The 80-20 mentality in fullest flower appeared during the Internet boom in products like the various "Internet appliances" that did everything but what you wanted them to. Today's best example is desktop software for the Linux platform, where programs do a reasonable fraction of what you expect them to, then abruptly stop short. It's as though the developers figured that since 80% was good enough, they'd work only Mondays and take the rest of the week off.
....
Tech products ought to work as reliably as refrigerators--the old ones--instead of saddling us with their "good enough" shortcomings. Consumers are right to mistrust the tech world's frequent knee-jerk response that highly reliable products are simply too much to ask for.

Stephen Manes, "Good Enough Isn't," Forbes.com, 28 Oct 2002

1:07:32 PM    

All of us on the UI team think the value of Google is in not being cluttered, in offering a great user experience. I like to say that Google should be "what you want, when you want it." As opposed to "everything you could ever want, even when you don't."
....
The utmost thing is the user experience, to have the most useful experience. It's important to differentiate between "usefulness" and "usability." At Google, we make a *useful* tool, and then we put a *usable* interface on top of that. One has to precede the other. If you have usability without a useful product, you don't really have much.

Mark Hurst,"Interview: Marissa Mayer, Product Manager, Google," GoodExperience.com, 15 Oct 2002 via Tomalak's Realm.

11:35:50 AM    

4:53:08 PM    

2:41:04 PM    

''There are things that you just can't learn from questionnaires,'' he says. ''You have to see people with the product at the very moment they're using it.'' ... ''What consumers say and remember and what they actually do are often two totally different things.''
....
''You know, ... maybe the term ethnography is a bit of verbal hype. But it more or less fits what we do. Whatever you want to call it, it's a real window into real lives.''

Lawrence Osborne, "Consuming Rituals of the Suburban Tribe," New York Times, 13 Jan 2002

8:29:52 PM    

What's interesting about the negative feedback is that, aside from the aesthetic -- which is always subjective -- none of the feedback is consistent. One user wants one thing, another user wants it the exact opposite.

Douglas Bowman,"Love It or Hate It?," StopDesign.com, 14 Oct 2002 via Scripting News

1:07:10 PM    

Dr. Gonick links his technical spareness to his view on the role of technology in the world at large. “For me it’s a philosophical aspiration — that technology will have its largest impact on our condition when it’s invisible,” he said.

Katie Hafner, "Wired, but Drawing the Line," New York Times, 10 Oct 2002

11:01:53 AM    

"I don't think the product line is ready to deliver what the ad campaign promises"

Danny Hakim, "Amid Skepticism, Buick Tries to Lure Younger Buyers," New York Times, 10 Oct 2002

9:49:01 PM    

You can ascribe TiVo's struggles to the business axiom known as "first-mover disadvantage." Technology pioneers typically get steamrollered, then look on helplessly from the sidelines as a bunch of Johnny-come-latelies make billions. First movers, the theory goes, are too smart for their own good, churning out gizmos that are too expensive or too complex for the average consumer's taste.

Brendan Koerner, "TiVo, We Hardly Knew Ye - Sorry fans, but it's destined for the ash heap of history," Slate, 9 Oct, 2002

9:19:55 PM    

"(Palm) must contend with the killer-application of note taking -- a day planner or a sheet of paper, or whatever people just scribble on and throw in their bag," said Slawsby.

"They have to market this as 'just like paper -- but better.' But if people perceive they have to learn something about computers, there is no success there," he added.

9:01:54 PM    

2:17:55 PM    

"I've observed that having an abundance mentality is crucial to a high performance organization. Leaders don't need to cultivate an abundance mentality to promote blogging, they need to promote an abundance mentality because that how you create an organization that works. The lack of an abundance mentality leads to an organization that doesn't communicate, doesn't act like a team, and eventually doesn't accomplish very much."

Phil Windley (Utah CIO),"An Abundance Mentality", Windley's Enterprise Computing Weblog, 1 Oct 2002.

11:12:50 PM    

12. I'm not in college yet, but I think I'd like to work at IDEO someday.

That's great. We like to encourage design in everybody, but especially junior high and high schoolers. There are many books about the fields of engineering and design over the last hundred years. Here are some subjects you might want to learn more about.

You may have heard of the great inventors Thomas Edison, the Wright Brothers, and Alexander Graham Bell. But there are many others: Chester Carlson invented the copy machine; Douglas Englebart helped create the modern computer, including the mouse; Paul MacCready developed a human-powered flying machine, the Gossamer Condor; and Bert Rutan developed Voyager, a plane that flew nonstop around the world. Their stories are classics of how a determined visionary with an idea can change the world.

Architecture and industrial design have had a tremendous impact on society, and you should learn about such people as William Morris, Raymond Loewy, Henry Dreyfuss, Harley Earl, Charles and Ray Eames, Frank Lloyd Wright, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, le Corbusier, Ettore Sottsass, and a very influential school called the Bauhaus.

There are also many books about design: Donald Norman's books (including The Design of Everyday Things) are about the difference between good and bad design; Henry Petroski's books (including Invention by Design and The Pencil) tell the stories behind everyday objects like aluminum cans and paper clips; Edward Tufte's books (including The Visual Display of Quantitative Information) address communication and graphics; and Jim Adams's book Conceptual Blockbusting can help you learn to think better. There's even a book about IDEO called The Art of Innovation, which you can read about here.

11:11:27 PM