Universal Usability Nightmare

Since I’m on a curmudgeonly streak, I thought I’d publish, once and for all and for posterity, my feelings about automobiles.

First, a little history.

As a child, I used to systematically puke in them.

When I began to look at the world with a critical eye, I quickly came to feel that cars were not only nauseating, but also foul-smelling, loud, dangerous eyesores. Every last one of them.

My dad loved to drive them, my brother couldn’t wait to be old enough to do the same.

I actually did fine without knowing how to drive during the first 35 years of my life. Living in Brussels, New York and Paris meant owning a car would have been an expensive liability rather than a convenience.

But then my son was born, and he liked nothing more than cars. When he was less than 2 years old, we’d sit at a bus stop in Paris to watch the cars go by, and he’d call out the different makes and models. I’m pretty sure his first word must have been « Twingo » (I don’t blame him. It’s a great-sounding word).

And I thought he would be really embarrassed to find out I couldn’t drive, and I didn’t want him to feel humiliated among his peers.

So I eventually learned how to drive.

During my first lesson, the instructor told me to start the car and drive off. I looked at him in disbelief, and proceeded to explain that I didn’t know anything about cars or how they worked (this was in Paris, where traffic is crazy, and where cars have manual transmissions, since frogs don’t drive automatics). I told him to think of me as an Amazon Indian who had just come out of the jungle. He unearthed a questionnaire for rare specimens such as myself, and asked me to answer a bunch of multiple choice questions to assess my level of automobile-related knowledge.

I scored a perfect zero. (Actually, I seem to remember that I had a negative score).

I didn’t know what any of the pedals were for. When the patient instructor explained how the little Fiat Punto we were in worked, I couldn’t believe it. I literally thought he was pulling my leg.

I’ve now been driving (rental cars) for close to 10 years. Manual transmissions in Europe, automatic ones in the US. I’m not too lousy at it. I’m not scared or nervous anymore, but I don’t enjoy it. Not one bit.

Because if you’re an Amazon Indian fresh out of the jungle, analyzing things with fresh eyes from a usability standpoint, manual transmissions are about as absurd as nostril-powered bicycles or pastrami-sandwich roller-skates, barbed-wire superconducting flying underwear, or Segways.

I’ve heard and I understand all the technical and other arguments from car afficionados about the superiority of manual transmissions in terms of responsiveness, or safety when you happen to be driving down Mount Everest and need to downshift into third gear.

OK. Why not?

But if you really want a manual transmission, for when you really, truly need that fine control, deft and adept super-pilot that you are, then ask yourself: is this the best UI you can think of? Is there any reason at all to resort to clutch pedals, and engines that stall? Can’t you think of many simpler alternatives, like pushing a lever forward or backward to change gears? (From what I’ve heard, SmartCars have a system like that).

Thare are all these jokes on the Internet about if cars worked like Microsoft Windows, some of which are pretty funny and clever.

But wait! You know what? Cars with manual transmissions already do!

In Europe, all of this incredible engineering has gone into making engines super fuel-efficient, into aerodynamics, materials, safety, tire technology, etc.

But you still have to do the Fred Flintsone routine with your feet to get the fucking thing moving!

There is absolutely no justification whatsoever for this surrealist, fucked-up, counterintuitive, user-hostile system to have endured this long.

Unless, of course, most drivers (in Europe at least) are resigned masochists who don’t mind suffering needlessly due to abysmal design.

Oh. Right.

Sorry for wasting your time.