Persona Misnomer

Microsoft have been using user archetypes for a while now and have released some interesting papers on how they can be deployed in development teams, but I have reservations about the recent publication of MSN's personas.

The purpose of defining an archetypal user from data about many users who form your current and target audiences, is to give a 'Persona' to statistics. The very act of boiling down figures into a tangible, realistic character helps focus a team on who they are designing and building for. But for this to be a worthwhile, non-refutable exercise, the personas must be realistic. Being realistic means being non-elastic, team members cannot stretch 'Mandy' into any variety of people to validate the design they personally advocate. If 'Mandy' doesn't understand how to enter a URL into an address bar, that does not mean she doesn't understand most of the week, but does on Sundays.

So, stating that Amanda is age 14-17 makes her unrealistic. Exactly how old is she? Unreal personas will quickly lose any value they may have had because as soon as you apply them, any decision can be refuted with another angle from within the definition. If the definition is specific and acute, there are few degrees of difference in what 'Amanda' will fundamentally understand and like.

MSNs personas are unreal in other ways too. All are particularly aspirational characters. Where's the realism? None of these people have even a sight impairment, a common characteristic that would have a significant impact on design.

Finally, the cue for the argument against what I'm on about here. If we're being truly user centred, we have to acknowledge who these persona web pages are aimed at. I would guess they're not even used by the internal design team, but have been conjured by the marketing department to depict the perfect audience for investors in advertising on MSN. Notice how they all use MSN products all day long? Notice how 'Jessica' manages her finances with MSN Money after a busy schedule of using MSN for her entertainment, socialising and news? I mean, c'mon lets get real! With all of Microsoft's recent disclosures of security gaps, who's going to trust them with the most private of affairs in one's life – money? Obviously some people do, so perhaps I'm speaking through my hat.

The point is, these personas aren't realistic. They appear to use nothing but MSN which is of course what MSN would have any potential advertiser believe. But are they personas? Is there a more appropriate name? Is it pedantic to want a distinction between these dream users and realistic personas used as a design tool? Did the design community steal these from the marketeers in the first place and therefore let them have the name personas and come up with a new one?