Selective Product Feature Omission/Bad Design
In our competitive world corporations are trying their hardest to prevent consumers from picking the competitors' product. Sometimes they have really good ads. Sometimes they have ridiculous lawsuits. Sometimes they do not let your product play nice with products from other companies.
If you have read this post, then you know that I can connect my phone to my car. Unfortunately, I can not have my iPhone give me directions through my car. I contacted Microsoft, and they have told me that navigation application audio is different from audio from other apps. That is ridiculous. Sound is sound. I can hear Pandora on my phone through my car. I can hear Siri through my car. I can not hear a map application give me directions through the car. Either Apple, Microsoft, or both are purposefully preventing me from getting directions.
These companies have given me a choice. Microsoft wants me to buy an upgraded system for my car that includes GPS. I already have GPS in my phone. I am not buying a GPS again. Apple wants me to leave my phone disconnected from my car so that I can get directions. I need directions to get where I am going sometimes, BUT legally I can not answer phone calls without a hands-free device...like connecting my phone to my car. Depending on the day, I now have to consciously decide whether or not to connect my phone to my car. Do I want to answer calls through my steering wheel, or do I want to be able to follow directions to get where I am going? This, no doubt, is going to lead to PEBKAC errors. My user error will stem from the fact that I want directions AND hands-free phone calls. Isn't that silly of me?
Both Microsoft and Apple are public companies. They are driven by their need to forever increase their profits to make shareholders happy. Unfortunately that leads to choices that make consumers unhappy. As an unfortunate bystander in the war between large corporations I have made an important decision. If I have a choice in the matter I must make any projects I work on free to interact without causing trouble to other devices.
Devices that do not communicate well with others decrease their usefulness to the user. I will take this observation to heart, and I will adjust any projects I work on in the future accordingly.
