For weeks now I've been seeing a button labeled "Alternative Login" on the UT home page. Each time I've said to myself, maybe someday I'll discover the deep and brilliant meaning of this.

al·ter·na·tive Pronunciation Key (ôl-tûrn-tv, l-). n.
1) The choice between two mutually exclusive possibilities.
2) A situation presenting such a choice.
3) Either of these possibilities.

When one looks for the implied "Preferred Login" or "Better Login" or whatever, and clicks on the "Support Area" or "Console" circles/bubbles/graphics/whatever one gets a panel with "User Name" and "Password" which seems completely silly and redundant. Also the message on that page that says "If you do not have Universal Thread account, you may click on Account setup from the upper menu" refers to an "upper menu" (whatever that is) which isn't there at all, it's on another page. I guess there is some economy in creating a panel loaded with watermarks and graphics but short on those expensive ugly hyperlinks that say "Account setup" close to where the user's eyes and mouse cursor are currently pointing.

I think that on balance it's a good thing that 99.99995% of the rest of the Internet hasn't yet found a way to generate such confusion about simply logging someone in.


**--** Steve