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In defence of physical buttons
I feel the need. The need for tactile feedback.
Buttons seem somewhat unfashionable these days and I think that’s terribly unfair. I want to defend the honor of the humble button. Button, knob, switch, tab, doohickey. Whatever you want to call them, they’re the physical manifestation of our desire to carry out an action. Unassuming, always there. Reliable. Unfortunately, their inclusion in certain contexts has been confined to the dustbin of design. They’ve fallen out of fashion with some, and I want to set the record straight.
There are contexts and situations for which the button is still a necessity and their removal frustrates and makes for a less enjoyable user experience.
“Okay Google, play some rain noise.”
“Okay, playing Rhianna at maximum volume at 10pm. I hope your kids are heavy sleepers.”
It’s at this point I panic, Umbrella starts to play, and I try my best to turn the volume down. I do so, eventually, after what feels like an extraordinary amount of time, because my Google Home Mini (now Nest Mini, which has subsequently added LED lights on either side for volume control) has no buttons. Well, apart from a switch tucked out of sight, but that turns the microphone off. Absolutely useless for my scenario. I rub the sides continuously because there are literally no signifiers whatsoever. This is guesswork on my part. I feel like I’m either going to eventually turn the volume down (or up further!), or summon a Genie.
I mean, come on, surely the product design team at Google have read Don Norman’s The Design of Everyday Things? The first iteration came out in 1988.
“Affordances define what actions are possible. Signifiers specify how people discover those possibilities: signifiers are signs, perceptible signals of what can be done. Signifiers are of far more importance to designers than are affordances.” — Don Norman, The Design of Everyday Things
