Feb 25th - 

Your best guess isn't good enough - if it was we wouldn't have so many bad interfaces - lots of people do try to do a good job

"The user is always right" - comes from the "customer is always right"  
	- They aren't stupid
	- They aren't lazy

	- Discussion ensued about what the typical average real user is... 
	- by definition if they have trouble with the interface, its the fault of the interface (and its 		designer). 
	- Assuming the users are motivated towards a task. This is an issue - if they aren't motivated they may 		not even try.
	
The user is not always right - 

	Intertia - resistance to change (all microwaves would be easy to use if designed like the one I have - 	this can be taken as an input to design - current use patterns)
	Better at finding problems than suggesting fixes
	Often suggest many specific tweaks with no global consistency
	React to artifact, not concept or generality.
	Users are highly variable


So, when do you listen to them?

You always listen (grist for your mill)

When do you act? (acting / changing is expensive)

When user testing really shows a flaw

When users react strongly positive or negative

when >1 person says it. (when see a pattern of users saying things, then you ignore it at your peril)


--- can email pui-help with task list ---


Users are not designers ---------

BTW, you guys are designers

user customization is not the answer

Novices are afraid to customize (and rightly so)

The power of the default 
	-SUIT program Randy works on could change gray color and change the window size - but less than 1% did 	so... 
	- X windows (libertarian software engineers - make no decisions for anyone) and uwin (purposely created bad default windows and found almost everyone a few years later was using this - 		the power of the default
	
	- Also if you customize then your screen doens't look like your friends - so the possiblity of informal help is diminished.
	
Bad choices: command abbreviations and error rates

Designers are not users -----------------

designers are human. They use the technology (similarlity)

general experience - enthusisam (we're geeks) mental model of implementation (difference)
problem is you can't unlearn something - and it taints your view of the system. You can't become a novice again. (this is way I prefer UTAs (for some of his classes he likes to have Soph undergrads who are closer to remembering trying to learn the material taught to TAs)

Vice Presidents are not users, neither are CEOs or college profs, they hold great influence and sometimes meddle - they were promosted for thier managerial skills, not their design skills - but if they care, the battle's half-won so nurture them!

battery is pretty much dead - will go anytime