3 ms·

And customers apparently like them, when deciding what to buy.

stainforth 7y ago
I never buy this argument. I'm sure we could've focus grouped seat belts and no one would've liked the experience but thank god we have them now, for the better.
- braythwayt 7y ago
  We did "sorta" focus group seat belts, and I was there to witness it. Before laws mandated the use of seat belts, most people didn't use them. My mother bought a Volvo 122 in the 1960s, and people marvelled at the three-point harness. But it's not like US manufacturers rushed to take advantage of Volvo making the patents freely available, and nor did Volvo take over the world by storm. Some cars had alarms that nagged the driver if the seat belts weren't done up. I recall my uncle routed around this by looping the driver and "shotgun" belts -behind- the seats and fastening them. Left to their own devices, large numbers of people prefer convenience and low price to safety. Only by regulation did the mass market adopt safer cars. So I completely agree, no, people did not like wearing seat belts. They only did so when their option to forgo safety was removed. p.s. I recall watching this PSA in Ontario. Everyone laughed about it, but soooooo many young men then went out and drove their muscle cars sans belt. Enjoy. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sri9j3PA5vE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sri9j3PA5vE
jki275 7y ago
Customers often don't have much choice. Most people don't make car buying decisions based on the head unit.
setr 7y ago
You can't use the market as an example of it, because the producers shifted in (almost) unison, and bundled it with other more valuable features. The same thing happened with 3DTVs -- the manufacturers all decided this was the next big thing, and shifted all their production to it, and it turns out.. it wasn't. But we as consumers had a 5-year drought where you simply couldn't buy a new TV that wasn't 3D. The same is happening with SmartTVs today -- if I want a new TV that isn't bottom-of-the-barrel tier, my only option is Smart. When I got leased a VW Jetta a few years back, you had the option of no-touchscreen.. but that was the lowest-featured car, so you have up 10 other things for it. You can also find the same thing in MacBooks with the touchbar -- once it was out, your only real options were to buy it, or throw the baby out and buy nothing/windows. You can't judge whether customers like them, because it's bundled to other far more valuable aspects.
- dublin 7y ago
  The Macbook touchbar holds a likely never-to-be-surpassed record for "The World's Most Useless Touchscreen". I literally cannot imagine how this UI abortion got to market. To me, the touchbar was the canary that Apple's innovation days were done. Sometimes, it's really NOT a good thing to "think different"(ly)...
  - 1123581321 7y ago
    Apple replaced the function keys because they were increasingly disused (and to increase the BOM and consequently the margin in absolute dollars.) The Touch Bar gets used more often. The default modes aren’t to everyone’s taste, but they’re easy for inexperienced users (based on our user observation) and power users like the potential to customize (check out BetterTouchTool if you haven’t yet.)
  - nikanj 7y ago
    It looks real nice on a render.

I never buy this argument. I'm sure we could've focus grouped seat belts and no one would've liked the experience but thank god we have them now, for the better.

braythwayt 7y ago
We did "sorta" focus group seat belts, and I was there to witness it. Before laws mandated the use of seat belts, most people didn't use them. My mother bought a Volvo 122 in the 1960s, and people marvelled at the three-point harness. But it's not like US manufacturers rushed to take advantage of Volvo making the patents freely available, and nor did Volvo take over the world by storm. Some cars had alarms that nagged the driver if the seat belts weren't done up. I recall my uncle routed around this by looping the driver and "shotgun" belts -behind- the seats and fastening them. Left to their own devices, large numbers of people prefer convenience and low price to safety. Only by regulation did the mass market adopt safer cars. So I completely agree, no, people did not like wearing seat belts. They only did so when their option to forgo safety was removed. p.s. I recall watching this PSA in Ontario. Everyone laughed about it, but soooooo many young men then went out and drove their muscle cars sans belt. Enjoy. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sri9j3PA5vE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sri9j3PA5vE

jki275 7y ago

Customers often don't have much choice. Most people don't make car buying decisions based on the head unit.

setr 7y ago

You can't use the market as an example of it, because the producers shifted in (almost) unison, and bundled it with other more valuable features. The same thing happened with 3DTVs -- the manufacturers all decided this was the next big thing, and shifted all their production to it, and it turns out.. it wasn't. But we as consumers had a 5-year drought where you simply couldn't buy a new TV that wasn't 3D. The same is happening with SmartTVs today -- if I want a new TV that isn't bottom-of-the-barrel tier, my only option is Smart. When I got leased a VW Jetta a few years back, you had the option of no-touchscreen.. but that was the lowest-featured car, so you have up 10 other things for it. You can also find the same thing in MacBooks with the touchbar -- once it was out, your only real options were to buy it, or throw the baby out and buy nothing/windows. You can't judge whether customers like them, because it's bundled to other far more valuable aspects.

dublin 7y ago
The Macbook touchbar holds a likely never-to-be-surpassed record for "The World's Most Useless Touchscreen". I literally cannot imagine how this UI abortion got to market. To me, the touchbar was the canary that Apple's innovation days were done. Sometimes, it's really NOT a good thing to "think different"(ly)...
- 1123581321 7y ago
  Apple replaced the function keys because they were increasingly disused (and to increase the BOM and consequently the margin in absolute dollars.) The Touch Bar gets used more often. The default modes aren’t to everyone’s taste, but they’re easy for inexperienced users (based on our user observation) and power users like the potential to customize (check out BetterTouchTool if you haven’t yet.)
- nikanj 7y ago
  It looks real nice on a render.