This was a pretty good, book, I enjoyed it much more than his previous book, "The design of everyday things". It was a much more modern look at what could happen and how we will interact with it.
It seems that this book is predominately about automation, talking about how your house, your car, and seemingly everything will one day be automated, and it asks if this is a good thing. I wouldn't mind my car being able to act like a taxi, but I would also still like to be able to drive it myself. I wouldn't mind my house automating a few things, but trying to anticipate my every move, need, and whim, that's pretty complicated, not to mention creepy.
Visions of HAL, Shai'dan, and other science fiction digital villans warn of giving computers to much power, even at the end of his book, Norman gives a vision of talking machines, at which point you start questioning the author's sanity.
A few things I did like about the book were how much control could be given to the machines, such as in the "tight reigns, loose reigns" situations. I don't think I would mind have the equivalent of "electronic livestock", but trying to replace humans outright seems to be a bit troubling.
All Hail the Robot Overlords.
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I think stories where machines gain too much power serve as a good warning but are ultimately unlikely. This repeated theme only serves to scare the general public away from automation much like what has been done with radiation.
ReplyDeleteI also liked the "tight reigns, loose reigns" thing. Having a car control like that would be interesting to see.
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