Mom, look! a “Misc error” hatched while talking to a friend thru’ Skype!
But… darn! my call dropped, why?
Well, lets dial again…. another error? and another? again? I’m closing Skype and opening it again; AGAIN?, is it me? am I doing something wrong?
Darn…!!!! why can’t I continue happily talking to my friend!? How do I go around and prevent this? Was it my fault? My friend’s fault? perhaps Skype’s fault?
Why? why? why? is MSN Messenger better? Perhaps Google Talk?
Fable’s moral:
If you – as a system’s interaction designer – must notify the User of an event, be explicit and specific: what happened, why, maybe who’s “fault” and (specially) how to avoid/correct it. The void left by this kind of nonspecific notifications do more harm than good by maximizing sorrow and frustration; this may lead people to stop using your service and flee searching for decent satisfaction.
Oh, poor little Users in the hands of some nefarious designers..!
PS: I still use Skype, but I hate it.
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