So the left turn signal is an arrow pointing to the right? And the right turn signal is an arrow pointing to the left?
How does that pass, well, anything at all without someone saying “that might not be the best idea”!
How does that pass, well, anything at all without someone saying “that might not be the best idea”!
https://harishsnotebook.wordpress.com/2015/08/16/what-do-you...
But presumably those would be too small for US rules so they lit additional segments, making the arrow, which is what the parent commenter referred to.
I've seen various Tesla models that just use a single horizontal line of LEDs (either amber or red on color) for their turn signals in the US.
I think you are interpreting "confused" as "I can't tell which way the car is turning", while everyone else is talking about "This UX forces me to use my brain when I shouldn't have to".
Maybe a better analogy is where you're having a conversation with someone, and they throw in a double-negative. It's not like you're literally unable to work it out, but you need to engage with it consciously for a second. In a high-stakes conversation, that's just something that's good to avoid.
A memorable example of this for me (if a bit of a tangent) was when Felix Baumgartner was doing his mega parachute jump, and they kept screwing up the comms for which direction the wind was coming from / going in: https://youtu.be/rNhmYaWiPEk?t=4200 (by convention, people talk about wind in terms of the direction they come from).
I think the whole thing here is that driving involves a lot of modelling other drivers and their intentions, so our tolerance for bad UX that requires conscious thought should be really low.
Can you really not understand how that might cause a moment of confusion? You see a turn signal like normal, but then you notice it is pointing in a different direction… you don’t think that might make some people pause for an instant and think?
We are used to both turn signals and arrows being used to indicate direction… when they contradict each other, it is going to get past our automatic brain and make us think, which is bad when driving.
The position of the light on the car is a signal for my brain, but it takes some processing. If it's on the right side of the vehicle, my brain evaluates that to "right" and vice versa, but maybe it's a short car, like a Smart ForTwo or a Fiat 500, and I'm looking at its side, so the right-hand-side indicator is left from the "center of perceived mass", but in that case there should be another smaller light somewhere around the side-view mirror and hmmm, yeah, it's turning right. It just takes a tiny bit of processing power and a tiny bit of time.
But an arrow, boy, I've been looking at arrows all my life. They've been telling me where to go at the train station, which way to turn on Google Maps and sometimes even literally which way to turn the steering wheel, on the outside of a sharp turn. An arrow requires no additional processing and is a strong, unmistakable signal.
So what my brain sees on that Mini flashing its left indicator is something like "Car turning left, btw RIGHT".
This idea is only slightly worse than using wrong-pointing arrows for turn signals.
You should have encountered many situations like this before, simple tasks creating cognitive load, how can't you know what the fuss is?
[1] https://slate.com/human-interest/2015/01/what-do-cows-drink-...
Signals are most important in reduced vision conditions, and this reduces the reliability of those signals.
Surely you understand this.
It's like those puzzles or quiz's or whatnot that have the word "red" written in a blue font. Of course everyone can read the word, but in split second decisions the brain is going to grab whichever details it can.
You don't know a priori that they work like other turn signals.
You are presented with a new paradigm. Blinking side AND arrow direction. All bets are off. You now have to decide whether they indeed kept them on the right side or if they innovated and it's the arrows that are right.
It's a turn signal on a car. It's not the enigma you're making it out to be. Thousands of these on the road for like a decade. Absolutely nobody is actually confused.
A whole lot of people pretending to be mystified for some reason in this thread.
https://trafficsafetyzone.com/product/magnetic-led-direction...
or this which looks a lot more like the Mini indicator:
https://www.duluthnewstribune.com/business/2304413-red-light...
Of course you can work it out with context and time, but are you sure your reflexes can work it all out quickly?
To be honest I think people are massively exaggerating how confusing they are for fun Internet outrage points. People calling for people to be sacked and things. Crazy.
How do you draw an arrow?