begin quoting DJA as of Sat, May 28, 2005 at 10:06:16PM -0700: [snip] > My research: I looked at the green button and I don't care for it. > M$ research: "Nah, I think the green looked better; go with the green". > > Just because M$ did the research doesn't necessarily mean they came to > the best conclusions.
Even honest-to-goodness upfront well-meaning research can result in a less-than-optimal UI. If 40% of the target population does best with approach A, then you might have 60% finding approach A needlessly limiting and/or deceiving, but the best approach for that 60% might be 29% for approach B, 29% for approach C, and 2% for approach D. I happen to think that's how the world works, more or less. Thus, "let's all copy just one interface" is an incredibly unhelpful thing to do for most of the people, most of the time. [MSWindows 1.0] > At the same time that many of us still thought Quarterdeck's DesqView > was the kick-ass user interface on x86. I knew a few fans of DeskView. It wasn't good enough to get me to give up my Amiga, but hey, not much was. [snip] > People only talk up "Bang for the buck" when they can't afford what they > /really/ want. "Bang for the buck" applies when you need to compromise. > Compromising is not always the best decision. My WRX was wonderful bang-for-the-buck. I would have _liked_ an STi, Lotus, or Maserati, but I couldn't afford those. It would not be honest of me to bad-mouth the choices I didn't go with -- especially in the mistaken idea that it somehow justifies my decision. Now, paying a lot more for a lot less (like all those people who bought IBM PCs after the Amiga and Atari ST were on the scene) is often put in the bang-for-buck category. So I'm not _too_ quick to dismiss the bang-for-your-buck argument, because it has its place. But it's not the only valid variable. -Stewart "Plus, it's a crappy way to avoid buyer's remorse." Stremler
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