Google’s G1 vs. Apple’s Ferocious Attention to Detail

September 24, 2008

Like many other tech nerds, I awaited Google’s announcement of its first Android-based device yesterday with bated breath. Alas, like many other tech nerds, I was ultimately disappointed with what I saw.

Without a doubt, the mobile device user has been abused for years by poorly-designed and implemented operating systems that seemed to delight in the befuddlement (and subsequent rage) of their hapless victims owners. Then Apple unveiled the iPhone in January 2007, essentially telling pocket computingdom “You’re mad as heck, and you don’t have to take it anymore!” The response has been overwhelming. Not only evidenced by sales of the iPhone itself (I myself being a shamelessly enamored owner), but by the frantic responses of its competitors, including HTC’s new TouchFLO interface, which is basically a shiny new coat of paint covering up the much-maligned rusty heap that is Windows Mobile.

So when Google announced its new Android mobile operating system, was anyone really surprised? Well, yes, actually - as Google doesn’t really do operating systems (or great software for that matter) - but handheld computing is the new It Girl, and everyone is rushing to bring her flowers. So why not Google?Fast forward several months to yesterday, when the first device featuring Google’s Android platform, the HTC G1, was finally revealed to the world. Me, I had an immediate and undeniable “Uh oh” moment. Yes, the hardware looks homely and clunky and outdated right out of the box, but I had seen “leaked” photos of the device already, so I was already prepared for that letdown. But looking past the ugly hardware in the promo pics, my eyes immediately went to a single element: that huge, Vista-esque analog clock haphazardly placed on the screen.

My brain instantly asked itself two things.

First, “What’s up with the big, ugly clock?”

And second (and more importantly), “Why does the big, ugly clock say 9:11 when the digital clock immediately above it and to its right says 2:47???”

Now, I consider it a personal curse to obsess over what some would consider meaningless details (typos on my blog notwithstanding). So I tried putting this inconsistency out of my mind. “Self,” I said, “it doesn’t matter. No one else cares. You’re just being you again.”

But then Gizmodo noticed. And if Gizmodo noticed, then perhaps countless others did too (with many more noticing, obviously, because Gizmodo pointed it out). Which leads to the obvious question: “How could Google/T-Mobile/HTC not notice this too???” I mean, typos in body text on a website or in a brochure are bad enough. But for the G1 to throw aside the curtain and step, arms outstretched, into the blazing spotlight, under the anxious gaze of a billion curious souls, with its fly wide open and toilet paper stuck to its shoe? Inconceivable! Yet, there it was, for all the world to see.

The issue therein was so aptly described by Jesus Diaz of Gizmodo:

The problem with the clocks would have never escaped Apple’s ferocious attention to detail, but it is not the image itself that’s so troubling. It is what it symbolizes, what is missing at Android’s most fundamental level: Attention to detail. 

“Ferocious attention to detail.” A beautiful phrase. And a rule we should all live by. How many times have you seen a big, important PowerPoint presentation featuring a glaring typo on the title screen? (With much audience forehead smacking ensuing.) Had such a thing as the Google G1 faux pas happened when the iPhone was announced, Steve Jobs would have had a public hanging of the employees responsible. Right there. On the stage. On that you can set your watch and warrant (whatever that quaint old saying means).

Equally perplexing is the fact that despite this glitch being publicly outed by Gizmodo last night, T-Mobile hasn’t scrambled to rectify the situation on its website. At least not as of the time of this writing. Which to me implies that they don’t see it as a problem at all. Which in itself is yet another problem. And now I’m rambling.

Lest you think I’m making a mountain of a molehill, Diaz does point out other obvious Android interface problems. Alas, it’s not just the clock. Though the clock is bad enough to be alarming. (Heh, unintentional pun!)

As I mentioned in my Judging a Book By Its Cover post, the problem with prominent, glaring flaws like this is that they imply a legion of other, less-glaring flaws lurking slightly below the surface. And they convey an “I don’t really care what you think” mentality. Whether true or not.

How many eLearning courses have you seen featuring such spectacularly visible errors that you naturally asked “Did anyone actually read this thing before publishing?” Some of them may have even been yours.

God is indeed, as Ludwig Mies van der Rohe so succinctly put it, in the details.

Sidenote: a friend of mine who has been singing Android’s praises for months, boldly proclaiming it the true “iPhone Killer,” called me last night to ask how much I thought he could find a used iPhone for, and how he could hack it to run on his T-Mobile plan.

Ouch.

Google, you lost them at “Hello.”

Posted in Apple, Presentations, Rants, eLearning Design