MIT Technology Review has a very diplomatic article on Windows 8: http://www.technologyreview.com/review/511116/windows-8-design-over-usability/. The captions all over praise Windows 8 and that Microsoft has done the right thing.
Curiously the contents say that the Windows 8 interface "fares poorly on larger desktop computer screens", "is clearly designed for ... having fun rather than serious work", "eliminates more than forty years of usability research",
"presents far too little information ... resulting in the need to frequently pand and scroll", "well serves the needs of those nontechnical users who just want to watch Netflix, and go shopping", "does a poor job of catering to knowlege
workers like me (the author)", is "a boon, maybe, for people with attention deficit disorder", "largely devoid of status information", "decreases usability", "an unnecessary inconvenience for knowledge workers",
and "is a puzzle you can't quite solve". "The waste of screen real estate becomes increasing evident as the screen gets larter" and "many tasks become unnecessarily difficult".
I didn't know that technical writers have to resort to such volumnous sarcasm to get published.
From their About Us page, I couldn't find out what the MIT stands for, but it does claim to be serious journalism by knowledgeable editorial staff goverened by a policy of accuracy and independence.
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Curiously the contents say that the Windows 8 interface "fares poorly on larger desktop computer screens", "is clearly designed for ... having fun rather than serious work", "eliminates more than forty years of usability research",
"presents far too little information ... resulting in the need to frequently pand and scroll", "well serves the needs of those nontechnical users who just want to watch Netflix, and go shopping", "does a poor job of catering to knowlege
workers like me (the author)", is "a boon, maybe, for people with attention deficit disorder", "largely devoid of status information", "decreases usability", "an unnecessary inconvenience for knowledge workers",
and "is a puzzle you can't quite solve". "The waste of screen real estate becomes increasing evident as the screen gets larter" and "many tasks become unnecessarily difficult".
I didn't know that technical writers have to resort to such volumnous sarcasm to get published.
From their About Us page, I couldn't find out what the MIT stands for, but it does claim to be serious journalism by knowledgeable editorial staff goverened by a policy of accuracy and independence.
View the full article