Product design should factor for human forgetfulness where possible. This is a picture of the detergent tray from a leading brand, top-loading washing machine. The hole in the tray is where detergent, mixed with water, drips into the drum during a wash cycle. However, when the tray is opened to fill detergent, you notice it…
Many of you must have seen that drawing of a World War II plane with red dots on it. It explains Survivorship bias, a bias that statistician Abraham Wald figured out. Pic: source Simply put, survivor bias is our tendency to view a situation or pattern as a comprehensive representative sample, often without considering what…
Invisible Bed has been an interesting product company. As a recent owner of a wall mounted sit/ stand desk, I recently shared some product design inputs with the CEO. They were well received. The Product: The Challenge: 1.Pre-attached table-top – makes installation a challenge even for a 2-person team, as the table-top weight causes the…
Over the past decade, the business world has had a real attraction to making everything a service. And rightly so. Would you rather struggle to repeatedly sell your product to the same customer? Or would it be better to offer it on a subscription model where you can keep improving it over time, and charge users a regular fee for using it?
However, if you compare the buying good ol’ products whenever you would need them, to subscription based services, a paradox seems to emerge.
Pic: source There are roads in Hungary that plays music! A musical road was first created in 1995 Denmark, by two artists. Given how brilliant a concept, I wonder why its Danish origins seem almost obvious. Just like the concept of hygge and especially Lego. Musical roads also exist in other countries like Hungary, Japan,…
The beautiful tri-colour waving at Connaught Place, Central Park, Delhi. It’s 75 years since India got Independence! A proud milestone for all of us Indians. Also one to reflect on and carefully choose the path forward. I happened to read a 75th Independence Day post on Instagram a short while ago, that took a…
The normal-seeming world of us men is often a battle zone that most women need to navigate each day.
Places and experiences we might not give a second thought about, can be horribly taxing on the attentional space of women.
We all need to educate, be considerate, and design safer and more thoughtful spaces and processes for them.
Image: source Heel rollers, heel wheel skates, or heel wheels, have a fundamental flaw in their design. If we humans were to pick between standing for a minute on the front section of our feet or the heels of our feet, odds are we would be more comfortable on the front section. The…
I recently got some (plastic 😬) bottles for home. Not proud of it. But anyway, I noticed a small design anomaly with them. Normally, the neck of most bottles are only slightly shorter than their lids. Now while these bottles are fine otherwise (except, plastic!), I wonder how many people who’ve bought them have…
Pic: source As our attention spans go from low to almost non-existent in an increasingly noisy world, I get especially wary whenever I need to read a verbose report. Especially ones with unusually large paragraphs. You know it might be important, but just the way it is structured makes it very difficult to read to…