Agree this design is bad and dangerous. China may ban it.
But, is there a cultural element to obviousness: is a door handle obvious to someone who hasn't seen one used before? That unobvious link between lever and larger body action used to be sufficient to stop forest dwellers like bears, but no more. They've even learned to operate hidden trashbin handles. I have seen a foreigner completely stumped by a can opener. The Irish made a sport out of stumping foreigners 🤣
@avi2022 is a handle on a door obvious? yes, if it looks like a handle. it's a space to put your fingers when pulling something. tell me about a culture that does not have handles?
the aztecs had no wheels, but, what do you want to bet they had handles?
edit: actually if you're looking to open a door then you'll probably put your fingers in a handle if there is one, whether you recognise it as a handle or not. you're looking for purchase to pull on the door…
@fishidwardrobe As it turns out, door handles may be a somewhat recent thing after standardized manufacturing - see Osbourn Dorsey’s 1878 patent for an “improvement in door-holding devices”.
Japan favored sliding panels with recessed pulls. Early America / frontiers favored "latch strings".
Older setups usually separated latch action from locking.
The Aztecs didn't use swinging doors with hinges, instead using a curtain or mat with a bell for privacy, and security was cultural.
@avi2022 @fishidwardrobe I'm reasonably sure I read that the Romans didn't have hinges for most (if not all) of their doors—the door was just lifted into place across the doorway and barred from inside at night.
more importantly, safety critical, a number of people have burned alive in Teslas because their door controls became inoperative and they did not know where the emergency manual release hatch is.
Also, China just banned recessed door handles like Tesla's. They may help aerodynamics a tiny bit, but once again a safety hazard.
@ignacyy if you want a 350 mile range EV for under £15,000, your choices are tell yourself that the second hand car sale money doesn't directly go to Nazis, or decide you don't want one after all. It's not on my shortlist of potential replacements for my current car, but I can understand why it would be for some people.
@armb It is genuinely disturbing how people find excuses to keep financially supporting a literal Nazi company.
I will tell you even more - in the Third Reich, the financial incentive to support Nazism was much stronger than just cheaper car.
Yet, as with buying Tesla, joining NSDAP or supporting financially Nazis was as bad as it goes. Because ethical norms go beyond money and yes, if you cannot afford an ethical good, do not buy one at all. And for sure do not buy a Nazi one.
@Charlie Stross The door handle did not need disrupting.
Apparently you open the glovebox from a pull down menu. That didn’t need disrupting either.
Having ridden in one as an Uber, they also appear to have disrupted the concept of “needing suspension”. I now never select “eco” when hiring an Uber in case I get a Tesla. I’m in my 50s. My back doesn’t deserve that.
My favourite one is the ability to dip headlamps did not need disrupting.
This is my current test prototype to deal with oncoming Teslas blinding me. I have to use these at all times of day and night.
(Note there are other cars with similar issues both recent fossil fueled cars and EVs but far and away the worst offenders with blinding headlamps are Teslas)
@goatsarah Wow -- that was a problem even when the Tesla 3 first came out, back in 2018-ish. Very bumpy rides. Weird that it hasn't gotten any better.
Weirdly, it could've been *even worse*. I remember Musk actually having to comment on it, how they wanted the standard air pressure in the tires to be 40/42 psi, but had to lower it to around 35 on production models, because the ride was just "way too bumpy at 40/42."
@goatsarah "What if a car, but instead of a car, it's just a high-tech simulation of what it feels to be trapped inside a VR experience jointly designed by a high-end hi-fi manufacturer and the people who created the user interface for your health insurance company's website?”
@NotTheLBCGuy certainly this is true for things the audience understands in general - sometimes the problem is that you're doing something genuinely new
sometimes the problem is that you're masturbating in public under the heading of "doing something genuinely new" and shouldn't, though
Yes, and...There's a bright line in engineering R&D between novelty of controls and human safety, where innovation meets liability. Tesla crossed that line again and again. They just pay off the families of dead customers.
Teaching every user a new thing is a very heavy lift, and people don't like to be forced. So novelty must pay off in utility or delight.
@skry @NotTheLBCGuy Ever seen what the fighting game community did with arcade parts and keyboard-inspired designs?
For those with quick fingers, even starting from fresh, a good leverless controller is both pretty quickly! (and I've seen people go "yep, this is better than pad" real fast too, even if the location of the up button is initially counterintuitive)
I read a book titled “The Design of Everyday Things” in college that greatly influenced my design philosophy as an engineer. The author’s main point was “doors should not need owners manuals.” This example clearly fails that test.
@TimWardCam @mort NO LOVE for modern electronics where the paper manual is a 10cm square glossy white pamphlet printed in pale grey 4-point type that's so tiny and illegible I need to photograph and enlarge it before I realize it's not the manual, it's just the warranty declaration.
@TimWardCam @mort fun fact: this is also why printed school textbooks often provide the answers on the publisher's website (partially: the other reason is printing and distribution costs, and just weight impositions on students).
Not so fun fact: finalising the answers often reveals impossible or poorly worded questions.
Yes... THere are many things on Teslas that are really non intuitive, or simply worse than what they replace. Change for the sake of it. The customer must bend to adapt to the "design" rather than designing for utility... What do you expect from a ketamine addled nazi?
@TimWardCam @mort Anything that requires someone(the manufacturer) to maintain a digital copy on a functional server somewhere is an inevitable locus for enshittification. Doubly so, if that was an intentional choice by that particular someone(the manufacturer). You definitely know they don’t care at best, and at worst they’re looking for a rug to pull.
@TimWardCam @mort There are two aspects to power. The ability to hold others responsible. And the ability to evade responsibility. Everything else is window dressing and cruelty.
The chance of me being found in a Tesla showroom is as likely as penguins in the wild in the arctic near polar bears. The car obstructing my user basic instincts is unforgivable.
I've been half-arsedly looking at 2nd hand cars as my car needs replacing this year. Every lot I've been to, the Teslas are the ones with misted windows in the cold. Not that I'd buy one.
If these instructions include serious "DO NOT" comments, your product is poorly designed as well. But yes, if you cannot work out clearly how to open a car door, then the design of the UI is fatally flawed.
@TimWardCam @mort My 2013 five-gear manual Corolla has 470k on the odometer. I'll be soon looking to, reluctantly, replace it. Any suggestions on the lowest-tech car available?
@quoidian @TimWardCam @mort I no longer drive, but I'd recommend avoiding anything recent enough to have Google or Apple car integration—and definitely avoid anything with a touchscreen, they're actively dangerous (requiring the driver to look away from the road to operate controls is a BAD THING).
while this is bad, my favorite of these was the BMW i8. There was a video of a a training session for sales people at a BMW sales room. If someone asked to see the engine bay, only a factory trained technician was allowed to open it.
1. You needed a special tool 2. Open driver side door 3. Put tool in hole in door jam, grab hook and slightly pull 4. Repeat on passenger door 5. With two people lift hood 1.5 inches vertically. 6. Tilt hood from towards the front upto 45 degrees.
I wouldn't care if they were only affecting their own awful customers, but by glamorizing these shit UI elements, they've got all the other car manufacturers copying them and endangering everyone. NTM kids who didn't consent to die in a fire.
You've sort of put your finger on a missed opportunity in motor vehicle #marketing.
Instead of all vehicle manufacturers having the current lot of samey weird advertisements where unicorns chase them down the streets in camera drone shots whilst children shout 'Play Peppa Pig at max volume!' at the computer from the rear seats and it suddenly does, there's a niche for a manufacturer to be disruptive …
… and run an #advertising campaign where they simply show that *their* cars have proper door handles, physical control knobs that don't need one to keep reading a screen away from looking at the road, and where a 5 year old cannot cause a motorway pile-up with 'Hey Google! Emergency stop!'.
It's a product differentiator. The marketers could use it.
@quoidian @TimWardCam @mort If I seem paranoid about Russia these days it's because I'm old enough to remember the Cold War and Putin's cowboys are pulling shit that would have had the Politburo and the White House tearing up the hotline and hammering shoes on the table in the UNSC back in the day.
What baffles me is that Hyundai makes a much better and comparably priced electric sedan, the Ioniq6, but the Tesla Model 3 outsells it in the U .S. by about 10 to 1. Madness.
i'm no tesla fan, but i think the purpose of this is different and deliberate -- make the owners feel good for knowing how to open the door, unlike the dumb n00bs who can't even open the door … doesn't that fit what you'd expect from elon's tesla?
I have, in the past, honestly purchased a box of toothpicks on which instructions were printed. I thought Douglas Adams was making that up for a joke! But no, very real.
I haven't built the Asylum, though - that seems like the kind of task that'd drive you crazy.
@jgobble I had to put little “Door Open” stickers on the button. This is the *least* of the very poor user interface in this car, which — unlike regular cars — gets worse over time because of software updates and lack of tactile controls.
@TimWardCam @mort I had the misfortune to argue with a deer in 2020 and so needed a 'courtesy vehicle' for a week. I have a clear list from that SUV what I don't want in a vehicle and the distracting display screen is on top.
@TimWardCam @mort My youngest has a cracked neck vertibra and, when I visited, I was happy to see he had a backup camera in his SUV. But if the price of having it is having nobs replaced by a touchscreen, then no.
@quoidian @TimWardCam @mort The in-car touchscreen controls are there to save the manufacturer's bill of materials. Knobs are custom injection-molded bits of plastic, so individual cost items. Touchscreens are surprisingly cheap in comparison to 20-30 knobs/dials ...
@gulfie Even if I could still drive (poor eyesight), I wouldn't drive a car where you need a touchscreen to mess with the climate control or windscreen wipers.
@mort @TimWardCam it's the existence of the screen as a reason for taking my eyes and attention off the road that I question. I wouldn't read a book, listen to radio, or talk on a phone while driving at my age and on our snowy roads.
@quoidian @mort @TimWardCam It takes your eyeballs a couple of seconds to accommodate from long distance vision to close-up. At 100km/h that can easily be 100 metres of travel, with lethal consequences if you don't adjust in time.
There are also other good use cases for touchscreens. Searching/ordering radio stations, settings, less often used information, ... It just shouldn't be necessary for anything commonly used while driving. Including AC, volume or track/station changes.
@TimWardCam @quoidian @mort Yeah, getting those buttons can be tricky in rough air - learned from another pilot to use a reference point on the screen edge or other point on the panel with the thumb or little finger and then operate the screen or buttons - eliminates the impact from shake
@TimWardCam @JdeBP @dalias The correct side of the road doesn’t matter in car ad land, because there is never any other traffic. Unless the ad is pushing the assisted-driving features, in which case you might get one other car driving perfectly predictably that the AI can “save" you from…
avi2022
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •Agree this design is bad and dangerous. China may ban it.
But, is there a cultural element to obviousness: is a door handle obvious to someone who hasn't seen one used before? That unobvious link between lever and larger body action used to be sufficient to stop forest dwellers like bears, but no more. They've even learned to operate hidden trashbin handles. I have seen a foreigner completely stumped by a can opener. The Irish made a sport out of stumping foreigners 🤣
1/2
Fish Id Wardrobe
in reply to avi2022 • • •@avi2022 is a handle on a door obvious? yes, if it looks like a handle. it's a space to put your fingers when pulling something. tell me about a culture that does not have handles?
the aztecs had no wheels, but, what do you want to bet they had handles?
edit: actually if you're looking to open a door then you'll probably put your fingers in a handle if there is one, whether you recognise it as a handle or not. you're looking for purchase to pull on the door…
avi2022
in reply to Fish Id Wardrobe • • •@fishidwardrobe
As it turns out, door handles may be a somewhat recent thing after standardized manufacturing - see Osbourn Dorsey’s 1878 patent for an “improvement in door-holding devices”.
Japan favored sliding panels with recessed pulls. Early America / frontiers favored "latch strings".
Older setups usually separated latch action from locking.
The Aztecs didn't use swinging doors with hinges, instead using a curtain or mat with a bell for privacy, and security was cultural.
Charlie Stross
in reply to avi2022 • • •Thorium
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •Fazal Majid
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •more importantly, safety critical, a number of people have burned alive in Teslas because their door controls became inoperative and they did not know where the emergency manual release hatch is.
Also, China just banned recessed door handles like Tesla's. They may help aerodynamics a tiny bit, but once again a safety hazard.
Klaudia (aka jinxx)
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •Ignacy 🇪🇺
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •Alan Braggins
in reply to Ignacy 🇪🇺 • • •It's not on my shortlist of potential replacements for my current car, but I can understand why it would be for some people.
Ignacy 🇪🇺
in reply to Alan Braggins • • •@armb It is genuinely disturbing how people find excuses to keep financially supporting a literal Nazi company.
I will tell you even more - in the Third Reich, the financial incentive to support Nazism was much stronger than just cheaper car.
Yet, as with buying Tesla, joining NSDAP or supporting financially Nazis was as bad as it goes. Because ethical norms go beyond money and yes, if you cannot afford an ethical good, do not buy one at all. And for sure do not buy a Nazi one.
Sarah Brown
in reply to Charlie Stross • •@Charlie Stross The door handle did not need disrupting.
Apparently you open the glovebox from a pull down menu. That didn’t need disrupting either.
Having ridden in one as an Uber, they also appear to have disrupted the concept of “needing suspension”. I now never select “eco” when hiring an Uber in case I get a Tesla. I’m in my 50s. My back doesn’t deserve that.
like this
Kristen, Charlie Stross, Brian Gordon, dch, Eggs now in different baskets., The Penguin of Evil, Isaac Ji Kuo, ghostdancer, Dave, Martin W, samiamsam, Alex@rtnVFRmedia Suffolk UK, Caitlinmonster, Meyltje ∞ 🍋 🏳️🌈, cyplo, Sophie Schmieg, Templaillo Ahi, random thoughts, серафими многоꙮчитїи, Simon Landmine, Kim Possible, Rehana Rodrigues, Ben Tasker, Billy Smith, Jon Hancock, Mark Hurst, sidb, Q.H. Stone, Oblomov, Taffer 🇨🇦, older, javitel, just zis guy, you know, The Flight Attendant, Lesley Shashaty and ghosttie like this.
reshared this
BadWoof, Charlie Stross, Bittersweetheart Transtifa, MrWtr0102, Seiðr, samiamsam, Alex@rtnVFRmedia Suffolk UK, Prufrax, CrazyDogLadySezPEACE, Bogeon and Debbie Goldsmith 🏳️⚧️♾️🇺🇦 reshared this.
Jernej Simončič �
in reply to Sarah Brown • • •Sarah Brown likes this.
Eggs now in different baskets.
in reply to Sarah Brown • • •My favourite one is the ability to dip headlamps did not need disrupting.
This is my current test prototype to deal with oncoming Teslas blinding me. I have to use these at all times of day and night.
(Note there are other cars with similar issues both recent fossil fueled cars and EVs but far and away the worst offenders with blinding headlamps are Teslas)
Administrator
in reply to Sarah Brown • • •@goatsarah Wow -- that was a problem even when the Tesla 3 first came out, back in 2018-ish. Very bumpy rides. Weird that it hasn't gotten any better.
Weirdly, it could've been *even worse*. I remember Musk actually having to comment on it, how they wanted the standard air pressure in the tires to be 40/42 psi, but had to lower it to around 35 on production models, because the ride was just "way too bumpy at 40/42."
Templaillo Ahi
in reply to Sarah Brown • • •Angus McIntyre
in reply to Sarah Brown • • •Saltysaur
in reply to Sarah Brown • • •Not The LBC Guy
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •Charlie Stross reshared this.
Philippa Cowderoy
in reply to Not The LBC Guy • • •@NotTheLBCGuy certainly this is true for things the audience understands in general - sometimes the problem is that you're doing something genuinely new
sometimes the problem is that you're masturbating in public under the heading of "doing something genuinely new" and shouldn't, though
skry
in reply to Philippa Cowderoy • • •@flippac
Yes, and...There's a bright line in engineering R&D between novelty of controls and human safety, where innovation meets liability. Tesla crossed that line again and again. They just pay off the families of dead customers.
Teaching every user a new thing is a very heavy lift, and people don't like to be forced. So novelty must pay off in utility or delight.
@NotTheLBCGuy @cstross
Philippa Cowderoy
in reply to skry • • •@skry @NotTheLBCGuy Ever seen what the fighting game community did with arcade parts and keyboard-inspired designs?
For those with quick fingers, even starting from fresh, a good leverless controller is both pretty quickly! (and I've seen people go "yep, this is better than pad" real fast too, even if the location of the up button is initially counterintuitive)
Mary Holstege
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •As the NTSB guy said: "All that safety is built on the wisdom of dead bodies."
More amusingly, my favourite design fail photo (from a toilet)
Charlie Stross
in reply to Mary Holstege • • •Mary Holstege
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •Autoerotic Defenestration
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •Greg Kemp
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •Charlie Stross
Unknown parent • • •Flic
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •Flic
Unknown parent • • •@TimWardCam @mort fun fact: this is also why printed school textbooks often provide the answers on the publisher's website (partially: the other reason is printing and distribution costs, and just weight impositions on students).
Not so fun fact: finalising the answers often reveals impossible or poorly worded questions.
All industries are the same but different.
Graeme 🏴
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •su_liam
Unknown parent • • •su_liam
Unknown parent • • •Frans Super 🇺🇦🇵🇸🍋 FKNZS🔻
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •Nullstring 🏴☠️
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •BoneHo-ho-houseWasps🔶🇬🇧🇪🇺
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •MJ Ray
Unknown parent • • •Schroedinger
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •If these instructions include serious "DO NOT" comments, your product is poorly designed as well. But yes, if you cannot work out clearly how to open a car door, then the design of the UI is fatally flawed.
People will break things.
Larry
Unknown parent • • •My 2013 five-gear manual Corolla has 470k on the odometer. I'll be soon looking to, reluctantly, replace it. Any suggestions on the lowest-tech car available?
Charlie Stross
in reply to Larry • • •vrek
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •while this is bad, my favorite of these was the BMW i8. There was a video of a a training session for sales people at a BMW sales room. If someone asked to see the engine bay, only a factory trained technician was allowed to open it.
1. You needed a special tool 2. Open driver side door 3. Put tool in hole in door jam, grab hook and slightly pull 4. Repeat on passenger door 5. With two people lift hood 1.5 inches vertically. 6. Tilt hood from towards the front upto 45 degrees.
Cassandrich
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •JdeBP
in reply to Cassandrich • • •@dalias
You've sort of put your finger on a missed opportunity in motor vehicle #marketing.
Instead of all vehicle manufacturers having the current lot of samey weird advertisements where unicorns chase them down the streets in camera drone shots whilst children shout 'Play Peppa Pig at max volume!' at the computer from the rear seats and it suddenly does, there's a niche for a manufacturer to be disruptive …
… and run an #advertising campaign where they simply show that *their* cars have proper door handles, physical control knobs that don't need one to keep reading a screen away from looking at the road, and where a 5 year old cannot cause a motorway pile-up with 'Hey Google! Emergency stop!'.
It's a product differentiator. The marketers could use it.
@cstross
#MotorVehicles #Google #GoogleGemini #SafeAtAnySpeed
reshared this
Simon Landmine reshared this.
Charlie Stross
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •Raccoon🇺🇸🏳️🌈
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •Chibani
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •DressToKILT
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •Bruce Mirken
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •Jeffrey P. Bigham 🔥🔥
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •Jennifer Kayla | Theogrin 🦊
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •I have, in the past, honestly purchased a box of toothpicks on which instructions were printed. I thought Douglas Adams was making that up for a joke! But no, very real.
I haven't built the Asylum, though - that seems like the kind of task that'd drive you crazy.
Gene Cowan 🏳️🌈
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •Larry
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •I had the misfortune to argue with a deer in 2020 and so needed a 'courtesy vehicle' for a week.
I have a clear list from that SUV what I don't want in a vehicle and the distracting display screen is on top.
Charlie Stross
in reply to Larry • • •I would make a qualified exception for a reversing camera display that delivers satellite navigation stuff when not in reverse gear.
But it needs to be a *display*, not an input touchscreen.
Tubemeister
Unknown parent • • •Larry
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •My youngest has a cracked neck vertibra and, when I visited, I was happy to see he had a backup camera in his SUV. But if the price of having it is having nobs replaced by a touchscreen, then no.
Charlie Stross
in reply to Larry • • •Larry
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •But since I have no automotive shares, I don't care to feel unsafe to give them a benefit.
Phil Haigh
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •Charlie Stross
in reply to Phil Haigh • • •Larry
Unknown parent • • •Charlie Stross
in reply to Larry • • •Mirko Schenk
in reply to Charlie Stross • • •It just shouldn't be necessary for anything commonly used while driving. Including AC, volume or track/station changes.
Larry
Unknown parent • • •Yes. I've never had a car with that 'feature,' but that would be on my automatic rejection list.
Larry
Unknown parent • • •avi2022
Unknown parent • • •Yeah, getting those buttons can be tricky in rough air - learned from another pilot to use a reference point on the screen edge or other point on the panel with the thumb or little finger and then operate the screen or buttons - eliminates the impact from shake
Rob Abram
Unknown parent • • •