Here's a news flash. Technology is too complex. So says a review of information technology, "Make it Simple," in the October 28, 2004, edition of The Economist. The lead article opens with the true story of someone who can't get any of his plug-and-play hardware to work and who struggles with frequent Windows error messages. What makes this story noteworthy is that this seemingly technology-challenged person is not technology-challenged at all. He holds a master's degree in computer science and a PhD in interface design. If a full-fledged, certified super geek struggles with technology that is supposedly intended for the masses, what chance do mere mortals have?

The article quotes research from Gartner that states that employees waste an average of one week a year struggling with their recalcitrant PCs. Think about that. If you had access to truly intuitive technology that worked first time, every time, your employer could give you an extra week's vacation without cutting into your current level of productivity. If your boss isn't quite so generous, you and your employer could split the difference. You could take an extra two and a half days vacation, and your employer could get an equivalent amount of extra work. Reflect on that the next time you are whining and complaining about your vacation being too short.

Regular readers of this column will have already guessed that I agree with The Economist's assessment of technology as too complex.

Often, in the name of progress, vendors take a function that was easy to perform in the past and make it more difficult. The November 11, 2004, issue of The New York Times described one example of this. It seems that the San Jose, California, police department placed Windows-based, touch-screen computers in every patrol car. Now, officers complain that they are discouraged from doing routine tasks because they are so much more difficult. Yeah, that's what we want to do, make police officers jobs even more difficult than they already are. A better idea would be to force the bad guys to use this stuff. That way, they wouldn't have the time or be able to figure out how to commit their nefarious deeds.

Technical complexity is not just making the San Jose police officers' jobs more difficult, it's jeopardizing their lives by complicating the "call for assistance" command that officers use when they are in trouble. The New York Times article quotes the president of the San Jose Police Officers' Association as saying, "Do you think if you're hunkered down and someone's shooting at you in your car, you're going to be able to sit there and look for Control or Alt or Function? No, you're going to look for the red button." Personally, I think that our police officers' lives are worth a red button. My recommendation to officers who struggle with a complex call-for-assistance command in an emergency situation is to pull out their guns and, before firing back at the people shooting at them, first shoot the computer.

Certainly, under the covers, most technology has to be complex. Otherwise, it couldn't do what it has to do. However, I'm convinced that its use can be made simple. Think about a telephone. If it were like most other technology, it would come with a thick user's manual and its use would still be totally baffling to most of the world's population. Instead, it's simple.

It's not that the technology itself is simple. A telephone takes sound waves, translates them into something that can be sent down copper or fiber-optic cables and, with the touch of just a few buttons, sends them to just about anyone in the developed world and many people in the developing world as well. That's pretty complex stuff, but using an old-fashioned telephone is easy for the user. (Of course, vendors have managed to complicate some cordless, cell, and VOIP phones, but that's another story.)

I've often wondered if I the only reason that I find telephones easy to use is that I've grown up with them. (No, I was not born before Alexander Graham Bell.) However, I think that it is more than mere familiarity. What could be simpler than picking up a handset and pressing a few buttons?

I want all of my technology to be that easy to use. Is that asking for too much? I know that making technology simple is difficult. A vendor quoted in one of The Economist's articles said that for every user mouse-click eliminated, his company had to make 20 things happen behind the scenes, but, hey, that creates more jobs for developers, which should help to offset job losses resulting from outsourcing.

From time to time, somebody suggests that advances in speech recognition and synthesis will simplify our technology. Maybe, but color me skeptical. If history is any guide, once the technology is accurate and cheap enough for the mass market--and the average computer has enough power to run it--developers will simply use it to put a new interface on an old technology.

I am not going to be particularly impressed if, in order to write a letter, I have to say to my computer, "Computer, wake up. Directory. Root. Program files. File. Open. Winword dot E-X-E. New document." Instead, all I want to say is, "Computer, I want to write a new letter."

In the unlikely event that the genius product developers actually do manage to make it that simple, it still won't be appropriate for most business environments. I work out of my home, in self-imposed solitary confinement. A voice interface would work for me, but what about today's cubicle gulags? Can you imagine everyone constantly talking to their computers and their computers talking back? The ambient noise would increase throughout the day as people raise their voices so that their computers can hear them over their neighbors. Before that comes to pass, America will have to revoke the Second Amendment, because you definitely wouldn't want to risk guns being introduced into such an irritating, cacophonous environment.

Joel Klebanoff is a consultant, a writer, and president of Klebanoff Associates, Inc., a Toronto, Canada-based marketing communications firm. Joel has 25 years experience working in IT, first as a programmer/analyst and then as a marketer. He holds a Bachelor of Science in computer science and an MBA, both from the University of Toronto. Contact Joel at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. While he prefers simpler technology, he would rather that it not be so simple as to be able to do his job without any help from him (unless he holds the patent on the technology).

Joel Klebanoff is a consultant, writer, and formerly president of Klebanoff Associates, Inc., a Toronto-based marketing communications firm. He has 30 years' experience in various IT capacities and now specializes in writing articles, white papers, and case studies for IT vendors and publications across North America. Joel is also the author of BYTE-ing Satire, a compilation of a year's worth of his columns. He holds a BS in computer science and an MBA, both from the University of Toronto.

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