[Gllug] printer shops

[JLMS]

On Fri, Jan 8, 2010 at 10:20 PM, Peter Corlett <abuse at cabal.org.uk> wrote:

> On 8 Jan 2010, at 15:01, JLMS wrote:
> [...]
> > The brain does not work in a linear way, it is unpredictable and easily
> > fooled.  I have explained myself abundantly in other messages.
>
> You have?
>
> All you seem to have done is claim that technology can solve the problem of
> incompetent people driving recklessly. However, it obviously can't,
> otherwise it'd already be fitted in all cars by New Labour diktat.
>
> We already have a much simpler solution: we find these dangerous nutters,
> hopefully before they kill somebody, and take their driving licence away
> until they have learned how to safely operate a car. Much more effective
> than something out of a science-fiction book.
>
>
Yes, I have.

I was not talking about incompetent people (that is the typical knee jerk
reaction of most technologically inclined people: assume users, that
otherwise are perfectly able to do anything else, all of the sudden become
stupid in an unfamiliar situation).

I have seen people with decades of experience driving in the wrong side of
the road when arriving to a new place where the cars drive the other way
around.

I am looking at this from the point of view of people that travel
infrequently and all of the sudden find an unfamiliar environment, not about
local people that are driving day in, day out the same vehicle (but even in
this situation, familiarity and routine create dangerous situations).

Even when it comes to "nutters", is it beyond  the dignity of designers to
come up with solutions that stop them harming others? By the time you deduct
those license points it may be too late (tellingly you use the word
"hopefully", which to me it says more could be done).

Sorry to go so far off topic, I have some background about user interface
design and one learns the hard way that it is rarely the user's fault when
something goes wrong  with a system (computing or  any other kind), as some
others have pointed out the solutions for the "driving system" are out there
already, the challenge is political not technical.
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