Hyper Adaptive Web Interfaces

I was reading about adaptive education where the technology adapts to the needs and actions of a student, helping him or her progress at their own pace and possibly skipping over subject areas they test out of. This optimizes the learning experience for the student, let’s the teach know the progress and pace of that student and allows everyone to move ahead at their own speed.

I was thinking about applying this to web interfaces. Why can’t we create adaptive interfaces that change based on how you use the website and optimize to your needs?

As it is web interfaces are mostly static and may change depending upon whether you’re on an iPad, an Android or a desktop computer. That’s it.

On Amazon there are certain parts of the site I never use, certain features of Prime that I don’t visit and aspects of the site that just bug me. Let’s change that.

What I’d like to see happen is the interface for Amazon learn to discard options and navigation which I never use, make the text boxes bigger depending on how long I take to enter in information and change colors depending on which help me along psychologically. Amazon could build in queues that help me along the purchase path while leaving those that don’t work for me, out.

What else could change within a website dependent up usage?

• Re-prioritize navigation
• Shrink or enlarge buttons and text boxes
• Change page layout
• Optimize for color
• Change text based on reading speed

By adapting a website to my particular use case, site owners can speed up and optimize for maximum return. The quicker I can do what I need to do the better for the site owner, their ROI and my general satisfaction.