Modern Human-Computer Interfaces have a variety of nuanced ways to indicate the status of a component, the relationships between components, the actions afforded by an element, and many other patterns. These nuances are designed to indicate the structure and possibilities of a system to people who don't already understand it. But this suite of indications, visual, typographic, and experiential cues is still not clear to everyone.
There is a famous digital divide between those who have access to and benefit from digital technology, and those who are barred access and don't benefit or are exploited by the technology. Since the exciting thing about computer networks, to me, is the way they already redistribute power (putting more of it in the hands of those at the edge of the material power network than before), it seems an exciting prospect to challenge this divide. One of the key barriers to the technology have-nots getting wired is, of course, a lack of funds, but there are cultural and educational barriers too. Since the Internet is the ultimate autodidactic tool, it's especially tempting to overcome these educational barriers, when so much education could unfold to those who can surmount them.
Has any project been attempted in trying to design interfaces for people who have never successfully used a computer before—or know anyone who has? I mean homeless people, and non-industrialized cultures. Children don't count, they can learn anything.
Assuming you have sharp, professional-quality interaction designers at your disposal, and plenty of time to test and re-test interfaces, could you create something that was substantially more usable by disenfranchised technology have-nots? Avoiding the kind of design that has gone into chintsy kiosks and idiot-proof museum displays would be the bugaboo of this effort: condescending to the users is right out. You're not allowed to make it "easier" just by upping the text size 50% and using monosyllabic words. Museum kiosks, ATMs, and the like, are very sloppy in this respect. The goal here is to design a human interface for a computer that deeply serves a specific audience, one that has no prior experience with computers—nor VCRs, digital wristwatches, or answering machines. Mainstream culture has managed to learn conceptual models for these devices over the decades, and it comes easily now, but there was a long time when a great many of those people were afraid to operate any VCR buttons other than "Play" and "Stop." What about people who've avoided—through opportunity or temperament—that cultural learning process?
What would it take to create an interface for writing a weblog, ideally suited for people who have never used anything digital?
Wow, what a coincidence. Just this morning, I was thinking about how Wow, what a coincidence! Just this morning, I was thinking about how computer usability changes as people become used to common ways of doing things. I was thinking that there are some easy-to-use systems, that would have been criticized in usability tests 5 years ago. Instead, they forged ahead with a good interface that everyone quickly learned and likes.
I was wondering which of the difficult usability issues we're attempting to tackle today will change as people become used to certain ways of dealing with it. Conventional usability testing and design doesn't seem to allow for evolution of the users. Perhaps in some cases, it might be better to guess how the users will change rather than pick an awkward but most-of-today's-users-can-figure-it-out solution.
In any case, you seem to be asking the opposite question. Going in the other direction, how much of what users understand is based on previous experience with technology? What if someone had no experience, how would you design it? Of course, it's not true that someone has no experience. People know that things that look like buttons usually do something when pressed. That's from the technology of telephones, doorbells and radios. Or even if you're talking about people who haven't seen buttons, then we have to assume they know that a bumpy object will encounter more friction than a smooth one, or that non-connected things can be moved while rooted things generally cannot, or at least basic principles about gravity. I don't think that anything can be usable just in itself. It has to be usable based on people's experience. You have to figure out what that experience is and use it as a stepping stone to help them understand your interface.
I wonder if you're suggesting that we should abandon some of the current idioms used throughout computer interfaces today and re-explore the question with the have-nots in mind. Even if you could do this to create a more successful interface for those people, you would be doing them a disservice. More important than initial usability is consistency. No matter what a person's previous experience is, he needs to take time to learn your interface. You may be able to help him get there faster by leveraging his existing understanding, but eventually he won't be thinking "that corner of the window looks bumpy -- maybe I can pull it"; instead he'll just think "I can resize windows from the corner -- whether there is a bumpy thing or not". And it is this understanding of how to relate to computer interfaces that he will take with him to the next interface. And you will have done him no favor if you found a better alternative to the tabbed interface, because every other application will have this tabbed interface and he'll have to un-learn yours and learn the standard.
So perhaps a better question might be: how can we help the have-nots understand the modern computer metaphors? What intermediary steps would they need to take to become familiar with the current idioms? I think that would be more helpful than the world's best new UI.
Hi Jeremy,
Thanks for considering the question with me. My goal was not so much to uproot all the existing interfaces, or create a second-string alternative for have-nots (what you say about the culture-shock of switching seems plausible and compelling). What I was interested in was the learnings that would come from going all-out to make a new interface with different goals and techniques. It's always valuable to try to see things from another's point of view, and even moreso to create something tangible out of that effort. So much is invested in optimizing the experience of the elites, those who are already part and parcel of the system being optimized; I think we'd learn more ("we" haves and have-nots) by investing a smiliar amount in designing from the outsider's point of view. I'm certain we'd get some take-aways that would be useful to designers, no matter who their audience.
Some feminists have complained that "All the technology in the world is designed by men." This is an interesting accusation. How would it be different if it were designed ground-up by women? I have no idea whether it would be different or not, but how valuable it would be to have a bit of an answer! What if our society could undertake a really large-scale research project to try to explore that question—to hermetically seal a group of women from the influences of men, and have them redesign technology? What might we learn?
Finally, may note that all of your "have-nots," Jeremy, are "he"s?