The Importance of Comfort

In my previous posts and throughout our class we have focused on the usability aspect of design and how it effects the user experience. It is often the level of comfort the user has when using the product however, that is truly important. A chair for example, can look beautiful, feel great to the touch, swivel 360 degrees, adjust the level up and down, but if it isn't comfortable when the user sits in it, it becomes useless. Often times in the design of modern products we are so obsessed with what or how many new things a product can do, that we lose sight of both its purpose and what makes the user happy. Usability will always be a key factor in design, but even a well designed product, where the user can easily see and achieve their objective, can be unsuccessful if it does not meet the comfort needs of the user. Throughout the average day people are forced to use uncomfortable products that sometimes even cause physical pain or injury. If businesses truly value the user experience, then why do most businesses contain industrial toilets and toilet paper that often leave the user both uncomfortable and unsatisfied. Is the money saved on tp really worth it if customers leave with a burning feeling they would rather not discuss. It is the same case with seating in businesses and almost any area where large groups gather. In a world where businesses are trying to stand out in the crowd, the comfort of users should become a much higher priority in both the designing of seating and bathrooms.

Classmates Blogs

In general I found that my classmates provided basic descriptions or quotes that led me to looking at their link and the actual article. I found Spencer's link and article about Dell and how they were trying to create a more user friendly design to be very interesting. Everyone knows that computers are all about user friendliness but few companies seem to be implementing this is their actual product. I also found the site linked from Roberts blog to be very interesting. I thought the idea of simplifying Normans idea was intriguing and i thought the seven principles were very good and possibly more applicable than Norman's.

Link to Roberts Blog

Link to Spencer's Blog

Interesting webpage

Who would have thought it -- a better stapler. This is a great example of how even the most mundane, commonplace commodity can be improved. Staplers look pretty simple and their design has not changed much, until now.
http://www.jnd.org/GoodDesign.html

I found this website to be very interesting because the author was discussing many of the same issues that we have been going over and actually talked about Norman. This site also was trying to find and give praise to everyday things that had actually been very well designed. I like the site and the premise because it is very difficult to know what products are usable before you buy and some kind of list or website would certainly be a useful consumer tool.

Making manuals fun

Let's take the whole damn ad/marketing budget and move it over to product manuals and support. Let's put our money where our users are. If we're in it for the short term, then sure--it makes sense to do everything to get a new user, while doing as little as possible once we've got them. But if we're really in it for the long haul--for customer retention and loyal users--then shouldn't we be using all that graphic design and pro writing talent for the people we care about the most? Our users?

http://headrush.typepad.com/creating_passionate_users/2006/08/why_marketing_s.html


This post is extremely interesting because it talks about not only what the problem is with manuals, this quote outlines how and why we should go about making them more interesting. I found this passage to be interesting because i have often thought about similar ideas, why large portions of money and resources are devoted to certain parts of design, but other parts, which are often more important, are neglected. I think that in order to changed this, people who design products have to realize the potential manuals have and how they could be used to improve the user experience and build customer loyalty.

My mouse

I feel that the mouse that I use for my laptop computer is very well designed. It has a curve on the sides and indents for your fingers so that it naturally fits your hand. In order to use the mouse you simply plug a small control into a USB port. It works extremely well requires little attention. My favorite feature however is that the USB attachment can be easily transported because if fits and attaches to the mouse, into a slot that is under the actual mouse. It makes it easy to transport and it becomes the ideal mouse for a portable computer ie students laptops. Also it makes it near impossible to lose the USB attachment. I never think about it meaning that it works well and I never have any issues with it. It lights up slightly when the USB attachment is inserted and when the mouse moves on the screen I have all the feedback I need. It is one of the best designed products that I have come across in some time.

Gym Showers

A product that I have encountered many times is the horribly flawed gym shower. It is most likely one of the worst designed products of the many that one finds in public schools. I assume its purposed must only be to make teen boys and girls have horrible hygiene, feel self conscious, and save as much water as possible. The gym shower at my middle and high schools were a series of long shower heads on both sides. In order to turn on the shower a student had to run in avoiding the spray of all the other showers, find a shower that function well and push the button in the middle to turn it on. They would then be hit with a powerful burst of freezing cold water. There was no space to put a towel or to place your own soap and shampoo. Teens would often come up with different theories on how to get warm water. Some claimed that twisting the knob would do it, others that it could be achieved only by pressing the button multiple times or leaving it on for several cycles before using it. In any case the cycle lasted approximately 15 seconds, so unless you were the worlds fastest showerer you had to press the button multiple times, as you attempted to get soap out of the impossible dispensers, in order to take a normal shower. The design is flawed in several ways: the mapping and feedback are horrible. It is impossible to determine if you have achieved warm water by some miracle of god, or by actually pressing some part of the shower. Users did not know which way to turn knobs, or how to effect water temperature change. The design failed to consider the needs of the user, there was no privacy, no place to set belongings, and no way to get soap. It failed to meet the users needs and often through the errors in achieving proper water temperature more water was wasted than saved through the "automatic shut off" every 15 seconds. People often repeatably pressed the button without even getting in, just to try and get warmer water. The end result of this horrible design was that many kids often chose to skip showers, and go through the day sweaty, rather than face the perils of cold water, frequent shut off, and little or no soap.

Egg Dropping

My partner Ben and myself began our process but outlining what we could create based on the limited materials that we had. We established that we could using shoelace and a trash bag, create a simplistic parachute and that, using a shoe box and some packaging material create a container in which the egg would likely survive. After this we set about obtaining these materials by traveling to the dorm recycling bin. In which we found both packaging material and a shoe box. I then removed shoelaces from a pair of my shoes and asked an RA for an extra trash bag. We then assembled our rudimentary design by attaching the shoelace to the bag and the shoelace to the box. we then placed the packaging material in the box and put the egg in there. Then we sealed it shut with tape and taped the shoelaces to the box. All that was then left was the testing phase. Ben and I were somewhat confident in the design although apprehensive about the parachute. In the first test onto the soft landing the parachute functioned well and the egg survived giving us some satisfaction in our success. I was very depressed however, when I learned that an egg could easily survive the fall without any designed structure. I was much more encouraged after the second drop when the parachute functioned well and the egg survived a drop onto concrete. I was even more excited and surprised when the egg survived without the parachute. Any attempts after that were just for fun but I was very satisfied with my first design experience. I had a lot of fun and dropping eggs had never been more exciting.