Monthly Archives: April 2007

The Air Canada Seatback Entertainment System Sucks

Posted on by

I recently flew to California on Air Canada to attend CHI 2007, a conference dealing with computer-human interaction. I was overjoyed (or perhaps just joyed) upon entering the plane to see that they had the seatback touchscreen entertainment systems that allow each person to choose their own movie or TV show. The bodings were ominous however, when an announcement (paraphrased) came over the speaker that “once the entertainment system is activated, be careful to not touch the screen too many times in quick succession, or it will crash.” Over the course of the flight I would discover the many other ways in which the seatback entertainment system was deeply inadequate.

So let’s enter rant mode and simply list the many flaws in the system. First the system reacted very slowly to any input. Several seconds would pass after touching the screen and seeing any sort of feedback. Second, the movies and TV shows were categorized in non-intuitive and inappropriate categories. Finding something you wanted required navigating up and down the hierarchy to figure out where Air Canada hid whatever you wanted. This was made more maddening by the slow response. Third, many of the buttons were far too small and jammed together. My fingers are fairly slim, but I only had about a 50% success rate in pressing many of the buttons (particularly for changing volume). Fourth, much of the text was far too small, to a degree that the woman across the aisle from me couldn’t read it at all. She had to get somebody beside her to read it for her.

So is having the entertainment system better than having no entertainment system? Absolutely, however overall the system was about as bad as it could be while still functioning. It seems the people designing it had no sense for how it would be used, and what requirements there might be. If I were Air Canada I would have refused to pay for this. I suspect they are perfectly content though. The management responsible for installing these systems probably doesn’t spend too much time worrying about user/customer satisfaction with the system. They just want to be able to tick the box beside “seatback entertainment system” in their competitive advantage comparison chart.

Posted in HCI

The United Nations Sucks

Posted on by

I was recently saddened to learn that one of my more liberal/feminist friends didn’t feel at all challenged by my opinion piece on abortion. I feel obliged to stir up some controversy, so my next effort deals with another touchy subject, circumcision.

Recently in the news was the announcement from the UN that they recommend male circumcision for the purpose of decreasing HIV infection. You see, they did a study where they went around Africa cutting the foreskins off of guys, and then later visited the guys to see if they had HIV. They discovered that the foreskinless guys were less likely to contract the infection.

So I wonder, did they do a similar study with women? Did they ride around in their trucks telling women “hey we’d like to do this medically unnecessary and invasive operation on you to see what happens?” No, they didn’t, because they are vehemently opposed to all forms of female circumcision.

But you may protest that female circumcision is a horrible painful mutilation whereas male circumcision is but a tiny clipping of useless flesh. Well, that is a commonly held belief, but it is false. The more extreme forms of female circumcision are indeed extremely heinous, but the lesser forms (Type I, refer to wikipedia) are roughly equivalent to male circumcision, and constitute around 85% of all female circumcisions in Africa.

So, on one hand the UN is entirely opposed to all forms of female circumcision, but endorses equivalent forms of male circumcision, and even went so far as to travel around performing circumcisions for experimental purposes. This is an extremely hypocritical standpoint, and one of the many reasons why the UN has lost all credibility in my eyes.

So, what do I think? Glad you asked. No medically unnecessary circumcisions should be allowed on anyone unable to consent, such as children. Only adults who go into the procedure with full knowledge of what they are doing should be able to cut chunks off of themselves. I don’t care if the procedure is a long held tradition in your culture, be it African, or Jewish. I don’t care if you are an adherent to John Harvey Kellogg’s beliefs in eugenics, circumcision, and corn flakes. Just don’t do it.