The Fish is Gone: Technology Paradox Killed it.

My fish died today.
He was just a goldfish I won at a fair, oh about 10 years ago. So I suppose he was old and it was time but I blame his death on the technology paradox.

Technology simplifies life by providing choices and functions not otherwise offered, yet that very simplicity requires a increase of operations and capabilities that often are too complex to control, requiring innovative and equally complex design to translate it's functionality.

In short, somewhere I must have misread instructions, misinterpreted directions or become confused about the affordance, constraints, and mapping of the care required for my goldfish and it's habitat.
I gave it food, although maybe too much food at times. Then I wasn't sure just exactly how much chemical I was supposed to add to the water to de-chlorinate it. As for the algae, how much was too much?

Come to think of it, there are dozens of things, technological things that produce background static and stress in my life for the basic reason they are not simple enough to understand and operate.
My digital watch/timer, my DVD player clock display, my alarm clock, my new touch screen cell phone, the menu table of my digital camera, my computer...to name a few.

I tend to use these objects only in a few prescribed ways that I, through trail and error and through reading the manual, have been able to mentally map. It's like learning a new language each time. I look for ways to naturally map these objects' functions based on how I intuitively work. Most often this mapping is not natural but based on my previous experience with the earlier generations of these products.

Occasionally a product comes along that requires no heavy sighing (the price I pay for being technologically up to date). For example, the i Pod is a quick study, easily mapped mentally because the functions mimic natural behavior. Not only that, it creates an enjoyable interface that encourages use because it is fun. I'm referring to the navigation wheel. I love the way it turns in a circle, the sound it makes and the simple tree structure of the database.

When faced with the ever expanding number of new technologies, I feel an affinity with De Cervantes' Don Quixote and Thoreau's Walden. I want to hide in the wilderness or attack these modern windmills but technology is not the over bearing all consuming monster that is taking over our lives. It provides me great advantages and comfort. The design and implementation of that technology is what pushes me to consider a more simple life, where my time is not consumed by bad design. Choices and varieties have become a burden in ways I never dreamed of.

I often wonder as technology progressed throughout the ages, was there such an abundance of things and choices that advancement was hamstrung like in this more modern era? Did the blacksmiths in the Middle Ages continue to use tools that were difficult to operate or inadequate for the job? Or were these badly designed objects quickly tossed aside in favor of more efficient better designed tools? I think the consequences of bad design was more immediate back then, seen in outcomes of wars or survival over harsh winters.

Nowadays our technology acts as a buffer preventing us from leaping over design disasters immediately into more workable designs. We must continually muddle through because the consequences are not clear. If my current MP3 player interface is difficult to navigate, I will still manage to survive the winter. I can build my Taj Mahal and no one will wonder why. This is the second level of the technology paradox. Like a tornado it spins within itself creating more things that take more time that create more need for things.

Give me sleek, well designed, naturally mapped objects and I will consider dismounting my horse and abandoning my spear to embrace the modern world once more. As we move away from the obsession with technology like a child in a candy store wanting everything all at once, I think we can transition into a world where the important choices are around time and not things.

Good, thoughtful design plays an important role.

To read more on this subject:

Donald Norman writes about "The Design of Everyday Things"