[tuppy]

>The problem which many have mentioned here and elsewhere is that while Japan is unrivalled in craftsmanship ("monozukuri") -- making physical things -- exactly the opposite is true when it comes to "unphysical" things like software.

This is something I do not understand. Why is there a cultural aversion to creating beautiful software? As an example, Honda has some of the most beautifully designed interiors in the automotive world. Simple, elegant, functional, with quality materials. The design is often very Apple-like (at least relative to other manufacturers, though they are improving). I would think that the culture that gave us wonderful interaction with a vehicle would be able to provide a similar sort of experience with a phone. What's bizarre is that most pre-iPhone Japanese phones have the UX of a mid-90s Buick: lots of buttons, nothing really arranged properly.

To me it's just strange that they were unable to produce it, but I am not surprised at all that the iPhone is so popular. I feel like the iPhone should have come out of Japan, but didn't.

[shioyama]

Have you looked at Japanese websites? Most of them have pretty terrible design/UI. It's the same thing.

My take on this is that you have to look more broadly to understand the tendency for cluttered design in Japanese interfaces. Walk around a small neighbourhood in Tokyo and you'll see how cluttered the layout is. On small "roji" (back alleyways), Japanese like to stack potted plants outside their front doors in a pretty disorganized arrangement. Streets are generally not straight, neighbourhoods rarely follow a grid layout.

(Shimokitazawa is probably the best example in Tokyo of this: http://globalvoicesonline.org/2009/11/04/japan-debating-the-... )

It's the same thing with cluttered interface design, except that whereas in urban layout it produces something amazingly complex, intricate and fascinating to explore, in UI design it just results in frustration and inefficiency. But I'm convinced the two come from the same source, and that you can't entirely separate them.

The beautifully designed interiors you mention come from a completely different place (mentally, not physically). I don't quite know how to reconcile the fact that the two come from the same country/culture, but I do believe they have both been here for a long long time. It's just that software somehow tends to bring out the former, whereas monozukuri brings out the latter.

[angus77]

The thing with the winding streets is that they came out organically---nobody planned them that way. You can't really fix that without doing something horribly draconian.

The newspaper inserts, magazines and websites, though...you'd think someone could just say, "Wow, this is an incredible eyesore that's impossible to navigate," and, you know, just not do that anymore.

I've got a Panasonic TV with an HDD recorder(can't remember the model, I'm at work) that is incredibly simple and intuitive to use. Want to record a show? Click one button on the remote, and you're given a grid of the upcoming TV listings. Click on the show you want, and it's done. Even my 6-year-old son knows how to use it. I can't imagine Apple doing better. Good UI can certainly be done in Japan.

[tuppy]

I'm baffled because historically, Japan is all about using limitation to great effect. In terms of food, art, language (is there a more contextual language?), and engineering, Japan very much has an island-nation use-limited-resources-and-achieve-great-things approach.

The website thing that you mentioned is true. .jp websites are TERRIBLE in UX. I wonder if there is some part of Japanese culture that wants to embrace complexity for it's own sake.

And, let's be honest, the US/EU/Everywhere-Else designs for phones weren't very good pre-iPhone either. It had the same complexity problems and close to the same UX ridiculousness that the Japanese phones had. Perhaps it's a human thing, to marvel at too much to comprehend and consider it a good thing.

That being said, if any company were to come up with an iPhone, I would think it would be a Japanese one. But Japan is very traditional and Apple is unique in that it disregards a lot of conventions. I think this might be to Japan's detriment. I don't feel that they've embraced the current approach to UX, they are still stuck in the "complexity = more features = better" days of the Web during the dot-com-boom days (aka ancient history).

I hope there are some Japanese entrepreneurs out there ready to shake things up, the cultural seeds are already there for beautiful and elegant products.

[cdavid]

Concerning websites, when you compare rakuten Japan and say UK, you see a stark difference in how things are presented. This may just be due to the UK site being done outside Japan/by foreigners, but this would hint at a some preference toward clutter for Japanese customers ?

[shioyama]

The classic case of this is Google vs Yahoo in Japan. Yahoo is more popular, and if you look at the layout, you'll see that it's much more cluttered (or at least, that there's loads more information). At one point Google caved in (in Japan) and added more buttons to their top page, but I see they've switched back to the basic logo + search bar.

Another thing to consider is that the cluttered thing is not only Japan: I've heard that other Asian countries also have a preference for clutter. I can't vouch for whether that's true, but it sounds pretty believable.

[cdavid]

Yahoo Japan is a pretty Japanese company (dunno about the proportion of Japanese workers there). I only got a very small look at it during interview there, but google Japan seems much more westernized as far as the workforce is concerned.

It would really interesting to know who is responsible for rakuten UK (or any other country). Since prices are in JPY, I am quite confused about the meaning of rakuten UK...

[thomasgerbe]

"Have you looked at Japanese websites? Most of them have pretty terrible design/UI. It's the same thing."

There are some pretty well designed ones.

http://bm.straightline.jp/