Have you noticed how technology seems to be going backwards? No it is not you, it is just that the younger generation has different UI needs than us older folks, and our technology compensating for those needs is making us dinosaurs' lives harder.
For example I recently got a new Windows 8 laptop - brilliant little Samsung machine that starts in no time and runs off 7 hours on battery power. It is very thin and looks a lot like a tablet. My problems with it are:
All of these issues stem from the same basic principle - vendors trying to make the device tablet like using same unified UI provided for all tablets (at least Windows based ones). And don't take me wrong here - Microsoft is not the only culprit here - there is exactly the same problem with Androids and iOS' out there too. And (unlike Apple iOS) at least Microsoft still supports the mouse interface.
Another example of this is Vodafone generalising their text message interfaces - in result for the last 6 months now we have not been able to send text messages to our families in Finland!
So why do we need to simplify the UI? Is there something wrong with our brains - are we getting dumber? If you asked me a month ago I would have answered yes - I certainly saw a big difference with IQ of our younger generation compared to us (at the same age), however the real answer might be somewhat different.
I believe our brains, our IQ is changing to a more cognitive, abstract thinker and in partly on cost of hand-eye coordination. The younger generation will be able to find patterns and chain (to us) random events together, use any tecchnology like a pro etc, but they will be absolutely useless on any job that requires hand-eye coordination like a builder, wood crafter or a sportsman. Just look at statistics on cooking for example - the younger generation did not stop cooking because they find it boring, but because they find it hard; their brains are not wired for manual "thinking" like cooking.
Some words on education - this is of course a problem; as our education system is defined for us and our parents' generation. We both (us, our parents and our older children) are a "staging" generation, "Jacks of all trades but masters of none"; as we can do both abstract thinking as well as still retain a good hand-eye coordination. Note also how this is a slider factor - our parents had better hand-eye coordination but less abstract thinkers, our older children are "less coordinated", but better abstract thinkers.
We need to change this education systems soon - I read an article a while ago that in year 2020 (only 7 years away) it is expected that 90% of the jobs out there require abstract thinking skills - manual labour (and even arts) are getting replaced with robotics, 3D printing (from computer generated graphics) and tablet UIs, and to be honest our youngsters are ill prepared for that.
It actually makes you wonder if the reason for the young generation all wanting to be singers, models and actors (as many as 95% of all US teenagers!) is just a symptom of our archaic education system - which just does not challenge our cognitive thinkers enough to interest them on any real jobs out there!
For example I recently got a new Windows 8 laptop - brilliant little Samsung machine that starts in no time and runs off 7 hours on battery power. It is very thin and looks a lot like a tablet. My problems with it are:
- I do not like that you have 2 separate interfaces for it - Metro and Classic. I would have preferred just Metro but with access to do the changes I need to do with Classic.
- It is very thin so hard drive is only 256GB and there is no DVD reader. I had to buy external USB based 1TB HDD and DVD writer for $200 but now have to carry them around!
- There are only 3 USB ports available on it - keyboard, mouse and HDD take over those so I probably need to buy multi-USB too (and carry it around too!)
- You cannot plugin an external microphone - so you either have to find a headset with both in same cable or use the internal (poor quality) laptop microphone
- It supports only resolution up to 1600x900 - however it can support higher ones if your external monitor supports it's drivers (worked fine with my Samsung monitor, but not with my Dell).
All of these issues stem from the same basic principle - vendors trying to make the device tablet like using same unified UI provided for all tablets (at least Windows based ones). And don't take me wrong here - Microsoft is not the only culprit here - there is exactly the same problem with Androids and iOS' out there too. And (unlike Apple iOS) at least Microsoft still supports the mouse interface.
Another example of this is Vodafone generalising their text message interfaces - in result for the last 6 months now we have not been able to send text messages to our families in Finland!
So why do we need to simplify the UI? Is there something wrong with our brains - are we getting dumber? If you asked me a month ago I would have answered yes - I certainly saw a big difference with IQ of our younger generation compared to us (at the same age), however the real answer might be somewhat different.
I believe our brains, our IQ is changing to a more cognitive, abstract thinker and in partly on cost of hand-eye coordination. The younger generation will be able to find patterns and chain (to us) random events together, use any tecchnology like a pro etc, but they will be absolutely useless on any job that requires hand-eye coordination like a builder, wood crafter or a sportsman. Just look at statistics on cooking for example - the younger generation did not stop cooking because they find it boring, but because they find it hard; their brains are not wired for manual "thinking" like cooking.
Some words on education - this is of course a problem; as our education system is defined for us and our parents' generation. We both (us, our parents and our older children) are a "staging" generation, "Jacks of all trades but masters of none"; as we can do both abstract thinking as well as still retain a good hand-eye coordination. Note also how this is a slider factor - our parents had better hand-eye coordination but less abstract thinkers, our older children are "less coordinated", but better abstract thinkers.
We need to change this education systems soon - I read an article a while ago that in year 2020 (only 7 years away) it is expected that 90% of the jobs out there require abstract thinking skills - manual labour (and even arts) are getting replaced with robotics, 3D printing (from computer generated graphics) and tablet UIs, and to be honest our youngsters are ill prepared for that.
It actually makes you wonder if the reason for the young generation all wanting to be singers, models and actors (as many as 95% of all US teenagers!) is just a symptom of our archaic education system - which just does not challenge our cognitive thinkers enough to interest them on any real jobs out there!