Indeed, flip does do a lot of things right in their manual. They load it up with illustrations, avoid technical terms and create a layout that leaves little doubt as to what copy is talking about what process. Still, they practice the cardinal sin of  assuming people can fill in the blanks. For example:

• It tells you what the software can do, but doesn’t tell you how to install it.
• The “insert the batteries” instructions don’t warn you about the extremely delicate (read breakable) tabs on the cover.
• They assume you know how to set the time and date.
• They don’t tell you what those numbers mean on the video screen.
• People who want to jump to imovie or moviemaker are left on their own to find out just where their videos are located.
• This lack of information lead one reviewer to, understandably, believe that this was not Mac friendly.
• Things go wrong with products. They freeze, people push the wrong buttons, etc. For example, how do you reset the time and date?
• Another problem with that skimpy manual is that it’s easily lost. Posting it online would be a matter of two scans and a link– something that can be done in minutes.

While their manual may be perfectly adequate for people who are electronic gizmo intuitive, it fails to accept the fact that many people lack that skill. As someone who taught classroom technology to hundreds of teenagers, I can testify that many members of the digital generation need explicit, step-by-step instruction. I can also state, with a good deal of confidence, that, should you want to offer this as a gift to Grandma, chances are Grandma would be lost the moment she took it out of the box.

All of these are easy fixes. How do we know that?

Because we fixed them. We started with a paper manual. For a cost of 49¢ they could give their customers this:

Were you to look inside,  (and you can by clicking here) you’d see full page illustrations that do more than tell you what’s what, they show you:

That’s if you want a printed manual. As a stand alone pdf, it’s a different story. In that case, it should be able to interact with the reader. It should get a sense of what the viewer is looking for and steer them in the right direction.

Here’s an example of that:

Rather that asking the viewer to search, it asks them where they want to go. As s a result, the viewer is not overwhelmed by the “Gee, I have to know all this” response and, instead, is told things on a need to know basis. Smaller bites, when learning, are always inherently easier to swallow. Easier to swallow yet. at least for many people, is a short video. Here’s a short video that explains the first thing you should do with your flip ultra.

Of course, there are those who need to see it, hear it and have it broken down into tiny bites. This is for them:

Click here to view the embedded video.

]]> http://www.workthething.com/?feed=rss2&p=515 2 http://www.workthething.com/?p=501 http://www.workthething.com/?p=501#comments Sat, 18 Jul 2009 15:37:33 +0000 Michael A. III http://www.workthething.com/?p=501

Some like the sandbox, some like story time.
And nobody likes to feel stupid.

Ask any new teacher. One certain way to jump off the tenure track is to flunk the “addresses diverse learning styles” check mark on the evaluation.

There are people of all intelligences who simply will not learn out of a book. Others have to have the book. Some will respond better to a silent video, others to a comic book, others to instructions read out loud. Philips, for one, offers a Flash driven DVD that (not always successfully) walk you through all the steps of its PhotoFrame but don’t expect to also find the instruction book anywhere in the packaging. Instead, you have to pop in the DVD, open the PDF (And download the PDF software, if you don’t already have it) then print it out and then you you can have the bloody instruction book.

For providers of product instruction, here’s the problem: whatever media you choose will inherently leave some people out. It’ll shut them down, make kindergartners and adults alike throw learning tantrums just like in a Sylvan Learning Center commercial. Kindergarten teachers fill the room with all sorts of different ways to learn many of the same things. People who provide product instruction can do that, too. What’s more, it’s actually not too difficult to put it together in a wide variety of media.

If you don’t want to leave anybody out, here’s what product instruction should include:

	A printed manual that looks more like a best seller. Though a user’s guide is hardly what one would call literature, many of the same principles apply.

It should be filled with playful language that incites smiles and thoughts. And, in this day of cheap digital photography, there’s no excuse for skimping on the illustration.

• Give it attitude. Make it Martha Stewart, Bob Vila, Michael Moore, Vince with Sham Wow. Don’t forget that thing your High School English instructors called “voice.” Make it smile.
• Speaking of High School English, think back to all those literary terms. Alliterations, puns, metaphors and the like have been around for a long time because they engage the reader.
• Don’t clutter it up. Just like a speaker needs to pause, the layout should pause as well. White space rules.
• Don’t forget that thing called “voice.” Make it smile.

]]> http://www.workthething.com/?feed=rss2&p=501 1 http://www.workthething.com/?p=425 http://www.workthething.com/?p=425#comments Fri, 17 Jul 2009 23:39:24 +0000 Michael A. III http://www.workthething.com/?p=425

Forget smart phones. I want an “anti-dumb” phone.

As in one that says, “Hey, to make sure you don’t screw up, I’m going to be your kindergarten teacher/nursemaid and lay everything out where you need it.”

It starts out by saying, “Wait just one sec. Look around and see if we can get this cheaper.”

Have a look:

With Shop Savvy, the phone can scan anything from a book to a CD to a bottle of Snapple. It uses the built-in camera to scan the bar code, and up pops the cheapest price on the product as well as reviews from people who have purchased the product. Source: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=96817211

Recently they added a feature that allows you to know the retailers’ inventories as well.

With the barcode and the product in there, why not take it a step further? Why not have it say, “Now that you have it home, I’ll make sure you know how to put it together and use it without either destroying it or cussing it and taking it back to the store.” Here’s how:

You bring home, for example a new Panasonic HDTV. It begins by scanning in the product and, voila, there’s the interactive user’s manual. Right there where it’s never lost.

• Before you start to install the television, you’re asked what other components you’re using. With that information, you also have the manuals for everything in your home entertainment system. What’s more, the manual is then able to guide you through what wires go where. Pictures and video show how to hook this up to your Tivo, your satellite box, Blue ray player and the VCR that you bought back in 2003.
• You come to a step you just can’t understand –even after repeated readings. You hit a link on your phone and it not only rings tech support hands them your model and serial numbers (thus saving both of you all the preliminaries), it tells them where, exactly, you happen to be stuck in the process. The voice on the other side of the phone says, “Oh, Mr. Branson, you seem to be stuck on step 13. Let me try to talk you through it.” What’s more, your recorded conversion is transmitted to the people who wrote step number 6. If they determine a way to make the whole thing easier to follow, they can make and post corrections before support gets the next call on step 6.
• After all the wires are set up, it asks you to connect your Panasonic remote to your phone and programs the settings for all your components. That way you can use one remote for everything.
• Years later, you decide to donate the TV to a charity resale shop. Fortunately, whoever buys it will have the user’s manual and everything that came with it right at their fingertips.

Also:

• Immediate Product registration. Bye, bye warranty cards. The phone sends your contact info to the manufacturer.
• Recall notification. If the toaster you bought a while back is found to spontaneously catch fire, every owner knows right away, every which way. Lawyers should like that.
• Repair Centers. 30 seconds from “Damn, I need to get this fixed” to contact that already knows everything about the machine and its owner.
• Parts and accessories. That back cover that came off your remote? A car charger for your MP3 player? Hit a button and find it.

The end result is that people have a product that works better and lasts longer. As for Shop Savvy, that’s just the tip of the, um, well, you know.

People who approach this machine without knowing how it works (such as some of my house-guests) are likely to create a mess that seeps into kitchen crevices you never knew existed. Or they may (as people who bought it on my avid recommendation) end up convinced that “the damn thing doesn’t work.”

What’s needed here is more show, less tell. For example :

Click here to view the embedded video.

Contrast that with how Bunn tries to explain it:

Step 1. Raise the hinged flip-lid (or swivel lid to side if using an NHB). Note: The post protruding from the screen is connected to a stopper that controls the flow of water into the tank. When lid is closed and the post is depressed, the stopper will be raised and water will flow into the tank.

Cryptic, indeed, but inherently so. There is no way to explain this. It’s harder yet to explain why it happens and answer the inevitable, “So what?”

If a picture is worth a thousand words, a demonstration is worth a thousand words squared. There was a time when door-to-door salesmen would come to the house and show you how the appliance worked before you bought it. Perhaps it’s time to start doing that again. Only virtually.

Apple, a company on the cutting edge of video instruction, could have made this product a lot safer to use by, instead of burying the usual lawyerly gobbledygook, providing a practical short video. I propose the following:

One qualifier: There are no statistics on cell phones and accidents. No one really knows if this or any hands-free device makes driving safer. They also can’t say, for certain, if driving with a cell is dangerous. Not the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. Not all those insurance dudes. Only a few surveys done in Perth, Australia, Denmark and an old one in Finland.) But we all know we have both done and seen people do stupid, potentially dangerous things as we try to drive and work the phone at the same time.

This much we all can agree on: the less distractions while driving, the better.

What this (and every headset) needs is a side lesson that makes it as easy to work as a turn signal.

1. Keep the thing off until you answer the phone.  Turn it off when you’re done.

8 out of the top 10 gripes on Apple’s own Most Useful Customer Ratings page are about the battery. You’ll get a lot more mileage if you conserve the battery.

2. Learn to use it as if you were blindfolded.

Just like a turn signal, you’re better off being able to work it without looking at it. Here’s how:

To turn it on, press the button for three seconds until you hear these four rising tones:

To turn it off, press the button for three seconds until you hear these four falling tones:

Try that little tray they provide for keeping your change or that thing people used to call an ashtray. If it’s in the same place every time, you’ll know where to grab it.

Seeing the instructions on their machine, one wonders.

At least, unlike Maytag (which quit doing it), GE  has the sense to include “How to do your Laundry” instructions right where nobody can miss them. But they’re the wrong instructions. Doing your laundry this way will allow the detergent to potentially disfigure clothes, towels, etc, with little blotches. What they all should do is follow the advice in the online book Laundry.

The only way to prevent blotches on your laundry is to dilute the detergent with the the water before adding your clothes. It’s time the people who offer instructions for washing machines and laundry detergent came clean on that fact.

More and more egg companies are stamping an expiration on their cartons. As a result, more and more perfectly fresh eggs are getting thrown away.  One obvious solution is for the egg companies to offer up this simple test that anyone can do.

All they have to do is print it inside the carton.

Here it is in more detail.

So why don’t they do it? According to incredibleegg.org,

Dates on egg cartons and all other food packaging reflect food quality, not food safety. An ‘expiration’ or ‘sell-by’ date on an egg carton tells the grocer to pull the eggs if they haven’t sold by that time. A ‘best-by’ or ‘use-by’ date tells you that your eggs will still be of high quality if you use them by that date.

But experience tells anyone who has ever performed this test otherwise. More often than not, eggs remain fresh long past the expiration date.

You’d think at one hundred forty bucks a pair , Ugg might waterproof the boots for you. Instead they tell you to Please treat sheepskin and suede footwear with UGG® Water and Stain Repellent prior to wearing to avoid any initial staining. All of which means it’s up to you to cough up ten bucks for the privilege of wading through directions with a few holes in them.

For starters, they never warn you the spray may darken your shoes, make them less soft or  cause colors to run. Could that be the reason they don’t spray them in the first place?  Is it that they want them to look showroom nice?

The do warn you, though,to Spray the sheepskin surface with UGG® Australia Sheepskin Water and Stain Repellant evenly until it appears wet, but not soaked. And what is the difference between wet and soaked? Look up “wet” in The American Heritage Dictionary and you get:

Covered or soaked with a liquid, such as water.

Look up “soak” and it says:

To make thoroughly wet or saturated by or as if by placing in liquid.

Does that make it clear?

You’re also warned to Apply outdoors or in a well-ventilated area yet make no accommodations for winter –the time when many people might choose to buy a product that’s marketed to work in 30° below zero. Though they don’t tell you what’s meant by well-ventilated, the housekeepingchannel.com does. They say:

Try the garage, particularly during inclement weather. Always open all doors to the outside.

This means all of us in city apartments can easily solve this by renting a garage.

If you go online you’ll find the instructions were even less thorough than what was found on the package. and if you call Ugg Customer care at 1.888.432.8530 (Something they easily could have also put on the package) you’ll get:

• a recording of someone reading the same directions over the phone.
• another recording contracting package directions about using a brush
• instructions visit to the website.

Given the above, I suggest Ugg do the following:

• Clarify the instructions by:
  • Defining “Well Ventilated Area”
  • Explain what you mean by wet vs. soaked. Instructions for other products say, “Spray until the surface is covered” or “Until the liquid beads on the surface.” Is that what Ugg means?”
  • Tell us where we can find the required  suede/nubuck brush. As it turns out, Target, CVS, Wallgreen’s all carry them.
  • Define ‘Nap” Wiki calls is the “raised (fuzzy) surface”
  • Warn us about what stains can really destroy our Uggs.
  • Like all products that contain toxins, kindly spell out the names of the chemicals (tiny writing is fine) and remind people to take the product with them to the emergency room. People should know to do that but sometimes they forget.
• Produce a video that demonstrates the procedure.
  • It’s easy to produce. Cheap to post. Look at http://www.apple.com/business/theater/ for examples.

Or simply put the spray on in the first place. Just like car makers finally saw the wisdom of including rustproofing, can’t Ugg see the goodwill it can generate by treating us to the first application of waterproofing? Yes, we will need to renew it but that first application will spare us waiting 24 hours (or until the weather warms up) before we can put on our high priced footwear.