Welcome to my blog. Here you will find postings relating to Human-Computer Interaction, also known as Human Factors, User Interaction, Interaction Design, Information Architecture, and more. As you can see, there's no standard yet for what it's called. In a sentance, it's basically how technology (computer software, cell phones, PDAs, etc.) is designed, with the goal of making them more easily usable by the average, non-technical, person.
Today's posting is about cell phones. Or rather the options you get when you call someone's phone and they don't answer.
Have you noticed that many services don't just give you the outgoing message of the person you're trying to reach saying "Hi, You've reached Johnny. etc.." This is followed by 5 minutes of instructions from the phone company to not just leave a message after the beep (as if we don't know that's what we're supposed to do), but also how to page the person, how to leave a callback number, and how to get additional options. Is all this really necessary? Do I really need to leave a call back number when it will show up on their called ID? And I can leave my number in my voice mail if I want just in case. I wonder what my 'additional options' are? Maybe it will let me find out where they're located, or listen in on their business meeting. Or find out what they had for lunch? Perhaps next time I'll try that option just to see what it says.
4 comments:
Ugh, that kills me. But the secret is to press #. You skip through all the riff-raff messages and get straight to the 'beep'. But I only know this because a super nerd taught it to me, how do we get these shortcuts to the average person (or more importantly, just make the interaction easier)?
First, the prompt level is probably determined by the operator. We make an IP messaging platform that is used by Vonage among others, and in in it both the operator and the mail box owner (if allowed) can control the prompt level. I guess the question to the operators is why they think that no one knows what is going on. If they were using some advanced features I could understand it. Our platform as a find-me-follow-me feature that will ring several numbers to try to reach you. That can take some time, so I understand that you want to play something to tell the calling party what is going on.
Depending on what type of cel phon eis being used the # sign will not work. It will ask you for a password. On some phones like Nextel it will allow you to skip through the message.
My new phone (the cingular smartphone) allows me to press "ignore" very easily.. and the person is sent directly to voicemail. I like that option b/c it relieves *some* of the guilt of not picking up.
Ironically, my fancy new phone is not as smart as my old Nokia in alot of ways, but some of this could be attributed to my conservatism (I was used to "doing things a certain way" on my old phone).
The weather is finally nice.. allelujah...
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