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David facilitating a UI Design Session
There ought to be plenty of humour in the UI Design Industry. There is certainly plenty of scope for self-mocking. I'd like to build up a collection of humourous examples relating to UI Design.
Enjoy.
Humour Index
Through the Cockpit Windows

This text appeared in comp.human-factors during a debate on Windows everywhere. The whole User experience with software simply isn't good enough in some situations. Mike Anderson very humourously points out why he wouldn't like to be a passenger on this particular airliner...

The lives of 74 passengers are at stake?!?!

COPILOT: AIIIIEEEEEE! What the hell was that? We've lost horizontal scroll! We're losing altitude: 18000 feet.
PILOT: Quick, hand me volume 3 of the user manual!
COPILOT: There is no volume 3. 16000 feet!
PILOT: What do you mean there's no volume 3? It says right here in the trouble shooting guide: "Loss of horizontal scroll: see volume 3, section 3."
NAVIGATOR: Volume 3 isn't out in hardcopy yet but it's on their web site.
COPILOT: 15000 feet!
PILOT: Ok. What's URL?
NAVIGATOR: I don't know. Do a search. Go to yahoo.
COPILOT: Altavista's better. 14000 feet.
PILOT: Ok. A-L-T-A-V-I-S-T-A-dot-com. Ok. Here it is. Hey, what the hell is this?
COPILOT: Oh. That's not Altavista's URL. It's either Digital-dot-altavista-dot-com or altavista-dot-digital-dot-com. 12000 feet. Or maybe it's altavista-slash-digital-dot-com.
NAVIGATOR: Just click the search button and you can have your choice of search engines.
COPILOT: 11000 feet.
PILOT: There's no time
NAVIGATOR: Hotbot! Type in hotbot-dot-com!
COPILOT: 10000 feet.
PILOT: Hotbot! Hotbot! Hotbot! Hotbot! Hotbot! Got it! What should I search for?
COPILOT: Hmmm... how about "Airline", "emergency", 9000 feet
NAVIGATOR: That's too generic!
COPILOT: Well excuse me for not spending my whole workday playing on the internet
NAVIGATOR: Shut up. SIR, TYPE IN EXACTLY WHAT I SAY: volume 3 section 3 loss horizontal scroll ENTER! No don't type "enter" hit the enter key!
COPILOT: 8000 feet.
PILOT: Ok! It found something...."Emergency Procedures: Loss of Horizontal Scroll" That's it!
NAVIGATOR: Yes! Information to the rescue!
PILOT: That internet is something, isn't it?
COPILOT: 7000 feet. You guys better hurry.
PILOT: SHUT UP! Hey, nothings happening. It's blank!
COPILOT: 6000 feet.
NAVIGATOR: There! There, down at the bottom. It says something. What does it say?
COPILOT: 5000 feet.
PILOT: I don't see anything.
NAVIGATOR: There! At the VERY bottom.
COPILOT: 4000 feet.
PILOT: Oh, I see it! I see it! It says..."Loading Applet....".

- end of transcript -

Reproduced by permission from the author.

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