DVD menus contain some of the worst user interfaces you’re ever likely to see. Their designers always seem to place form before function, and even then, the resulting product looks cheesy and primitive. In this article, I’d like to examine what websites would look like if they were created like DVDs. Here are some examples:

– The website privacy policy would take up the whole screen every time you visit the site, with no way to bypass it.
– The body text would be overlayed on top of pictures and displayed at an angle, making it really hard to read.
– Navigation options that naturally go together, such as Previous and Next, would be placed far apart on the screen.
– After clicking a link, there would be a long delay while a pointless animation or visual effect plays.

Obviously, these scenarios sound ridiculous. Yet we’re forced to interact with this type of design whenever we watch a DVD. Sadly, I doubt this is going to change until someone outside the DVD authoring field gets in the business. Only then will the studios be able to see what their customers have been missing.