[Sigia-l] Exhibit A

[Ziya Oz]

Christopher Fahey:

> A smart and extremely senior person at Microsoft should be using Vista every
> day, 

You're right of course, but there's even a deeper problem. What is Vista and
just how many versions of Vista are there? It's a hydra run amok. Every
imaginable market from grandmas to cash machines happen to be Vista targets.
That's the albatross around MSFT's neck. Their business model depends on
volume/OEM sales, ubiquity and, ultimately, safety in numbers. That's how
they have been able to justify mediocrity so far. It's unraveling on its own
weight.
 
> I really doubt usability testing would have helped much in this example at
> all: Such research would almost certainly have shown that the interface was
> hard to use and error-prone to some degree, and that every one of those
> shutdown options was useful to some important customer type.

Bingo!

> Only a single person can make the final decision to remove or combine features
> to make it easier for some users while deliberately forcing other users to
> adapt to it.

That's heresy! :-) You're going to let some whimsical designer type with a
pony tail make that decision, let alone a guy in jeans and a black turtle
neck?!

> It sounds to me like MS's senior management has basically abdicated user
> experience accountability (if they ever had it) and relegated it to middle
> management. 

Hence, Steve Jobs' quip about Microsoft being run by a "sales guy."
 
> Another reason why I think someday an IA will work their way up to CEO.

Of a publicly held company?

Ziya
Nullius in Verba