And it really should not. The link from a validation email should validate immediately, without requiring the additional action of a log-on.
Causing additional friction for your users is a sign of poor User Experience Design. The solution is easy: validate instantly.
Screenshot of LiveJournal’s Warning Page for E-mail Validation
The text reads:
“You do not have access to send email validation requests to other people. If you are trying to validate your own account, be sure you are already logged in to your journal in the same browser where the validation link opens.”
Why is this a problem?
Because each additional action you require your visitor to take proportionally reduces their willingness to complete the mission. Basically: you are making it difficult for users to use your services. Are you trying to scare them away?Why is this a User Experience Problem?
Because the web page in itself is fine. It works as designed, it reacted to the e-mail validation link, and it offered an exact description of what it expected.An Easily-Offered Solution
Stop requiring users to log in before you can validate their email address.We understand that this may require some effort on the part of LiveJournal in order for their blogging system to remain safe and secure, and it should be easier to build new systems without said restriction.
Whether LiveJournal should correct this failure may depend on a cost analysis: how much friction is it causing? How many users will complain about it, causing our brand name to lose respect? How many support cases will we have to tackle if it stays the way it is?
We hope LiveJournal is tracking these vectors and will be able to decide accurately. Of course we hope they will decide to remove friction: “the best user interface is no interface at all” (we believe it was Seth Godin who said this).
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