It’s not me, it’s…

Okay let’s pretend you wanted to get out of this van.

You pull the door handle. Oh, the van is locked. You see the following:

What do you do?

If you answered “push the button down,” you are wrong. In this van, if you want to unlock the doors, you press up. Towards the writing that says LOCK.

I press the wrong way EVERY time. First of all they shouldn’t be using writing- is there not an icon or image or something? But I mean, stick to your guns, here. Having no writing at all would be better than this.

When in Canada, when I type google.com into my browser I am redirected to google.ca

That’s fine, and in fact, that’s usually preferable since google.ca returns results with Canadian relevant content.

But what about when I specifically want American content? Like when I was filing my taxes (yesterday. shut up) and had to keep searching for the meaning of all sorts of terms.

1. If I’m filing out these forms online, it’d be awesome if they hyperlinked these terms to their definition, or had some sort of build in hovering definition tool
2. How can taxes be this complicated? I am an intelligent person!

And google.ca kept returning Canadian results. I don’t care about Canadian results when I’m filing American taxes!

I eventually realized that I should type IRS into all my queries to get rid of the Canadian pages, but still. I sometimes want google.com!

Most people get their drivers license when they are 16 or 17.

I didn’t, but I got to relive 2004 anyway when trying to book my test:

What’s the worst? (click for larger/clearer image)

1. Totally inaccurate geographical labeling? (For example, Etobicoke is part of Toronto)
2. The fact that there is no way to make an address show up beside “Address:”?
3. The fact that Ontario has some sort of town or municipality called PICKLE LAKE?
4. Quit and Continue being on the wrong side of the page? (TWICE when meaning to click Continue, I clicked Quit instead. And I am even conscientious!)
5. How nostalgic this layout made me (in grade 10 ALL my friends were in my Visual Basic coding class)?

…I’m leaning towards 3, and trying to come up with a good dill and/or sweet and sour pun.

There is a time and place for defying standards.

Standards that I’m okay with defying:

• Eating turkey at family Christmas gathering (live on the edge. I’m telling you: lasagna)
• Promoting the most senior staff member (sometimes the best person for the job is more junior, and more experienced)
• Inviting people to weddings out of obligation (wedding standards are plain silly)

Standards that I recommend you do not defy:

• Using white font on a black background (it’s ugly and it hurts my eyes)
• Covering your mouth when you cough (this is less of a “standard” and more of a “health issue”)
• Making conditioner bottles opaque and shampoo bottles translucent

Yes, John Frieda, I’m talking to you.

Gentle readers, I ask you, which of these looks like conditioner at first glance?

The images aren’t really doing it justice. The on the left is really translucent, in the way that we have come to expect shampoo bottles to be.

My BFF recently saw these two next to each other on a shelf, and bought one of each assuming she was getting a shampoo and a conditioner. Sadly, she got two shampoos. What a let down!

Moral: People won’t read when there are obvious other conventions. Don’t lead them astray by defying conventions. Don’t give them reason to have to stop and think. Keep your logout button on the top right, keep your hyperlinks underlined, and use opacity exclusively for conditioner bottles, not shampoo.

(images from John Frieda’s website)

Even if you take super good care of something, you can easily misplace it.

Case in point: the lids to flash drives.

Take a look at this poor sucker:

You’re definitely going to lose that lid. Especially because you can’t even stick it on the other end (you know, like a lid to a marker, or something)

Now check out this dream boat:

Hunky-dory!

The USB part retracts when you pull the slide thing back. And don’t worry, you can’t accidentally retract it at an inconvenient time; you need to push down a little then pull back on the slide.

With good design like this, why would anybody ever buy something with a lid again?

(Images via amazon)

We all know some people who are a little over zealous the Reply-All button.

I promise you, I would never do that. I will never Reply-All when a Reply will suffice.

Unfortunately, facebook maliciously forces me to break that promise approximately bi-weekly.

There are many occasions when a Send To All response is completely appropriate. Well, not many, but a few. (Move it to a wiki, already!)

But there are countless times when Send To All is inefficient to the point of being rude.

Like that time somebody I hardly know sent spam to like, a hundred people, asking if anybody wanted to sublet her apartment for the summer. I had absolutely no interest in subletting her apartment, and yet I was forced to witness a 10 message exchange: “Hey, I might be. How much per month” “$350″ “Including utilities?” “Yeah. And oh yeah, there’s great parking” “Anywhere for bikes?”.

I would have much preferred that these two take their conversation away from the rest of us. And maybe they would have, if given the option.

See, facebook? Sometimes I don’t want to reply all.

Presenting users with ONLY a Send To All button is like an English teacher who allows students to submit essays written in text-speak, or commenting “haha hilarious!” on really lame blog post where the author talks in detail about her new shoes, her boyfriend (named only by initial), and how drunk she got on Friday: it’s only going to build bad habits.

Come on facebook. One more button. Seriously? Is it that hard?

I’m the intern. I’m sitting at my desk with very little to do.

And yet if you look on Communicator, you’ll see that I’m asking not to be disturbed.

I didn’t change it! Is there a keyboard short cut that I unintentionally pressed? After X minutes of inactivity does it randomly choose one of the other messages?

This has happened before, too. One time it told everybody I was in a meeting.

As soon as I notice that I am displaying a message other than “online” I immediately change it back, but then break into a sweat wondering how long it’s been like that.

Do people actually think I am asking not to be disturbed? Do people think I am a dirty liar for saying I am in a meeting when obviously I am not?

Either way, strike one against Microsoft Office Communicator. Shortcuts are fine and dandy, but should be off by default to prevent this from happening. Unless I intentionally click the status menu, I don’t want my status to change.