.apple.com/us/browse/home/shop_ipod/family/ipod_touch?aid=AIC-
WWW-NAUS-K2-BUYNOW-IPODTOUCH-INDEX&cp=BUYNOW-IPODTOUCH-INDEX)

[2] <http://www.sony.co.uk/hub/walkman>

------
shrikant
I get the point he's trying to make, but you can still type in
<http://sony.com/walkman> and it takes you to the correct page.

~~~
nuclear_eclipse
How do you discover that though? If you get to it from Google or another site,
you're immediately thrown onto a page with a hideous, unrecognizable URL.

------
evansolomon
It's ironic that a post about URL tidiness would be here:
[http://reillybrennan.com/post/7686471401/even-a-url-
tells-a-...](http://reillybrennan.com/post/7686471401/even-a-url-tells-a-
story)

~~~
andybak
Aside from maybe removing the numeric ID, is that url that bad?

~~~
simonw
A better URL would be <http://reillybrennan.com/2011/even-a-url-tells-a-story>
\- stick the year in there to get a fresh namespace every 12 months so as not
to end up with collisions some day.

~~~
duck
I can see going either way with or without the year, but not for the reason
you stated. If you are writing the exact same title for a blog post then the
year should probably be in the actual title because that most likely is an
important piece of the article (thinking "Resolutions - 2011"). The reason I
might include a year in the path is just to let users know quickly how old the
material is when they see a link to your article, but then again do you really
want to let them know that before click into your site?

~~~
simonw
I like using years for namespaces because I like thinking long-term - in 50
years time, will that site's namespace be getting too busy? Using years means
you can even completely change the rest of your URL scheme without needing to
update last year's URLs.

Quickly letting users use the age of the article is a good reason too, but
only for blog-style content. I don't think you should use the year trick with
evergreen content (example.com/2010/terms-of-service for example).

~~~
eru
example.com/2010/terms-of-service would still be a good URL for the namespace
reforming reasons you cited.

------
rglover
I like the point of this post, but I wish the author would have elaborated
more. Sanitary URLs are great because they play on human emotions. Looking at
the simple, clean Apple URL, it does two things: it provides an easy to
remember route to their specific product, and two, it feels _clean_. In
contrast, the Sony URL feels dirty and disorganized, lacking a real focus and
seemingly, makes the Walkmen feel like just another electronic whatchamacalit.
Although it seems purely cosmetic, there's a subconscious thing going on. Yes
it helps developers/consumers but even more importantly, it makes your brand
look focused. There should be more writing on the psych aspects of web
development. I feel like there's a lot to be said.

~~~
andos
Donald Norman wrote a great deal about that subject (psychological and
emotional aspects of user experience), albeit not specifically about web dev.

~~~
rglover
I thought the name looked familiar. I downloaded a copy of "The Design of
Everyday Things" not too long ago. Guess I'll have to crack it open?

For those that are also interested: [http://www.amazon.com/Design-Everyday-
Things-Donald-Norman/d...](http://www.amazon.com/Design-Everyday-Things-
Donald-Norman/dp/0385267746)

~~~
andos
And there's also Emotional Design: [http://www.amazon.com/Emotional-Design-
Love-Everyday-Things/...](http://www.amazon.com/Emotional-Design-Love-
Everyday-Things/dp/0465051359)

------
ThomPete
The interesting thing though is that Jobs was always very inspired by Sony and
"tidyness".

I really do wonder if Apple can continue without Jobs or whether it will decay
into management kingdoms like Sony and other large organizations.

------
parallel
The story here is, 'hide complexity'? Or perhaps 'Focus on the details of user
experience'?

I love the reference to "all of this business at the top". Perhaps there's a
design principle in there. If a user is ever referring to "all this
business..." then you've gone off track.

------
yread
Who cares about urls? My browser hides everything except the domain anyway

~~~
Arjuna
_Who cares about urls?_

Clean URLs can help developers to better manage their site. This is because
they provide an intuitive way to organize site content. By design, this also
means that users can find information easily.

As a simple example, imagine surfing an exotic car website. You want to find
information about the Koenigsegg Agera. Now, imagine the following two URLs
which both point to the page about the Koenigsegg Agera:

1\. <http://www.example.com/vehicle.aspx?id=0x5F3759DF>

2\. <http://www.example.com/vehicle/koenigsegg_agera>

Clearly, the URL in example 2 offers:

1\. An intuitive way to navigate the site's content. As a user, you could
enter a different vehicle name, using the given URL structure, to locate other
vehicles:

<http://www.example.com/vehicle/ariel_atom>

<http://www.example.com/vehicle/porsche_918>

2\. SEO (Search Engine Optimization). This is a topic unto itself. In general,
one of the areas of SEO is optimizing URLs in order to achieve the best
results with regard to indexing and ranking. Please see Google's Search Engine
Optimization Starter Guide (see link, below) for a more in-depth treatment of
this topic.

References:

Clean URL <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clean_URL>

Google's Search Engine Optimization Starter Guide (See page 8, "Improve the
structure of your URLs") [http://www.google.com/webmasters/docs/search-engine-
optimiza...](http://www.google.com/webmasters/docs/search-engine-optimization-
starter-guide.pdf)

URL structure
[http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answe...](http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/bin/answer.py?answer=76329)

Search Engine Optimization
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Search_engine_optimization>

~~~
Xurinos
I went through your links to understand the SEO issue, and I am having a hard
time finding more than one technical reason to make URLs friendlier. The only
thing that stood out to me was along the lines of including searchable
keywords in your URL, so indeed, rather than just an ID, having the word
"walkman" in Sony's URL would raise their URL score in the search engine.

The rest was pure speculation on what "users" do with URLs -- aka some
engineer's personal opinion on what's pretty. Can anybody provide links to
usability studies regarding what users actually do with URLs? This would be of
far more value than some company's personal standard, be it Google or someone
else.

My experience is unfortunately anecdotal, but all my users just bookmark or
copy-paste whatever they see. They are more concerned that the site has good
navigation than that they can alter the URL or type it in directly. They use a
starting point and then move on from there. So I have a hard time believing
statements in these documents like "users may remove a part of the URL,
thinking it is not important". The one exception is that I _have_ seen newer
users type "www." before URLs that do not need it.

~~~
Arjuna
(I am attempting to repond to both _Xurinos_ and _romaniv_ in a single reply
here.)

My clean URL example was just an example. I did not intend to infer that the
world is primarily navigating via URL manipulation, but it came across that
way. Rather, I meant that it can be a nice touch for usability, in certain
cases. For example, power users are going to quickly notice, "Hey, I can find
a vehicle by manipulating the URL by using the 'manufacturer_carmodel'
pattern." Of course, the site would have normal search functionality, so that
traditional users could locate vehicles in that manner as well. In the end, it
is more about SEO, but with the clean URL paradigm, you get both (again, in
some cases), so it can be a win-win. Also, the URLs look nice when they appear
in search results (i.e., nice keyword-based URLs instead of URLs with query
strings and IDs) which can lend itself to readability/usability.

Of course, even with clean URLs, a case where it probably does not work is a
blog (as noted by _romaniv_ ). For example, no one is going to manipulate a
long URL string for a blog posting; they will simply navigate the site for the
information. Although, here is a real-world example that I have encountered: I
have come across multi-part blog postings via Google searches. In many cases,
"Part X" displays in the search results, but not "Part 1." In these cases, it
is always nice when these sites are designed with clean URLs, making it a
breeze to simply copy the URL from the search results, and change the "X" to
"1". Clearly, this is not easy (or possible) to do if the URL is a query
string with an unintuitive article ID.

Ultimately, I think that clean URLs are about SEO, but I think they can have a
usability factor, again, in some cases and well, for "power users" at least. I
probably should have said "power users" instead of "users" in my original
post.

------
qntm
I wrote a thing about my exceptionally short urls a little while ago:
<http://qntm.org/urls>

------
skarayan
IMO, this shows how important each respective product is to each company.

