Playing With Hoops, or Every Step You Take

I do not often pay full attention to Giles Bowkett. That is the flip side of being the provocateur that he is, some people will occasionally tune out. However, when anyone plays the Steve Krug card, I am compelled to take a look.

Yesterday, Giles posted a dead-on point about user registration, called "I Don't Care About Your Hoops". When you compare the success of simplicity, as in the Google and Apple examples, to what we all tend to fall into, I hope you are as embarrassed as I was. Time for some self-examination.

I was ready to hack down the user signup process to size. Here are my new rules:

• 4 or more registration steps = FAIL


• 3 registration steps = A long shot, but you might make it


• 2 registration steps = At the top of the key, worth taking a shot, but no sure thing


• 1 registration step = A free throw, you should easily sink it


• 0 registration steps = Slamdunk ala Michael Jordan. Ain't no stopping us now.