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Worst Design Failures

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19 pointsmtreder21 comments

Windows Mobile? Worst OS ever? Why ? It was very usable with a stylus, and you could do tons of what you now do on the iPhone like 5 years earlier (or more). It was not perfect but it certainly was not bad.

Google Wave ? Bad usability ? Where? No reasons given.

Sony Remote for Google TV -> what's wrong with it? You don't like having a keyboard? Again, no reason given, just a picture that is supposed to explain everything.

Shitty Blogspam. The author did not even sign with his name (because they are several of them in About Us) so I guess he's not too proud of his shitty list.

Google Wave was great. It's failure wasn't due to design either.

Due to what then?

Bad rollout (invite only) and marketing. They generated a lot of hype and then kept people from using it until interest died off again.

Launch rollout: "Here's a collaborative engine, to help you work and interact with others. Others who likely won't be able to use the product, because we'll make invitations rarer than six-leaf clovers until we pronounce 'failure to launch', kill the product, and then open it up more."

OK than. Couple of reasons - Windows Mobile was a single worse case of Fits Law violation. Small interface elements hard to reach even with stylus. I remember that one of my test devices was HTC Diamond. I don't recall slower, uglier mobile device. Apart from that UI guidelines were a joke. Microsoft tried to fit Windows into a mobile device and failed. Phone 8 is a completely new approach. Just try to compare them.

Google Wave failed to address one particular useful 'use case'. The interface was a mess and people didn't know what to do with it.

Sony Remote? It was actually canceled and changed because of problems with usability. Lots of buttons with lack of clear information architecture - straight way to design hell.

Each and one of mentioned devices could be throughly analyzed. I just thought it will be more fun to list them :).

Thanks for comment anyway.

Assertive overstatements are no substitute thought or analysis. I'm glad it was fun for you. It wasn't fun for me. More a case of "Why is this idiot wasting my time?"

Seriously have you ever used WIndows Mobile more than 5 minutes? You could resize the icons to make it as big as what you have on iOS screens today in case you were not able to reach the small icons with a stylus. Plus, there was not a "single version" of Windows Mobile, the system went through many iterations and improvements and the later versions had nothing to do with the earlier ones. Your blanket statement shows your ignorance.

And there were many changes made by Microsoft vs your so-called "windows just putting windows into a mobile device". First, there were no windows per se, every application was filling the screen by itself. There were gestures as well, and the task bar had nothing to do with the windows task bar. So give me a break with that line. They did change many things to make it fit on the small screen.

I used Windows Mobile devices for years and it was certainly not the nightmare you describe. Why do you think so many manufacturers supported the system ? There was NOTHING like that out there at the time. It was the only convincing touch interface system. And it had lots of applications, too, from first and third parties. The key drawback was certainly the on-screen keyboard but there were many third party apps to make this less painful and more natural.

Google Wave's interface was certainly not a mess, it was more of a concept issue. Were you ever in the beta ? What did you do with it that made you dislike it so much ?

Listing devices without argument is not fun, it's just not very insightful. If you make a top 10 list, you should think a little bit more about what criteria you use to put inside there - if it's just that you don't like these designs, your list if worthless because I could say the exact opposite to most of your choices there.

Agree, worrying to see what is basically a buzzfeed list on the frontpage of HN

For those of you who are annoyed by the shutdown/restart processes in Windows 8, consider adding some shortcuts to your desktop and start menu to make this process 1-click[1]:

Shutdown: Right-click on the desktop, click "New > Shortcut" and enter "shutdown /s /t 0"

Restart: Right-click on the desktop, click "New > Shortcut" and enter "shutdown /r /t 0"

You can change the icon to look more appropriate, and pin this to the start menu or task bar.

[1]: http://www.redmondpie.com/how-to-add-windows-8-shutdown-rest...

I'm sure that's something every average Windows users does as a first thing after they install the system. The point in usability is not having to do these things for common and obvious actions.

I think ordinary users are supposed to press the (physical) on/off button. That's really simple.

Although this only suspends the machine (by default, as far as I remember the only other option is hibernate).

Yes. Push the power button and your Windows 8 machine should resume in about two seconds, and even after hibernating overnight, come back in less than 20 seconds.

You don't want users to turn it off, and they shouldn't really need to restart it more often than Microsoft Update does already. Hiding away the reboot process is therefore a useful bit of design....

This bit of obvious linkbait would look less stupid if the headline read "10 of the Worst Gadget Design Failures of the Past 10 Years", though it still wouldn't show much knowledge of gadgets....

The worst spelling of all time as well. The sheer number of errors in that 'article' made my eyes bleed.

I would personally add iOS7 to the list.

Thanks man. In my opinion - too early to judge. Will see after the final release :).

Why?

Because what we have now is called Developers Release. It may differs from the final release.

It's just matter of personal preferences. I find it step backward. But maybe it's more aesthetic issue than UX. As I said - subjective opinion.

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