May 26, 2007
The Uncanny Valley of Design
I just read an interesting article by Bill Higgins on how the concept of the “Uncanny Valley” (the idea that humans will interact positively, normally to robots up-to the point when robots are to human-like, whereby humans become uneasy about the interaction.) applies to web design.
The concept really doesn’t apply to software design squarely, so Higgins extends to concept to the sort-of unfamiliarity that people experience when they expect a program to look or work one way, but it does not.
So the problem here is how to build upon and improve a paradigm, say operating system design, without compromising the environment users have come to expect:
