Why Meredith Fumbled: A Modest Hypothesis

I decided to give a bit more thought to why Meredith Vieira's first "engagement" with an iPhone was such an embarrassment to her (if not to Apple). I would like to entertain the hypothesis that today's telephone users, particularly those who seem so good at one-handed operation of mobile phones, depend heavily on haptic cues, all of which are conspicuously absent from the smooth display surface of the iPhone. In all the hype that preceded yesterday's launch, there was almost no mention (if any) of the whole legacy of touch-sensitive interfaces whose displays (and, therefore, functionalities) keep changing. This has been investigated at least all the way back to the days when Bell Labs was a research powerhouse; and they were looking for ways to make telephone operators (remember them?) more productive. Think about it, though: How often do you “fly” your hand-held device by touch, without giving it very much focal visual attention. I suspect that all of us are now very good at feeling our way around standard telephone keypads; and I bet there is a whole culture that can do the same with Blackberry-style “mini-typewriters.” Now imagine what it would be like if your sense of touch were take away from you. My guess is that you would not be a very happy camper!