I'm sorry you hate the avatar! I get lots of mixed feedback about it, but overall the feedback has been positive. I accept that I can't make everyone happy unfortunately.
I am trying to avoid walls of text, but I think it is an unfair statement to say that people don't like to read. People are reading the same amount of text regardless of whether pictures exist or not.
Unfortunately, I can't remember the name of the book, but there's one on brain science that discusses how people process text. Letters are still images as far as our eyes and brain are concerned. There's an extra processing step to turn one type of image (letters) into another type of image (what the letters are describing). This is exhausting and throwing in images act as "taking a break" even if that break is only a second or two.
I'd like to chime in and agree -- the cartoon dudes are mildly amusing. It might be disconcerting that they are so large, but then I ended up un-zooming most of the page, so it might just be PEBCAK at my desk. ;)
I can see the intention, but it had the exact opposite effect for me. My eyes were drawn to these images like some blinking ad banner, and I got annoyed about how it draws my attention away from the content.
I am trying to avoid walls of text, but I think it is an unfair statement to say that people don't like to read. People are reading the same amount of text regardless of whether pictures exist or not.
Unfortunately, I can't remember the name of the book, but there's one on brain science that discusses how people process text. Letters are still images as far as our eyes and brain are concerned. There's an extra processing step to turn one type of image (letters) into another type of image (what the letters are describing). This is exhausting and throwing in images act as "taking a break" even if that break is only a second or two.