“Kee” to Safer Driving

During my Industrial Design studio class last spring our professor broke us into groups and had us create entries for the James Dyson Award design contest.

Partly because I have been interning at Little Springs for a while, my group's project was something to prevent texting while driving. While this issue has been big forever, and was covered at last year's D4M conference, but our project came out before Oprah made her appeal for driving safety. So we were very progressive.

Anyways, entries were posted earlier this summer and I had almost forgot about it until I got a text message from one of the group members yesterday. It turns out we're actually fairly competitive in this thing. While it's a bit late to be asking – voting ends tomorrow at midnight! – I'm asking everyone to check it out, and if you like the concept, please vote for it.

The whole brief and voting can be seen on our page at the Dyson award site. Here's a brief description of the project:

“  Kee to Safer Driving
Kee is an in-car stereo system that will prevent automobile accidents caused by driver distraction by taking the mobile phone out of the driver’s hands. Upon entry into the vehicle the driver must insert their phone into the unit before the vehicles ignition system becomes active. Once the vehicle’s engine is started the connected phone enters "car mode." Car mode disables the phones touch screen, activates simple music and navigation features which can be used eyes-off like a traditional car stereo, and holds all calls or messages until the vehicle is turned off. ”

Even if you don't think our project is worth voting for, the rest of the submissions are definitely worth a look; the projects range from pretty cool to useless and utterly self-defeating. I know you have register in to vote, but it's not that long a process, and votes would be hugely appreciated.

This post from AAS brings up a good point:
http://www.allaboutsymbian.com/features/item/Not_a_Dedicated_Follower_of_Fashion-10_Reasons_Why_Touchscreens_Suck.php

Quoting: “8. Touchscreen phones are a menace to use while driving. Yes, yes, you’re going to say that I shouldn’t be using ANY phone while driving. What I mean is that, with my smartphone in a cradle on the dashboard, perhaps giving route guidance or playing back an audio file, trying to interact with it briefly while driving is difficult if everything’s touch-based. You end up stabbing hopefully at roughly the right spot on the screen while taking your eyes off the road for a micro-second. And, invariably, because the car’s vibrating up and down as you roll over potholes etc, you end up hitting something you didn’t mean to and then spend the next few taps trying to undo what you just did. Working with a capacitive touchscreen is even worse, the slightest touch in the wrong place as your hand gets jogged out of position and you’re in a world of hassle.”

So, there’s a kneejerk reaction to using mobiles while driving, but we’re still morally allowed to use standalone GPS, even when they are hand-held, and use a radio however complex, and even an iPod attached to the radio. I say my phone works just dandy as a music player.

Except the last one I really was comfortable using this way was the N95. Because it had dedicated media keys, so I could just poke at it to pause, skip to the next track, etc. With any touch-centric device, I have to look at the phone, and it’s a gamble whether I can interact one handed at all. I tend to not use them at all. Even if I can set up playing before I start driving, it’s so hard to pause, skip, etc. I just give up and am sad with radio.

Oh, and I am disappointed in the touch mentality also. My Hero200 has a scroll ball and some buttons. Which are of no use in many apps. None of my music/radio players use them, even though sideways scroll would seem supported.

Anyway, while there’s a lot I’d change (or just add to as detailed) about the Kee idea, it’s totally on the right track: the device isn’t the problem, and the information is only a little bit of the problem (sms, voice, may be unsolvable hence blocked) but the interface and interaction is a HUGE problem.