[IxDA Discuss] How far have we come?

[Chris McLay]

I just had a strange coincidental moment I thought it appropriate to  
share...

I'm re-reading a paper by Michel Beaudouin-Lafon, "Designing  
interaction, not interfaces." 2004 http://doi.acm.org/ 
10.1145/989863.989865

In this paper he basically argues for HCI to become Interaction  
Design (I'm simplifying). He compares the original Macintosh computer  
from 1984 with the current iMac (2003) - despite the massive growth  
in computing capacity, over 3,000 times, and storage capacity, over  
200,000 times, the basic interaction is still the same after 20  
years– a mouse, a keyboard and a desktop using windows, icons, menus  
and a pointer.

As I'm reading this I see a brochure in my in tray - “25 years of  
CHI. Look how far we have come… Imagine how far we can go.” with  
pictures of children golding pictures of a keyboard, a mouse, a  
drawing tablet, and palm-top device with a qwerty keyboard and an  
anthropomorphic robot.

Most of these were cutting edge 20-25 years ago, sure they have  
evolved and improved, but by how much? I don't really want to bag HCI  
or CHI, but it was such a solid comparison / co-incidence it honestly  
made me think how far have we really come?

(or maybe CHI just needs some better marketing?)


-- 
Chris McLay ...// interaction & visual designer

Email chris at eeoh.com.au
Web http://www.eeoh.com.au/chris/