"Say Like Never Say Like That"... afterthoughts of User Research Smoke and Mirror

(The above title is a direct translation from mandarin: 讲好像没有讲一样！)

The die die must read article had alot of thought provoking points, but at the end of it all it seems to lead me back to square one. So to do or not to do user research? The article seems to be hinting that most user researches are ... crap. It is via pure GUT feeling (recall the pot bellied picture that Mr Reddy showed us in one of the lectures) that you get the inspirational design. And very often, simple common sense would lead to the same answer as empirical studies. From a design perspective it's probably true! Let us see why...

To me user design experience is very much an individualistic experience. It differs from person to person, and factors such as gender, cultural upbringing and age. Let's take some interesting example:

How about a Karaoke bar, complete with bottles Remy Martin XO and beautiful bar hostresses? To some middle age businessmen, it would be a priceless experience there. To a young kid, there's nothing appealing there. To a housewife... the husband will be so dead if he was found there! With this in mind it is common sense that one shall not build a gym that resembles a funeral parlor, one shall not make an item so heavy that is meant for a body builder. We are making something for a specific user! However like what the article mention, sometimes in a bid to appease some of the key stakeholders (i.e. the ones that give you money), it is build for them instead of the real target audience in mind.

I came across one interesting web example:
http://cedysworld.com/en/index.php?Insref=domain_com/

Looks like a kids website right? But look at the one promoting the site: Mercedes Benz! Wow... to me it's so ironic, promoting a brand that is more towards the older population to kids! What user research was made for the creation of such website? I wonder...

Anyway the article pretty much is a variant of Dead Poets' Society. Poetry, like a good design, is not created via rules and procedures, but by inspiration, creativity and sometimes abit of luck. The part where the teacher asks the students to rip off one whole section of a poetry book is still etched in my mind.

It confuses me then... are rules and procedures really insignificant? I remember working in an F n B outlet where one of the first things I was told to do is to read the Standard Operating Procedure. (SOP) for mixing certain drinks. I could be creative and try to mix my own composition of drinks... but I will get into trouble with the boss.... ahhhh! Now I get it about the part on research as a political tool! You need facts, figures, statistics and SOPs... simply to show that you are doing something and doing it "right". This "right" method may not necessarily be the "best" method, but it has been codified and "backed" by the very power of quantitative authority. Ever heard of the old adage "number speaks louder than words"? There is always the idea that numbers provide a more authoritative and asserting statement than mere words. A simple example... one can go on and on describing how a man looks like, how much white hair he has, how dry is his skin etc... but one phrase: "He is 50", conjures almost the whole image of him.
Still I am in suspended animation... to research or not to? One thing's for sure... we still need to do the card sorting exercise... which the article indicated that it is not scientific...

Say Like Never Say Like That... in the end still must do card sorting exercise!

On a side note... I am coming to the point of evaluating the whole concept of user experience. Throughout it seems that designers must have the assumption of User is king, User is everything. But I'm not sure... is it really true that all products should be user centred?

Assume now that we have a product that is extremely difficult to master. That only a few in the world would be able to handle that product. Can it be successful? For me who is musically challenged, I regard the violin as one example. For me to play the violin, it will simply make terrible noises. It is not at all intuitive, even if it's just simply movement of the bow and string. But if say I take time to master it, I believe there is much pleasure to be gained. So is the violin a user centred design? Not really... it is... activity centred.. or even learning centred to some extent!