Andrew Wirtanen » HCI

The next big thing: Internet-enabled set-top boxes

Andrew Wirtanen — Sat, 21 Aug 2010 22:58:55 +0000

Do you know anyone who is still saving up for an iPad? I bet you don’t. That ship has sailed. The iPad did not really disappoint, but it never proved itself as a necessity. Sure, I’d like one to keep on my living room table, but I’d much rather have the new Kindle. But, I don’t view that as a necessity either since I can always read books for free from my library.

The iPhone has proven itself as more than a luxury item. All cellphones that can’t browse the Internet quickly became dinosaurs the second the iPhone was released. Sure, I pay more per month for service (just under $70 on my grandfathered plan), but it’s worth it. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve used the GPS with Google Maps to figure out where I am, or I learned something important with the ability to check my email/twitter/Facebook/etc.

A lot of people I know live without cable television. Considering you can save over $600/year by going unplugged, it’s not a bad idea. Cable TV is a lot of money, especially if you tack on the HD DVR and extra channels. You can watch a number of TV shows online now, but there isn’t one clean solution to put them on your big, shiny LCD.

In September, that will change.

Get ready to spend $99 on the iTV from Apple. Kevin Rose (founder of Digg) says the device “will change everything”. If you look at his reasoning, he’s absolutely right. Of course, the Boxee box will be released right alongside the rumored iTV. Unfortunately, not many people outside the tech community have heard of Boxee (and everyone has heard of Apple). Google TV will join the party a little later, providing iTV with the same competition that the iPhone faces from Android devices.

Forrester says 14% of Americans are considering buying a tablet next year. Companies are rushing to get their tablet out the door. Instead, they should be rushing to come up with their Internet set-top box.

Anyone want to buy a 40GB Apple TV?

So why don’t you slide?

Andrew Wirtanen — Sat, 03 Jul 2010 17:36:59 +0000

Despite efforts like the reCAPTCHA project, we still hate CAPTCHAs.

Famed web form guru Luke Wroblewski posted on his blog about an alternative from They Make Apps. All you do is slide to submit a form. I can’t believe this would actually work. It’s pretty simple, but Luke notes that we still need an accessible alternative for those that can’t use a mouse. Anyway, this technique already has a theme song:

Do you wake up on your own/and wonder where you are? You live with all your faults/../So why don’t you slide? (Goo Goo Dolls – “Slide”)

If Mario Was Designed in 2010

Andrew Wirtanen — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 03:56:45 +0000

This blog post by a game designer was intended to poke fun at contemporary trends in games. But, I think it also applies to a trend in usability. In usability, it’s cliché now to joke about putting something in the manual. Everyone in the field pretends that manuals don’t exist when they’re designing products (unless, of course, said product is the manual). But, I’ve never heard anyone discuss providing too much help or guidance. Sometimes when you don’t provide any guidance, the end user has the most fun and they learn more quickly how do things (like in Nintendo’s Super Mario Bros.).

My suggestion: Provide visual cues when appropriate. Allow for some exploration if it’s not a one-time-only or walk-up-and-use interface (like an ATM or grocery self-checkout). Users are smart and will figure some things out on their own. Don’t interrupt them frequently with tips–put all the help you want in a sub-menu.

Chatroulette Improv

Andrew Wirtanen — Sun, 21 Mar 2010 17:30:47 +0000

Ben Folds is playing with the NC Symphony this week, and I just ran into a fun video from March 20th of Ben having fun with Chatroulette in Charlotte (I love the irony):

Click here to view the embedded video.

Chatroulette is a very simple site that sets you up in a webcam chat with a random stranger. The site was created by a high school student in Russia and was launched in November 2009. It only took off recently, and on March 11th the first piano improv video was posted by Merton. The video has since gotten over 3 million views on YouTube and Ben Folds took notice, probably because a lot of people thought Merton was Ben Folds. Here’s the original video:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Chatroulette brings me back to the early days of the Internet when a lot of simple sites existed. You could have your own web page on Geocities and live virtually in a community with neighbors. AOL and Yahoo Chat were both pretty big, and it was fun to talk to people around the world. It’s nice to have a website that makes the Internet personal again. I feel like so often I’m using the Internet, not signed on to chat, and not talking (or twittering) to anyone in particular.

Experience Is The Product

Andrew Wirtanen — Sat, 16 Jan 2010 15:53:44 +0000

Peter Merholz (Adaptive Path) posted on his blog this week that his slidecast “Experience Is The Product” hit 400,000 views. Peter gave the talk at dConstruct 2007 in Brighton, UK. The presentation argues for focusing on the experience rather than technology and features. It’s a great talk that uses examples of good user experience design that we still use today, three years later (e.g. Nintendo Wii, iPhone, iPod, Tivo, etc.).

By the way. Slideshare doesn’t give you valid XHTML for embedding, but I found this tutorial that shows you how to embed valid slidecasts.

CRISTAL: Control your living room with your coffee table

Andrew Wirtanen — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 02:00:53 +0000

Researchers at the Media Interaction Lab of Upper Austria University have demonstrated an alternative use for Microsoft Surface tables. It’s called CRISTAL: Control of Remotely Interaced Systems using Touch-based Actions in Living spaces. In the demo video, you can see how the interactive table controls the entire living room, from the TV to the Roomba. It’s a pretty cool idea that is aimed at improving the living room user experience by consolidating remote controls and making devices more interconnected.

My concerns are that interactive tables are very pricey and the angle of control could be awkward for the user. Also, you can’t exactly keep magazines on your living room table any more, and kicking your feet up on a $10,000 multi-touch computer just doesn’t seem like a good idea… maybe someday these things will be more affordable and CRISTAL will be a reality.

Click here to view the embedded video.

[Wired via Gizmodo]

Chroma-Hash makes confirming your password easier

Andrew Wirtanen — Sun, 02 Aug 2009 23:53:56 +0000

One of the most frustrating things on the Internet is when you have to type in a password twice. Sometimes, a website will force you to hit the “submit” or “log in” button before it tells you that the passwords don’t match! Chroma-Hash is a jQuery plugin that securely generations a color bar for each password field. If the color bars don’t match, then the passwords don’t match.

I love this idea, but of course it wouldn’t work as well if you are color blind (or blind, for that matter).

[Chroma-Hash Demo via information aesthetics]

Texting While Driving–the Flash game!

Andrew Wirtanen — Sun, 19 Jul 2009 19:04:02 +0000

The New York Times has released a driving simulation Flash game that tests your ability to multitask. It’s far from scientific (and so was the NBC driving experiment) since the game requires a constant rate of lane switching and has a constant rate of incoming text messages, but it’s fun and educational nonetheless.

While I initially thought that banning texting while driving was ridiculous (i.e., why not ban eating while driving too?), I am seeing it more frequently. Also, it is more challenging to text with touchscreen phones because they lack tactile feedback.

[New York Times via Waxy Links]

Tips from Two Tweeps

Andrew Wirtanen — Thu, 28 May 2009 01:53:13 +0000

Boston has a very strong usability community, which every year turns out in great numbers to their own annual “Mini-UPA” conference in the spring. It’s called Usability & User Experience and it actually has grown to compete with the national UPA conference.

A couple of my former peers at Bentley (@jledwell and @kaniasty) created a great presentation on Twitter called “Tips from Two Tweeps: How User Experience Pros Find Value on Twitter.” Apparently, the presentation drew a full room and sparked great conversation. The presentation mentions @uxforward, a user experience link sharing service, which I started back in December ’08. @jledwell now does a lot of the posting for @uxforward.

[@jledwell's blog: Compete on Usability]

Designing for Big Data

Andrew Wirtanen — Sat, 02 May 2009 13:43:32 +0000

Jeffrey Veen (Small Batch, Inc.) gave a great talk on data visualization at O’Reilly’s Web 2.0 Expo in San Francisco recently (March 31-April 3, 2009). He provides a history of usage of visualizations, including the first subway map (the tube map) and John Snow’s map that is credited with ending the 1854 cholera outbreak in Soho, London. He then talks about how visualizations have changed from telling a story, to allowing users to discover their own stories.

It’s a clear, concise (20 minutes), and modern look at information visualization.

Click here to view the embedded video.

[Veen.com via Waxy.org Links and information aesthetics]