This article originally published in Self-Service World magazine, June 2007.
The best way to get to know kiosk software designer Sara Slater may be to take a look at her work. The faux Chinese proverb says a picture is worth a thousand words, so seeing Sara's work lends loquaciousness to this otherwise shy graphic artist. It's understandable that, after 12 years of creating touchscreen interfaces for kiosk designer St. Clair Interactive, Sara's language is graphic: colors, shapes, movement. Space.In a sparsely worded interview, Sara told me that in addition to the visual, her work behind the screens largely concerns usability. Good interaction between human and machine is defined by clarity, ease of navigation and speed, she says. Years of experience have taught her the best methods for achieving a kiosk's full potential. Sara declined to elaborate or give an example, saying only that she has "set ways of doing things," and that she didn't want to give away any trade secrets. I can't imagine shy Sara ever letting anything slip out.
She did tell me a couple more things, however. In addition to being set in her ways, she also enjoys experiencing cutting-edge technology. Did she contradict herself? Very well then, she contradicted herself. She has literary great T.S. Eliot's blessing to enjoy both a standardized design structure and new design concepts. Perhaps she also will walk along the beach or eat a peach (to borrow a bit more from Eliot) — if she dares, and if the demographics are right.
Sara says she keeps the audience for a particular touchscreen in mind when designing for the self-service universe. And as more kiosks pop up, the demographics for users kaleidoscope into rich and various colors. More variety. More applications. More graphically rich content, including full-screen motion, video and real-time-3D applications. Sara is saying less and less, and becoming more and more interesting at the same time — as is self-service.
Sara uses self-service technology herself in day-to-day life. "Absolutely," she says. But she admits that after a dozen years designing the stuff it is difficult, probably impossible, to separate her interest in touchscreens from her work. "I want to check out the competition," she says. "I just gravitate toward it."
I wonder whether this touchscreen technology doesn't appeal to the same sort of person who designs it. To all the shy people of the world, for whom human interaction is somewhat mysterious and perhaps a little frightening, I give you Sara Slater. The world is your touchscreen; it's at your fingertips. You won't have any trouble trying to get the words out when talking to strangers. Instead of reaching out to touch someone with a telephone (which is so 20th century), people like Sara Slater are determining to make it easier to reach out and touch something.
I'm seeing visions of E.T. pointing his glowing finger at things and fixing them. That little brown alien didn't say much, either, but he was pretty cool.
