Lessons in UX: How the iPad may change everything
If you are a tech geek, you were probably glued to your computer screens and clicking refresh every 30 seconds Wednesday afternoon, as Steve Jobs and Apple unveiled their new tablet, called the iPad. I know I was, and am very impressed with the features and industrial design of the device. But commentators on the Internet seems split right down the middle about it.
Shortly after the announcement, the criticisms started flying all around the Internet: “I don’t need it.” “It sounds like a feminine hygiene product.” ”It’s just a big iPod Touch.” “Where’s the camera?” And so on. I don’t disagree with many of these comments – especially the ones around the product name – but I think they are mostly trivialities. The iPad is a game changer, for many reasons, and one that I think will be very very successful.
Why? Because it is going to be a device that people will use instead of a full-fledged computer, just as netbooks have supplanted full laptops and desktops. Netbooks are limited devices, just as they stated in the keynote announcing the iPad. Is the iPad better than a notebook? No. It’s different, and services many of the same needs that netbooks do, only better – which is why I think it will be successful.
The best description I heard of the iPad came from Chief TWIT Leo Laporte, immediately after the announcement. The iPad is not as powerful as a full computer, it doesn’t do multitasking, but that’s fine. It’s an appliance, a utilitarian device that gets “out of the way” and lets people DO THINGS. That’s been Apple’s modus operandi for years, and this device appears to do that quite elegantly.
Another observation from the announcement: Steve Jobs said very directly at the end that they could not have released this two years ago, basically because the interaction model and UI would have been too high a learning curve for consumers. The iPhone and iPod Touch, as it shares the same model as the iPad, has reduced that learning curve tremendously.
This, I think, is one of the brilliant things about what Apple does. They can do some revolutionary things with their products – just look at some of their patent applications – but they know that if they put something out that is too “out there” then users will be confused and this “resistance to the new” prevents them from purchasing the device. Again, another reason I’m bullish on the iPad.
So, what does this mean when it comes to us Interaction design folks? It means a great opportunity to do things differently. Looking at the keynote and reviewing the updated SDK, it appears the interaction models and controls they have defined for the iPad are very consistent and quite “learnable” – I particularly like the way they have designed the standard “portrait” mode and differentiated if from “landscape”, hiding contextual navigation and other controls in portrait and displaying them in landscape (The e-mail client is a good example of this).
More than that though, the iPad presents us with both design opportunities and challenges. We have to adapt to the new interaction models that the iPad allows. The thing that the iPad reminds me most of is, ironically, a Microsoft product. Microsoft Surface featured some very interesting technology and design ideas that allowed you to “play” with information on a tabletop. Now, we have similar tech in a portable magazine-sized device, and the same possibility, which was much more limited when it comes to Surface, is available to all.
I know that I am already working on how I can design things in this medium, and if you want to “future proof” yourself, I’d recommend you start looking into doing the same. Knowing how to design apps on the iPad will, in my opinion, become a very desirable skill in the years to come.
