While doing some research —
Made of technology, by technology, for technology.
Look at Internet Explorer on a PDA phone and
you can tell where we are heading.
(image source: http://thepda.neocities.org/ )
Back in 2010 I was using a POS.
At that time it could do DMB, 360-degree camera rotation, internet, Excel, Word, and so on —
pretty much most of what a smartphone does today.
But in the end it never crossed the tipping point, and most people don't even know it existed.
Even with the very public actor Cha Tae-hyun doing ads,
a PDA was ultimately just a tool for businessmen.
(image source: http://blog.naver.com/PostView.nhn?blogId=ibo75&logNo=40002430681)
Many experts compare smartphones to the iPhone.
But what really matters is the iPod.
(This is similar to Korean carriers copying the App Store outright instead of iTunes.)
(image source: http://geardiary.com/2012/09/11/iphone-5-event-rumors-makes-me-ask-if-anyone-cares-about-a-new-ipod-touch/)
The iPod is a device for listening to music. (Not an MP3 player!)
And the iPhone is just that iPod + internet.
Then the App Store came along.
The App Store? It's similar to the iTunes you used with an iPod!
Moreover,
the iPod lets you re-experience what the early MAC first showed.
Namely, UI and NUI.
(image source:
- http://apple.wikia.com/wiki/User_Interface
- http://www.theregister.co.uk/Print/2011/10/21/apple_ipod_is_ten_years_old/ )
As on the MAC, they gave the iPod an icon (typography) UI
and, in place of the mouse, a jog; touch (I'd personally call it a "gesture") interface on the iPod.
I'll skip details — there are plenty of experts out there. And before they made or found the UI and NUI experience (most tech is borrowed), what came first was deciding which service to provide.
Smart devices being made around the world
(smartwatches, refrigerators, TVs and other IoT gear... oh, and flexible displays, ha)
are literally just devices made by "experts for experts, by experts."
Looking at smart TVs with UIs that resemble smartphone icons,
I'm reminded of the Explorer UI I saw on PDA phones.
Jobs has passed away.
So stop copying — it's time for us to worry about our own style.
From my shrimp-sized experience working in fashion, furniture, interior, street vendors, motorcycle delivery, and stock-related firms,
I noticed UX experts and service designers are overwhelmingly graduates from elite schools or overseas.
Maybe that's why — a lot of what any non-expert could see is being overlooked, which is a shame. Most of what they work on is the everyday stuff we all use.
