Beyond the interface: users' perceptions of interaction and audience on websites

Dynamic pages and the increasing number of functions that websites can perf orm are changing users' relations with the Web. Little has been reported on how the experience of using this kind of interactive site differs from the 'point and click' interactivity of the early Web. This paper reports on a qualitative study of users who entered text while visiting a website of the ir choice. It shows how the process brought with it two levels of awareness : that of the interface, and that of the social context beyond the interfac e. The paper goes on to describe the perception of audience that emerged fr om analysing users' accounts. It also gives details of the data collection method, which is based on the work of Vermersch and has not been widely use d outside France for analysing interaction with computers. The implications for website design are considered. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All righ ts reserved.