User Interface Criteria in Online Ticket Sales Systems Case study: Guggenheim Contemporary Art Museum in New York and Georges Pompidou cultural and artistic Center in Paris

User interface is an interface between user and machine which makes tools under application capable of being understood and known. User interface is considered as those parts of a tool which may be observed and touched by users or typically its appearance, with which the user directly deals. In other words, a desirable user interface provides a condition for easy transfer of what the user intends, to the computer. In the research, effort has been made to answer the following question upon several criteria mentioned thereafter: “To what extent these criteria have been observed in online sales systems of contemporary arts museums, as one of the most important economic online portals for such cultural and artistic complexes?” Aforementioned criteria include: stability, simplicity and clarity, graphic and combination of colors, using alerting messages and signals, flexibility, conclusiveness, not surprising the user, considering vision, frankness (power of selecting and decision making), not forcing the user to excessive mental workload, Shneiderman’s Eight Golden Rules, Nielsen and Molich’s Ten User Interface Design Guidelines and globalization of user interface design. To answer the question, online ticket sales systems of Guggenheim Art Museum (New York), and Center Georges Pompidou (Paris) have been analyzed, as a case study. Center Georges Pompidou is a cultural and artistic institute in Paris, established in 1977 and named after French president. The gallery is considered as the world’s largest contemporary art museum. The center includes “National museum of modern art”, “Industrial design center”, and “Administration office of cultural development”. Artistic and cultural exhibitions are always holding there, as well. The two other important organizations i.e. “Reference public library” and “The foundation for music and acoustic research and coordination” is also a part of this center. Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum is one of the famous museums in New York City, established in 1937. The museum was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, great American architect and interior designer. Both of the museums are from among the world’s most superior and famous contemporary art museums. As a result, they attract visitors and have audiences from all over the world. In the paper and recognizing user interface and some criteria to evaluated user interface in a system with consideration of high volume of addressees in these museums, user interface of ticketing system in these two museums would be studied, in addition to the point that how much concerned principles and criteria have been observed in designing their website? This applied research is considered as an analytical-descriptive research in terms of method. Library method of data collection has been used, as well as linear decomposition of the system structure; and, obtained criteria have been evaluated on the prototype. The results show that online ticket sales systems in both Guggenheim Art Museum (New York), and Center Georges Pompidou (Paris) are not only of very good graphic design; but also, they have created a simple and understandable user interface for communication and ticket sales. However, their user interfaces is incomplete; because, no updated content matching up to the museum’s programs is available, which results in lack of appropriate information provided to the audience. In fact, lack of appropriate pictures for each exhibition –to provide for better visual separation- is considered as one of the most important weakness points for both of the systems. Also, the systems could have been promoted and capable of attracting more audiences, if they would have been made available some side systems such as 360˚ virtual tours, cinema seat preview, pictograms, etc.