A few months ago I started taking screenshots of odd software and interface notifications. Here’s a sample of my continuously growing collection:
Hang in there! We know life is tough without Twitter but it will have super strength when it is back online. Nice example of the vitalizing of software.
This is you. This is fugly!
Fugly? Is that Yahoo Mash’s way of saying f*cking ugly? Fugly is the new default.
My boring default picture looks rather scared actually.
I love the way they really point out that they think you are a boring person if you are a default person. Apply social pressure to get people to change the default.
“Do NOT tick yes”
OK, sure, but why is that tickbox there? If I am not allowed to tick it, why show it? Now you make me want to tick it!
I previously wrote about the Whatever Button developed by Michael Stevenson and Erik Borra that it makes your life so much easier. Want to make decision making easier as well? Download the Whatever Button as a Firefox plugin at www.whateverbutton.com
More:
- A theoretical and critical essay on interaction and affect: Michael Stevenson ‘Interactivity is Affectivity,’ Current Themes in New Media class paper, University of Amsterdam, August, 2007.
Michael Stevenson and Erik Borra developed the Whatever Button for Firefox which makes your life so much easier:
Pay Submit Send Whatever
At almost every turn on the Web, we are asked to say yes. Yes to registration, yes to membership, yes to personal recommendations. Yes is said for us, with pre-filled checkboxes that read ‘Keep me informed’. Or there might only be a semblance of choice – for example, saying no to browser cookies makes navigating the Web nearly impossible. More generally, however, it is a matter of clicking through the various forms in order to get what we want and to get to it faster. A matter of saying, ‘Whatever’. And when that happens, we might wonder to what extent ‘Yes’ is our own default setting rather than that of the machine.
The aim with the Whatever Button, then, is to pause and ask why we give away personal information so easily. The add-on makes the exchanges honest, re-labeling the buttons we press – whether they say ’search’, ’send’ or ‘okay’ – with the more accurate description, ‘Whatever’.
The Button is for fun, of course, but should highlight rather than hide the significance of our various Whatever moments. Buttons can be serious enough: consider the economic importance of Amazon’s One-Click service. Or the implications of the many license agreements we click through so quickly. Given this, perhaps the Whatever Button can be used as an experiment for reflection. Are you careful with your data, avoiding ugly Third-Party clauses and monstrous Spyware? Or do you throw caution to the wind, opening up the personal information floodgates? What button fits you best?
Get the Whatever Button here. (You’ll need Firefox, of course)
It perfectly integrates with WordPress too:
Recent Comments