Today is D-Day. Or maybe we should say iDay: the launch of the iPhone. Only a few select people have been allowed to use it up to now, so it's kind of early to form an opinion about it. But one concern that I must say I share is: how smudge proof is that wonderful glass touch-screen? Will my iPhone (when I get it with a discount in 5 years...) look like this?

A well, who cares. I just need to have it anyway. I'll bring baby wipes or something.

via Bright

Technorati Tags: consumer product usability, design, interaction design, mobile phones, usability, user interface design

This is my TV remote control and I love it. It's not that often that I hear someone mention his or her remote in positive terms, so I figured I'd explain myself. The thing is a generic remote control for low and mid-end TV sets. What I like about it is that it is not a black box with 46 similar buttons in a matrix. With this remote someone actually thought about where to put what, and how it should look. At the top, and clearly separated from the rest in a circular shape, there's the most used buttons: volume, channel, on/off and mute. These functions are right under your thumb if you hold the remote in a neutral position (see picture below). Below those primary keys there's the numbered keys to access a specific channel, or punch in a teletext page. Below hat there's a line (as if to say "watch out it gets complicated down here..."), and then you get the teletext controls. Good hierarchy, but the icons of the teletext buttons are a bit hard to understand (some room for improvement there). And at ultimate lower part of the remote you'll find the controls to program the TV set.

All in all I think it's a great design, mostly because of the hierarchy, grouping and difference in form factor between the function sets. Also the remote fits the hand better than most square boxes. Needless to say it's not shipping anymore...

(click images to enlarge)

See also:
> One Person Per Household Understands the Remote
> More Than 4 Remotes in 75% of Dutch Homes
> Fruit-Sticker Fixes Unusable Universal Remote
> How to Design a Usable Remote Control

Earlier on I was slightly mocking the capability of 1967 film makers to predict the kitchen of 1999. If you like this type of 'look into the future that never was', visit this weblog on paleo-futures. However, some predictions of the near future can be pretty accurate. Take this 1999 movie, made by Ericsson (that did both networks and handsets at the time). It illustrates the - back then - future possibilities of 3G mobile phones. I don't think that there's anything in the movie that hasn't arrived yet. Taking pictures, looking movies, gps functionality, listing to music. Well, maybe one minor detail that's off: we're still sticking to mp3s for music, and not mp6 as the movie suggests.

Of course Ericsson, being a network technology supplier, was in a place to push these technologies. The fact that they made this movie tells you they were going to make an effort to bring these functionalities to the market. And it spans less than 10 years. But still, it's remarkable just how much the movie resembles mobile phone use in 2007.

Technorati Tags: business and usability, consumer product usability, consumer products, design research, interaction design, user-centred design

The West Wing, one of my personal favorites when it comes to television, puts workplace ergonomics on the map. In the episode The Lame Duck Congress, characters Donna and Josh go over the issue:

DONNA
See, what I think you don't understand is that Carpal Tunnel is only one of many afflictions that fall into the category of repetitive stress injuries or RSI and which are covered by the science of ergonomics.

JOSH
I'm not in charge of the science of ergonomics. You're going to have to find somebody else who, you know, cares.

DONNA
You don't have to be in charge of it, OSHA is. They're come up with a new series of industry standards. And I want to know why the White House isn't implementing them.

JOSH
[pouring himself coffee] Because the SPA says the cost to small business could exceed 18 billion dollars in the first year. They'll be a huge increase in workmen's compensation premiums. And republicans find the word ergonomics to be silly.

DONNA
If we backed off everything because of words Republicans find silly we'd have a lot of pregnant teenagers and no health care.

JOSH
We do have a lot of pregnant teenagers and no health care.

DONNA
So, how's your plan going so far?

Thus pointing out one of the major issues in ergonomics: who's paying for it, and what do we gain from it? But the real point of course is that no one can correctly pronounce the word ergonomics without smirking. Read more on the issue of workplace ergonomics in this topic on footnotetv.com.
By the way, I would have loved to put a 15 second movie of the scene online, because it's all a little more engaging if you see this text acted out, but I figured I'd spare myself the lawsuit. But if you're an NBC executive and want to grant me permission, please drop me a line.

Technorati Tags: business and usability, ergonomics, usability

At the turn of the century (from 20th to 21st that is) we were supposed to use cheap, disposable dishes, food would be stored frozen in personal portions, and the computer would keep track of our supplies. All this we can learn from the brilliant film "1999 A.D.", made in 1967, showing the marvelous kitchen of the future. Makes you wonder how accurate we are right now in our predictions.

via: core77 and boingboing.

Technorati Tags: usability, user research, user-centred design

A nice concise visual overview of the human-centered design process, as described in ISO 13407 at this website (by the Mitsue company) and on the site of the usabilityweb project.

Technorati Tags: business and usability, usability, user-centred design

A lot of people are dying to get their hands on the iPhone, and try out that spectacular multi-touch display. J.Ello from Tech Op/Ed actually got some hands-on experience with the iPhone and has some reservations. Among others, there's the lack of tactile feedback.

Typing on the iPhone compared to a Treo (Or any keyboarded device) is clumsy at best. The touchscreen may be infinitely more accurate than anything you’ve every used before, but still suffers from the lack of tactile feedback. Typing with it is a little like regaining your virginity, you suddenly can’t be sure of hitting the right buttons, or that you’ve touched hard enough.

Thx to Bob for the tip

Technorati Tags: consumer product usability, design, interaction design, mobile phones, usability

aimed at emerging markets
It's definitely slick an has some amazing specs. 68 grams, 4,5 hours of talk time, 396 hours of standby time, and en E-ink screen. Motorola's Motofone F3 is intended for the 'emerging markets', such as Africa. The target group at the so-called bottom of the pyramid: the poorest but biggest socio-demographic group. In other words: the millions of customers who don't want to take pictures or listen to music. Making calls at a low price, that's what they want. The F3 just offers the basic functionality, and was fitted with an E-ink screen to improve battery time and legibility (even in broad daylight). Read more on the development of the product here.

compromising on usability
Dutch newspaper De Volkskrant took a look at the Motofone F3 and observed a number of usability issues. First of all the unconventional display can only display two lines of 6 characters each, which makes sending an sms (max. 160 characters) quite cumbersome. "As if you're trying to read messages on a pocket calculator," according to De Volkskrant. For some reason it is not possible to correct a spelling error in an sms you wrote: back means erasing the whole message. The phone only has seven basic menu options, that are accessible by scrolling through icons. All text labels were removed from the menu, as many of the projected users cannot read. Which is why the phone also addresses users with audio feedback ("give pin code") in local languages (a distribution nightmare I guess...). However, the menu does not provide a good overview, and it's not immediately clear what an icon means.

the situatedness of usability
If you compare the F3 to 'western' high end phones, I can imagine these remarks. They do reduce the usability. However, the phone was not aimed at advanced users in an advanced context. If your two options are having a mobile phone and not having one, you're less interested in usability, and more in the functionality the phone offers. And some design decisions, such as the icon-based menu, were made with a specific target group in mind. If you can't read, what good are well chosen text labels?

Basically, the Motofone F3 is just a great illustration situatedness of usability, as reflected by the ISO definition of usability (ISO 9241-11):

Usability is the extent to which a product can be used by specified users to achieve specified goals, with effectiveness, efficiency and satisfaction, in a specified context of use.

It all depends on who you are, where you live, and what you want. The efficiency of a wind-up radio sucks if you have batteries or a power outlet, but you'd be really pleased to have it if you're somewhere where you can find neither one. But then again, that can never be an excuse for poor usability within that specific situation.

Technorati Tags: consumer electronics, consumer product usability, design, mobile phones, usability

The Rich Interactions Camera by Joep Frens

Joep Frens from the faculty of Industrial Design in Eindhoven (NL) did a PhD project in which he studied an interaction paradigm which he refers to as rich interaction:

To design for rich interaction is to start from people’s skills, aiming at aesthetic interaction, concurrently designing form, interaction, and functionality.

During his research he developed four working prototypes of digital cameras, ranging in interaction style from a conventional interface to a more tangible, rich interaction style. The four variants are presented in movies on his website www.richinteraction.nl. The conclusion was that the test participants preferred the rich interaction style over the buttons of the conventional camera, and interestingly, that no difference in perceived usability was found.

I would have expected some problems with the learnability of such a novel interaction style, but in the abstract on the website it is reported that the participants found no differences in 'perceived usability'. Which is interesting, because I think that evaluating the usability of a product should always go beyond self reports. All in all the Rich Interaction paradigm seems very interesting, would love to get my hands on one of those cameras one day.

Technorati Tags: consumer electronics, consumer product usability, design, interaction design, usability