UMO - 5th Boycott Bad Design Contest'09

How many times a day you've felt some things could just be "slightly" better than they are now?

It may be your wash-basin tap, that tries hard to impersonate gym equipment by being hard and clumsy when you are all sleepy in morning, or it could be your phone bill that poses more intellectual challenge than toughest of the cryptic-crosswords.

We live in a world that is a consequence of conscious or unconscious design decisions made by the manufacturers or designers of the various systems. Most of times these decisions are resultant of hasty time-lines, compromise on quality or just plain ignorance about 'you'- the one who is going to use them.

The UMO-Boycott Bad-Design Contest'09 was organized with the view of calling attention to the bad design in everyday things with the theme : So tweet earth - rethink, refresh and recycle ideas for a sustainable world.

Boycott Bad-Design Contest'09 Winners

The following ten entries were chosen as the best submissions ( Rs. 3000/- each ) for the "Boycott Bad-Design Contest'09"

Team-UMO duly acknowledges it's gratitude towards all the participants.

So tweet the Earth

Visit World Usability Day Home Home

'ek chidiya, anek chidiyaN; dana chugne baith gayee thi .....' The song conjures up childhood imagery, memories of an entire generation that was still lucky to learn the lessons of life from Mother Nature. For all others who couldn't strike a chord yet, 'ek chidiya, anek chidiyaN' translates to 'a lovely bird and many such lovely birds....'. Those are the opening lines of a beautifully animated song that encouraged harmony and unity in diversity, the mottos that best describe India, through a delightful cameo from Nature.

Most of us used to take delight in watching birds paying us a visit in our very own habitats during our childhood, when today’s cities were still attractive enough for nature to cast its beautiful spell with changing seasons, colors, flowers and more. However, all such pleasures of nature are strangers to our cities now. It’s something that we have done ourselves, still doing, depriving our younger generations of all such pleasure.

The greater irony is, we seek solace in the virtual worlds. Our bird song comes from MP3s, our greenery in screensavers. And tweet on the web mimicking nature. As we use these products, as we live a synthetic life, we need to think, rethink how our life is affecting our world, our Nature. As creative people, it’s time we thought about how our creations, the products and services we create and we use impact our world.

Boycott Bad-Design Contest'09 Entries Preview

Gtalk doesnt have invisible option.

Bad  Designs

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2011 - 01.22.

Keypad in touch phones are designed in a way to be used with a stylus not our fingers:
     Although a stylus is provided with the touch phones, it is not really designed in a way to sense the finger which is needed, thus finger having a higher surface area does not get well sensed sometimes.

Bad  Designs

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2011 - 01.22.

Unknown people can see the entire picture album if his/her friend is tagged in even a single picture of that album:
    Anybody can access the entire photo album if any of his/her friend has been tagged in any photos of the same album.

Bad  Designs

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2011 - 01.22.

The bottle of Zinda Tilismath, the Unani Medicine which is being used from many years is made of very thin glass, if slipped from hand will be smashed in pieces in a fraction of seconds as the size of this bottle is also very small.

Bad  Designs

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2011 - 01.22.

Friend requests are send to all the people added in the mail account:
    Sometimes, Facebook sends friend requests without permission to all the members added in the e-mail address provided.

Bad  Designs

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2011 - 01.22.

Poor Facebook search engine
     Facebook has an comparatively poorer search engine than Orkut. It is extremely difficult to find a person with no mutual friends.

Bad  Designs

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2011 - 01.22.

Fm radios in cellphones doesnt work without the earphones:
  Although there are wireless headsets developed for the same, the idea has not yet reached the masses which still makes it an unsolved problem.

Bad  Designs

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2011 - 01.22.

Thousands of drinking straws are used each day around the world. These are made of plastic and unsafe for children and even for adults.

Bad  Designs

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2011 - 01.22.