The idea that you'd want to start on a section's first page makes sense for a book because most are based on linear exposition. The usability problem with non-linear content is crucial because it indicates a deeper issue: Kindle's user experience is dominated by the book metaphor. Even so, it's still bad GUI design to make the most important commands tiny and thus reduce their visual emphasis.) However, the 5-way controller makes it equally easy to pick a small or a big target indeed, this is its only redeeming quality. (If Kindle were a touchscreen device or a mouse-driven UI, I'd further complain about the Fitts' Law implications of using the smallest click target for the most important choice. In fact, after two weeks, I still make the mistake of doing the only natural thing: I click a section's name to see a list of articles. To see the section's list of articles, you have to click the number in parentheses that indicates the number of stories. That click takes you only to the section's first article. Where would you click in this screenshot?Įverybody I've asked said they'd click "Technology" to see that section's articles.įalse. In short: Awkward pointing + slow reaction = a bad user experience that discourages people from exploring and attempting different tasks. Even turning the page takes slightly longer than it should, and all other actions are definitely sluggish. Every time you enter a command, it ponders the situation before acting. Interacting through the Kindle 5-way feels much like many mid-level smartphone user interfaces, though the 5-way is worse than a BlackBerry mini-trackball.įurthermore, Kindle is slow. The 5-way owns the cursor, not you, and getting the cursor where you want it requires a lot of work. It doesn't feel like direct manipulation at all. Repeatedly flicking the 5-way to move the cursor around the screen is extremely tedious. Most Kindle interactions are mediated by a small joystick called the 5-way, which lets you move the cursor in 4 directions pressing down enables the fifth action. While reading, your only interaction is to repeatedly press the next-page button. The device thus offers good support for the task of linear reading - appropriately so, as Kindle's design is centered on this one use case. Paging backwards is a less common action, but it's also nicely supported with a separate, smaller button. This one command has two buttons (on either side of the device). Kindle shines in one area of interaction design: turning the page is extremely easy and convenient. (See sidebar for analysis of Kindle's Out-of-Box Experience: unwrapping and "installing" the device.) Awkward Interaction Design This fact alone is high praise for the device designers. But when I actually sat down to read the novel, I became so engrossed in the story that I forgot I was reading from an electronic device. When I was carrying Kindle through the house, I felt like a Star Trek character with a datapad. ( Update: a bigger study found that the Kindle 2's reading speed was still slightly slower than printed books, though much better than old studies used to find for computer-based reading.) So I can't say for sure that Kindle has finally reached the nirvana of equal readability for screens and paper. Of course, one person reading one book is not a proper measurement study. My reading speed was exactly the same (less than 0.5% difference), measured in words per minute. Alternating for each chapter, I read half the book in print and half on the Kindle screen. It now provides good usability for reading linear fiction (mainly novels), though it's less usable for other reading tasks.Īs an experiment, I bought two copies of the same book: a trade paperback and a Kindle download. The new version of Kindle, 's dedicated e-book device, recently shipped with an improved display and various other upgrades.
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