I don't normally make blog posts around YouTube videos, but this one warrants one. While I've been mostly working on software packaging, there are times when aesthetics can clash with usability. Put in engineers that build things to the letter of the specifications, and you can have a mess. So it's been a normal practice for me to test out whatever I do from a new users' perspective, over and over again, wiping my mind from previous experiences and really wondering how they would feel about it.
And then, Asus built the Nexus 7 (horrible name by the way) for Google, and of course people made unpackaging videos of this new product. The results are hilarious.
After all being said and done, I'd love that this Apple-copying for electronic packaging rolls back somewhat. The packaging of the RIZR Z8 was "trendy and cool", yet horrendous in usability. Same with lots of Nokia phones. At some point, I'd rather have an ugly but functional box than a box made by a design school reject that was never tested. Compounded by the fact that not a single engineer or exec looked at the Nexus 7 box and said the obvious "this thing sucks" may be indicative of the disdain they have for their users, or at a level of hubris that blinds them from such obvious problems.
Published on July 16, 2012 at 21:10 EDT
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