Features Don’t Matter Any More?

by on 28 February, 2006 - 10:24

by: Karl Long

A nice little article from the “Association of Computing Machinery” proposes features don’t matter any more and pro-ports “welcome to the age of user experience.”

I totally agree with the central thesis, that once technical features reach equilibrium in a market, be it processor speed, or storage space, or bandwidth etc. the overall user experience becomes the differentiator. This is a pretty common aspect of the technology “innovation” lifecycle which is explained and illustrated by Don Norman.

Anyway, I do rather like the “10 fundamental rules for the age of user experience technology”, or what might be called the 10 truisms of customer experience:

1. More features isn’t better, it’s worse.
2. You can’t make things easier by adding to them.
3. Confusion is the ultimate deal-breaker.
4. Style matters
5. Only features that provide a good user experience will be used.
6. Any feature that requires learning will only be adopted by a small fraction of users.
7. Unused features are not only useless, they can slow you down and diminish ease of use.
8. Users do not want to think about technology: what really counts is what it does for them.
9. Forget about the killer feature. Welcome to the age of the killer user-experience.
10. Less is difficult, that’s why less is more

I certainly I agree with the concept that “features check lists” can’t compete with a superior user experience, but features still matter. Sure the ipod on its own is a simple piece of technology, but look at the features when used in concert with itunes; the music store, the audio books, the podcasts, internet radio, the album covers, the music rating, the recent photos, the games. There are lots of features, it’s just they work in concert to create a killer user experience. The features hang together to create an “integrated” experience. What it shows is product management discipline, design discipline, and leadership with a vision.

Original Post: http://blog.experiencecurve.com/archives/features-dont-matter-any-more