Under pressure…

People seem to shurg when I talk about the iPhone and how the touch surface may not be all that great.  The concept is very cool but the hard surface that the phone requires is going to be tricky to use.  I don’t believe that people realize how much tactile feedback they rely on every moment of the day.

Consider for a moment other hard surfaces that are buttons but don’t feel like buttons:  Hard non-moving buttons on microwaves or touch sensitive screens (bowling alleys/bank machines).  Have you found yourself pressing the surface quite hard waiting for something to happen?  There’s only one issue that causes you to press that hard:  no feedback.  If the system beeped upon pressing the surface then you’d have feedback but most of these systems don’t beep or the beep is delayed.  Imagine using a phone like that where you were constantly hurting your fingers.

What about if you needed to dial without looking fully at the phone.  Most of us can dial our cell phone while looking at it marginally because we can feel the boundaries of buttons.

These are the little things one needs to worry about with next generation technology and while the iPhone looks great it’s not going to be a great experience right out of the box.  It may take many people months to get used to the touch sensitive system.