An Everyday Thing

The object I’ve chosen is the remote control provided by Comcast for operating a television when a type of premium cable service is provided. Basically, the remote is handed to a person when the installer finishes setting things up and they explain to use the “All On” button to turn things on and off and then quickly run through some of the other buttons very quickly. So, as a stand-alone product in the hands of an inexperienced user, the remote is less than ideal in its design.

The affordance of the remote control, or what it is for, is clear – it is used to control the operation of the television. Also, the conceptual model one has of a remote matches the remote itself; a hand-held gadget with buttons on it to indicate things like channels, volume, and power. It seems that one’s conceptual model of the remote and how it operates should match easily. But, this remote is not so straightforward and easy to operate as it appears. When other aspects of the design are considered we find that sometimes the conceptual model works and sometimes it doesn’t in directing us how to use the device.

Problems begin to arise when thinking in terms of constraints. On the one hand, the remote has buttons and buttons are usually for pushing, so the mechanics of the remote’s operation are clear. On the other hand, the remote has 45 buttons on it, and though the result of pushing some of them is clearly understandable for a person who has had experience with televisions and remote controls, over half do not make sense in terms of their function as related to operating the television.

For example, there are two buttons, one labeled “+” and one “-“ with the word “Page” printed underneath each. One might understand “+” means go forward a page, whereas “-“ would mean the opposite. But “Page” in relation to operating a television doesn’t make sense on the surface.

A remote control such as this does give the user feedback; when one pushes a button there is a corresponding action, but one can’t always predict the result of the action without repeated practice.

In terms of visibility, the buttons one would push are highly visible, but the message that some of them attempt to convey are not really understandable to the user. For example, several questions are raised in relation to the message some of the buttons give, like: Why have buttons for play, fast forward, reverse, record, etc, like one would see on a VCR on a remote control for the television? Do these buttons mean that I will be able to control a VCR that is hooked up to my TV with the remote or is there some other function they serve? When attempting to operate a VCR with them, nothing happens. What about the buttons labeled “A”, “B”, and “C”? Why are they different colors? Why is the “A” in a triangle and the “B” and “C” in circles? The questions keep multiplying.

This leads to consideration of the principle of mappings. There are some apparent mappings, such as a +/- button with “VOL” printed on it and another +/- button with “CH” printed on it. An average user would probably infer that “VOL” means volume and “CH” means channel and that the +/- for “VOL” would either raise or lower the volume, and for “CH”, would advance to the next channel or go back to the previous one. However, as pointed out earlier, there is not an intuitive mapping from the labeling of all the buttons to their actions.

Finally, I would point out that with repeated use one can master much of what the remote control does, but I’ll admit, I don’t quite get all of it. I have looked at the instructions online and it seems that I need a manual to understand parts of the manual!