Through Being Cool.

Being the product of several ‘got picked last’ events, I can certainly see some of this ringing true in my life. I think I’ve grown/matured out of most of them, but it’s still fascinating.

The American Car industry can’t die soon enough for my tastes.

Ok, that’s a little harsh, but they need to wake up to a few realities out there.

The car manufacturers from other countries are DOMINATING you in every way. Even the mainstay of the US industry (trucks and SUV’s) will be taken away. Truck quality from Toyota and Honda (and to a lesser extent Nissan) has met or exceeded the quality of Ford and Chevy. Almost everyone I know who likes trucks is lusting after a Honda Ridgeline. The Toyota Tundra is an amazing truck as well. And SUV’s? That market is being eaten by the run up in gas prices, and increasing quality from non-US makers. It will take some time for this to manifest itself, but I believe that the truck industry will increasingly move towards the Asian makers, and the Titan, Ridgeline and Tundra are just the first wave.

This whole rant was kicked off by me getting in a wreck just before Labor day. Some kid from Emory rear ended me in Lenox Mall parking lot. He drives a nice, 2007 Honda Civic. His front bumper shattered. I drive a nice Infiniti I-35. I’ve got a nice dent in my bumper. After some time of organizing the insurance companies, etc, I drop my car off, and get picked up by Enterprise to get my rental car.

A Chevy Malibu. THIS is what they (Chevy) think people want?

I guess I should back this off a little bit, and say that the car drives somewhat well. The steering wheel is VERY loose though.

But the focus of this rant is on the interior. I’m somewhat intelligent. I’ve been figuring out my way around user interfaces for a very long time. But this interior center console is a maze of buttons with short hand labels (srce for source for example). Every thing about this car is a UI designer’s nightmare.

There is nothing ‘fun’ about this car. Little that is ‘sporty’. Everything is set up in such a way to just be a LITTLE annoying.

Even in bad interfaces you can usually find something thats ‘nice’. Something that makes you say ‘that’s well done.’ Nothing.

On the off chance someone reads this, here’s a couple of things to fix the issues:

1) Redo EVERYTHING about the center console. First, plan on getting rid of 2/3rds of the buttons. Make some buttons context aware, so that they can be re-used for several tasks.

2) I’m not asking for auto everything, but make some more things adjustable… seat hight, steering wheel hight… these are simple things that are ALREADY SOLVED. Just implement them.

3) Ditch the ‘car computer’ concept. Hey Chevy? Toyota 1985 called. They want their LCD pixel display back. Listen, this concept died back in the 80′s for a reason. Without a simple interface, NO ONE WILL USE IT. You’re just wasting your money designing it, and customers money selling it.

4) And for the love… PUT A STANDARD AUDIO INPUT in the stereo! This simple thing will SELL YOU CARS. To the young, hip people car manufacturers WANT talking about your cars. Don’t bother with in-dash mp3 players. They’re cumbersome and complicated. Just give a sane input that ALL mp3 players can use. That’s a headphone jack. It’s not hard.

Gah.