Inclusive Design at Microsoft
microsoft.com
microsoft.com
There's a great chart on page 41 that breaks out disabilities into "permanent", "temporary", and "situational". When I saw this, it opened my eyes up to the reality that everyone can and will experience a sub-optimal, disabled experience when trying to use a product. One example from that chart is that you can suffer a permanent sight disability by losing your sight, a temporary one by dealing with a cataract (pre-surgery), and a situational one when you're in an environment with a lot of distractions or poor lighting conditions.
This all underlines the spirit behind "inclusive design": improving a product's accessibility for one person does more than benefit that one person -- it will provide benefits for everyone. In essence, accessible UX is good UX. If anyone's interested in these ideas, I strongly recommend watching Rob Dodson's fantastic presentation on the topic [2]!
[1] https://download.microsoft.com/download/B/0/D/B0D4BF87-09CE-...
About 14 years ago, I created a software company that produces software that just feels right from truths in kinesthetic learning. I target the Microsoft platform, because that was where I got my start. The way I helped to make the world a better place is very tiny droplet in the grand scheme of things. But it felt rewarding to do something.
Since Microsoft is a big company, they make a lot of mistakes. This is to be expected, and a natural thing. The Microsoft platform effects millions of people who can at times get disillusioned and frustrated by the design choices made by the old Microsoft - not the new one shown here today.
Those of us in this industry forget, or maybe never knew, that there are people who have to use technology for their work, for their life. They are not geeks like you and me who like to toy with technology. They are people who expect things to work and help them to be efficient, and to follow their train of thought, not ours.
So, good on you Microsoft for thinking about this. This is a beautiful presentation and I would love to see the software that will come out of this. It's time for technology gate-keepers to have the skills and empathy of product designers. Programmers can make the code beautiful - they always did. Graphical designers can make it sparkle - they always did - now let's make sure the software experience is beautiful too and based on what users need, not what we need.
The best software in the world feels wonderful to use, its a beautiful experience, it's an extension of what your mind saw and a tool that helped you do something.
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