Superficial Intelligence

A few days ago, I took my wife to a store which she has grown very fond of called Archiver's. The store sells scrapbooking materials, which I am not really too interested in. At one point, I had to go make a quick stop at the store restrooms. I went to look for the men's restroom, but to my surprise, there wasn't any! There was a women's bathroom and a unisex bathroom. This definitely isn't the standard. Stores usually have men's and women's restrooms or just one unisex bathroom. So why this combination? Because Archiver's knows who they are selling to. They know that the majority (and by a big margin) of their customers are women. This way they can better meet the needs of their real customers.

The same concept applies to user interface design. One major focus in the User Interface Design class I'm taking this semester is users. You do not build an application just to show off all the features that you think are cool. When you build an application, you do it with your users in mind. You may need to scrape off some features that you think should be there, but which are not what your users really need, just like the men's bathroom at Archiver's. Know your users and make sure you build your applications with them in mind. No matter how cool your application is, if nobody wants it, nobody will use it.