“The most common user action on a Web site is to flee.”
- Edward Tufte, Information Design Guru

So when is too much control in an interface a bad thing? When are having too many functions available in an interface just too much for the average user?

Well I know BMW has gotten their share of criticism lately for their iDrive UI in their vehicles but I had no idea just how many functions within that system were adjustable. Apparently almost every facet of the vehicle is adjustable…radio stations, rain sensors, gearbox, horsepower, tire sensors, light sensors, seat adjustment, active cruise, traction control, etc., etc. There’s been a fair share of automobile journalists a bit overwhelmed with the BMW system and I imagine the same response is evoked in certain vehicle buyers.

This reminds me of what happens in traditional software UI design when you turn a design solely over to engineers. As Alan Cooper has illustrated in his books, engineers don’t think like normal people, they always prefer more controls over less controls, expert systems over simpler systems, and generally add more and more functionality into a system until we have feature creep on a grand scale, not to mention reduced usability. Not to criticize engineers too much, because they couldn’t do the amazing things they do if their minds worked any other way. But as for design by engineers, why is the horsepower even adjustable in the first place in the BMW M5? Which brings me back to the point. When is too much freedom, too many options and functionality, in the user experience a bad thing?

Robert Farago over at The Truth About Cars thinks automotive manufacturers are already at the point of too much. He points out how, contrary to popular opinion, the vast majority of consumers share similar likes and dislikes. He illustrates his point with the myriad number of options available to BMW M5 (pictured) buyers. While there are a few us hardy folks who would enjoy programming the vehicle’s suspension, shifting, e-tracs, horsepower and gearbox options (there are 279 combinations), the average buyer will either use the default options or seek a less complicated car.

Farago suggests automakers go against the grain and–gasp!–lessen consumer choice of features. This includes designing said features with fewer settings (i.e., heated seats are just On/Off). The consumer will then enjoy driving their car, not be frustrated trying to remember which submenu contains the volume control for the ninth audio speaker in the third row of seating of the ‘Don’t-Call-It-A-Van’ grand tourer/people mover.

As much as purple dinosaurs would have us believe otherwise, most humans share the same likes and dislikes. Put an Audi MMI interface in front of a wealthy, middle-aged man, and he’ll use it (or not) the same way as any other wealthy, middle-aged man: completely ignoring 80% of its functions. If middle-aged men are your core clientele, confronting them with options they don’t want or (worse) understand is an indisputably boneheaded idea.

Robert Farago’s Article >>

I predict numerous economic ripples from the annoucement this week of [Apple's video iPod/iTunes->http://www.apple.com/itunes/videos/], but let’s also point out that the user experience for personal video players just took a giant leap forward. And that’s really what’s driving the ball here–the user experience.

It’s not because Apple’s hardware is that innovative. Apple’s iPod has been around for a while and playing videos on any personal video player (PVP) device is just not that big of a stretch technology wise. But, what really has changed is the user experience for a PVP. Now it’s actually easy to buy a video, load it, and play it via iTunes and the new iPods. Here’s what [CNET->http://news.com.com/Commentary+Apples+video+jump-start/2030-1041_3-5895461.html?part=rss&tag=5895461&subj=news] said this week…

While Apple is not the first company offering a portable video player or a legal download service–Microsoft got there first with partners CinemaNow, TiVo, Creative, Samsung and Zvue–Apple does it better. Together with its new iTunes video-capable software, Apple created a simple, end-to-end experience for video purchase, download and portable viewing.

And that last point is key. Apple was the first to see that the user experience with all these other devices including the Sony Playstation Portable, which really has one of the most beautiful small screens anywhere, should have been out there first. But they aren’t. And like I mentioned in a [previous post->http://www.rnalabs.com/archives/18], you have to bridge that gap between your hardware and software with an easy user experience. It’s shouldn’t be stupid difficult. Keep it simple, make it easy. It’s easy to make it hard, and hard to make it easy.

Personal video player (PVP) hardware developers just don’t get it yet. The user experience doesn’t stop at the device, it extends to the desktop.

Take Sony as as example. While the PSP was designed as a gaming platform it seems to be used a lot with video playback from the memory sticks. "The Street finds its own use for things." My expectation is that transfering a video to a PVP device should be as easy as an putting a song on my iPod using iTunes. But not so. There’s no cross plaform iTunes like interface from Sony for managing video content on the PSP. Sony really missed the boat with this aspect of their device. Users have to resort to third-party utilities that manage the alphabet soup of video CODECs, formats, and sizes. If you thought music file formats were difficult, with all the different bit rates and mp3’s vs. AAC’s vs. ogg’s, video is a true nightmare compared to digital music. One look at my compression software and there’s a litany of choices; Quicktime, Real, or Windows Media wrappers, compression in MPEG-1,2,4, Motion JPEG, Sorenson, H.261, H.263, H.264, DV, etc. In addition, there are various frame rates and audio compression choices of various flavors. Wow, what a user experience nightmare. Which really means there’s a huge opportunity for any company that get videos working as easy as the iTunes/iPod, hardware/software marriage. If you’ve seen other PVP’s out there that you think have nailed it, leave a comment, let me know.