It's amazing how difficult it is for UI designers to make hard decisions. By this I mean the decision to leave stuff out. To choose that less is more. To remove functionality out of a product. To throw stuff away that is not really needed.
Instead, many designers tend to see their work as how to package that additional feature somehow into the product. It's as if cleaning your room always has to consist of rearranging stuff, never chucking away those old pair of jeans, or the book that someone gave to you for your birthday and you never had time to read. Many designers marvel at their ingenuity of somehow managing to keep everything in the room, just in case it's needed. And the room contains more and more stuff in it.
But decisions must be made. And things need to be thrown away. So that users entering a room find stuff easily, and everything there is wonderful. And they can go about doing their things in an enjoyable way. But it's not easy making those decisions.
Why can't there be more UI designers with that discipline? A deep belief that sometimes, less is more.
( more thoughts on less is more: Mies van der Rohe, who coined "less is more", a minimalist architect )
Rubbish, at least if you don't have a solution other than to throw things out and keep things simple, as is your way, yet you never get it because there is still always too much on the Skype GUI and always will be if your idea is a conflict between keeping and throwing out. There is another way entirely that solves this issue and would be that WOW factor you are looking for, but why would we give it to you for free? That was said to you in Tallin. The room was silent. And you stated that you don't believe the issue of simple and advanced can ever be resolved it has to be one or the other. And you avoided those who had the solution for you. No wonder Skype UI satisfies often neither group, though 2.5 is now better for power users. It is useless for Grandma. There is an easy way out of this if you can think outside the box, or listen to those who know how to do it instead of thinking you have all the answers or avoiding them.
Posted by: Nomad | 11 August 2006 at 10:34 AM
Good subject--but quite a challenge. Swapping out menus and replacing them with mouse-overs and buttons is very tricky work. Especially if your user universe is very small. Doing these things in a vacuum proves very difficult knowing that 90% of the available functions are used by 10% of the users.
The longer I hold a cell phone in my hand, the lower my threshold for frustration becomes. And that device hangs around my neck every day.
Today I thought about having a little person on my shoulder to encourage me to explore the deeper functionalities of my cell phone driving to the value I can actually receive from Nextel. Unfortunately, I am that little man for my partner who often calls me with a cell phone use tip!
Posted by: jim asiano | 11 May 2006 at 01:10 AM