WTF Cell Phone Design
 

A telephone is, above all else, a device you use to send and recieve telephone calls. I know this should be a statement of the obvious, but apparently the people who design cell phones have forgotten this key fact.

How many clicks does it take you to call a number you have stored in your phone?

I have to (1) click select for menu (2) click navigate down to an indecipherable icon that is supposed to be a rolodex (3) click select (4) from that menu, either select 1 or key numeral 1 to select my list of stored numbers.

Question: Why isn't my list of numbers the first thing that pops up when I open my phone? It's a telephone. I'm going to use it to call people. Why are my stored numbers buried back 4 clicks?

Instead of legislation making it illegal to operate a cell phone while driving, the authorities should focus on legistlation making it illegal to design a cell phone interface that requires the user to navigate through such an elaborate series of steps in order to access the main function of the device.

P.S. It's easier to take pictures than it is to place a call. I know this, because my phone takes pictures of the inside of my pocket all day long.

I was recently shopping for a new phone and the salesman was telling me about all the features of the different models. He said he rarely uses his to make phone calls. I guess it's a whole different world now.

Salesmen sell what the thing can do, not what the customer wants.

They want you to think you want what the thing can do. Did that make sense?

I have a blackberry

I normally have to push a button to take it out of sleep mode
push that button again to be told the device is locked
select the option to unlock it
type in my 5 digit password
push a button to enter those 5 digits I just typed
this takes me to the main screen, where I scroll wheel over two icons to the phone function
push a button to activate the phone feature
scroll down to the number I want to call
push a button to select that number
scroll down to select the option to call that number
push a button to place the call


There may be a faster way, but I don't know it.

Those are intended to be more of a multi-use device, so I wanted to give a little leeway.

I noticed that when you activate the phone feature, the stored numbers pop right up. Great! But then...

Okay, WTF? You're on the number. There should be ONE CLICK to CALL the number!

and I exaggerate a little. The scroll wheel is also the button I push to select things, so the scrolling and selecting is all one smooth motion and should really be counted as one step. I really like the scroll wheel/button on Blackberries a lot. Very easy to use.

Almost all of my calls are to Mrs. Dar or the kids. They're all at the top of my speed dial list. So three.

single-digit-number # dial-button

I can hit the call button and bring up recent contacts, scroll then click call again. But if I haven't called or heard from the person in a while its a ridiculous process to bring up my contact list.... def easier to take a picture, thats 2 clicks.

As few as one.
Almost all my calls are to Tink or Tink's work, or Tink's home or Tink's cell, or Tink's kids, etc etc... They're all on speed dial.
Blackberry (Curve) here too. Assign a key to the Speed Dial list. Press and hold that key, number dials. Boom, baby.

It's extremely difficult to take a picture using my phone.

(For starters, there's no camera. Ba-DUM-bum!)

You need "several" clicks to get down to the number if you go through the phone book. In addition it's relatively easy (for me at least) to highlight and open a number when I thought I was dialing it. (Memo: use the "talk" button instead of "ok".)

I make liberal use of speed dial and voice recording so it doesn't bug me that much. (Of course, I don't have that many people I actually talk to. That also simplifies things.)

My current phone has voice dialing, but I've never set it up. That would be the easiest thing, especially if you don't have opposable thumbs.

Understood, I need to populate my speed dial list.

However, anybody I already know should be in my speed dial list will already be in my recent calls (see post #8).

So I won't gain much for the time spent activating a feature that should be a core functionality of the device. That is to say, every number on my phone should be quickly accessible, not just a select group I have to spend my own free time to program--because the designers of the product were too thick-headed to allow the device to perform its own main function; i.e. place phone calls.

hmm. On my little pre-paid Virgin Mobile phone; It takes only one click to get to my contact list; (plus clicks to scroll to select the person if not at the top); then one click to dial. Seems pretty easy to me.

But that's about the only thing on the phone that seems easy.

Then, "Mission Accomplished" as far as I'm concerned.

I don't know about you, but I bought my phone to use as a phone.