Rise of users and usability

Flashy designers (bleeding-edge) and simplicity gurus often don't agree when it comes to interaction design. There is a fundamental difference between designing for a client and designing for a client's client.

What is the objective of the design? Is it to satisfy your client's design eye? Many of us would say that to get business, their piece of design has to be what the client wants to see. While doing this they often do not design what they need to. So their design may make perfect sense to the designer or even to the client, but a design which a mere reflection of designer's or client's personal likings and must haves often does not solve the problem for which the very existence of that design is required. Design, whether for interaction or non-interaction media, has absolute, scientific measures of success that has nothing to do with the opinions of its creator or creator's client. Most often than not, both these parties have opinions that are personal and intangible.

Usable design always revolves around the user who is going to use it. This design does what it's meant to do for its users without overwhelming them with fancy stuff and also doesn't require users to find ways to complete their tasks. Such a design is always based on user's needs, objectives behind that design, tasks that design is meant to facilitate and/or the message designs' host wants to convey.

Signal vs. Noise.

Most often than not, every successful design turns out to be a very simple signal. After all, every solution for users' requirement is made of a simple signal. It's either the designer or the client and their personal choices that make it a noise. Those unnecessary elements or gimmicks they try to force on the simple signal which turns it into a noise. In all successful designs, usability takes precedence over "cool." All they need to ask themselves is "Is your user going to gain from these elements and gimmicks? Isn't the objective of your design to give user what he wants? How foolish you think your users are that you have to write 'apple' and draw one too (most of the times an animated one).

Now many would say what about the 'wow' factor? Noise gets that 'wow' in the first impression - no doubt. But that 'wow' normally sounds like this "Wow! This is great" Then there is a pause, admiration and then… "Let's move to the next one". So this 'wow' is very momentory. Signals also get a 'wow', the difference is that it comes after the user uses the design. It sounds like… "Wow! This really works for me."

When interaction design was in its primitive state in early 90s, poor designs were commonly seen. But then people were more committed to learning due to expense, obligation and limited choices, they were forced to adapt to poorly designed user-interfaces. But things have changed. When it comes to interaction design on digital channels, choice is the users' ballot, and their votes can be costly.

As interaction design evolved, agencies who understood users and usability by putting users before their own assumptions, have taken design and their own success to all new levels. We all would agree that Apple creates arguably the best user experiences when it comes to interaction design. Careful observation and you would notice that there are no bells and whistles to their designs. They still user the age old mantra of 'keep it simple'. Many of us find it difficult and believe that it's easier said than done. I have read somewhere during my art school days, "Try going through all of your design elements and removing them one at a time. If a design works without a certain design element, kill it."

While beautiful, engaging, impressive, and compelling designs are important for a variety of reasons (including creating brand identity, entertaining and drawing people in, and establishing credibility), design choices need to be weighed against meeting the user's needs in order for the goal to be achieved.

Isn't that the ultimate objective?

iPhone wannabe blackberry

Last evening I had a chance to get my hands on BlackBerry storm and instead of getting blown away I was just puzzled and wondered what the hype all about was. In single line I feel blackberry storm is like a person caught between split personalities from within.

Considering that the market is really heating up with technology giants trying to compete with the iphone, it’s hard to overstate how important the BlackBerry Storm is to RIM. It's RIM's bold effort to fend off the iPhone...

It's good —RIM clearly put a lot of thought into this design. But I think it falls short of what they were aiming for, and ultimately what all the hype is driving people to expect.

It’s well established by now that "touchscreen" is the code for ‘iPhone competitor’. You'll see that in terms of hardware, the Storm is much more competitive with the iPhone than the underwhelming and overpromising G1 (google phone).

It feels surprisingly heavy ... It feels thick, too, thicker than it actually is, because of its squarish shape ... On the other hand though, all this substance also makes the Storm feel really robust ... It has sleek and very well sized contours. I may sound confused myself but yes that’s true. Storm has this capacity to confuse people with its first impression.

Interface of Storm breaks away from all of blackberry’s previous releases. Though the usability is still not at par with the iphone, it’s the best attempt done in that regard. No Wi-Fi is a huge negative. That's the major area where iPhone has an advantage, although BlackBerry smartphones are typically aimed at enterprise users, who primarily use their smartphones for e-mail -- so they may not mind. Still, quite a big omission from a handset that features a web browser and multimedia capabilities virtually identical to the iPhone.

I feel the Storm needed a little bit longer in the oven — it still feels a bit half baked. It just lags all over the place in performance, which is a sin with a touch-based UI where response time holds the key to overall experience. It really needs to be more stable. I guess it won’t be long before there's a software update, it needs one badly. G1, I have heard scores very well on that aspect.

Overall, the Storm appears to attempt to strike a balance between "business" and "casual," allowing serious enterprise users to take a breather every once and a while and watch a video, for example. However, it would be interesting to see whether enterprise users will appreciate the lack of a physical QWERTY keyboard and that all famous roller. That would be the most important feature these high-fliers will miss. That has actually made a huge difference between using a smart phone and the smartest business phone – blackberry.

So, to conclude: Storm neither threatens to dethrone the iphone nor has the capability to force all blackberry users to upgrade. Young entry users in to enterprise usage would have a very good option though.

Slumdog v/s millionaire

After a long time I saw something extraordinary. Not only picture perfect in terms of storyline but also the execution was impeccable. Every frame, every move, every character was well thought of. This may be because Danny Boyle did not have any big wigs of Bollywood to please by giving them more screen space than others. Movie, getting its well deserved accolades and praise could be a surprise for all associated with the film but not to it’s viewers who I think, would agree that they knew it as soon as the first half was over.

What followed after that was a shame. Everyone was ready to give their opinion about the film. Some called it “The underbelly of the third world”. Some called it “Wrong image of India”. I just have few things to say to this. We are all used to living in that dream world created by few cash rich producers of Bollywood who make glorified wedding videos. These families never have to work; they all live in palatial houses, always wear picture perfect make-up and dress like ramp models or cocktail party attendees. It’s like landing in Mumbai with eyes closed till u come out from the aircraft. They just make us believe that that’s India. It doesn’t take too much to just get to know the real India. So what’s wrong in showing the reality?

Let’s accept that we have this Slumdog v/s Millionaire situation in India or for that matter in all developing countries. Towers are growing higher and their shadows are covering the darkness that is growing deeper and deeper.

Yes, Bollywood should be shameful about this film. But not because of what’s shown in the film, but because it took somebody from UK to pick up a novel written by an Indian, come to India; hire an Indian co-director and an entire Indian cast to create a masterpiece which Bollywood can only criticize.