Snapping Back to Reality.
When it comes to design, products exist to have one purpose: serve the user. A product simply cannot stand alone. A product must not inhibit the user, and a user’s experience is not limited to a product interface. If that is true, why does it feel like products are taking control and enslaving us like zombies to technology? When interacting with our devices, we find ourselves constrained to a set of prescribed movements, re-training our muscle memory while evolving new habits of holding, touching, and tapping the product. We have even developed the medical term “Text-Neck” from excessively hunching over our screens. Think of the last time you dropped your phone on your face while you were scrolling through your newsfeed in bed. Or think about the 1 in 4 car accidents caused by smartphones. Undoubtedly, the new generation is interacting with their products and environments under restricting behaviors.
How can we gain control of our products and surroundings once again? Or, better yet, how can we better synergize with products to obtain the benefits unlocked by our technological advances?
The Obvious Answer, is Wearables.
The potential world of wearables offers everyday efficiency and capabilities to users in their busy lives. Wearables can improve the quality of life for everyone in every aspect making their days a little more rhythmic, a little more harmonious. Currently, these devices allow people to track, listen and communicate — all with a tap or a glance. The future of these gadgets promise help for users with life threatening diseases, allowing monitoring capabilities and even treatment for demanding illnesses. Wearables can also transform personal safety, by assisting your late-night walk home, and personal information by identifying who you are. Gone will be the “death grip” required to carry devices for fear of losing or dropping them. Instead, devices can now be secured to a limb or otherwise integrated into or onto one’s anatomy.
The future of wearables provide opportunities beyond tapping a screen by using the body and its natural movements to address our needs in an intuitive manner. Studies have shown that we are actually ready to integrate technology into the anatomy. However, like most leaps into the unknown, humanity must evolve one step at a time. We cannot go from A to C without a B in between. In this case, in order to get to C, we must prove to ourselves that technology can be more human. This is why the wearable era will be relevant.
Making Wearables Human.
Although technology seems to advance rather quickly, there is one problem that is taking longer to solve:
Wearables are barely wearable.
As wearables become adapted into the consumer market, the biggest challenge will be something designers already seem to face frequently — seamlessly merging the features, functions, and aesthetics — an attempt at merging UX, ID, and now even fashion.
In other words, there has been a missing link between the wearable and the user: making it more human. Perhaps the mistake is in our approach, going into the process with the perception of wearables as another device, another hunk of tech or plastic, instead of something personable and approachable — something wearable.
Likewise, with any new technology, where there hasn’t been much opportunity for testing, boundaries for creativity remain nonexistent. As the exploration with wearables continue with the merger of futuristic-fashion and tech, we are brought a conceptualized world which in reality may not be the future, causing wearable creations right out of Star Wars film that would be mockery if worn in public.
The right direction might begin with asking ourselves how do we make wearables something greater than strapping multiple screens to ourselves. How can we make them an extension to the user without being so literal? How do we make them beautiful or seemingly invisible?
More Is Not the Answer.
Regardless of approach, the solution must be smooth and eliminate steps and distractions associated with smart gadgets. The overall answer is not more. A product that does too much, or that is too ornamental, can create a world of chaos for the user. As a product that is worn everyday, wearable designs must be pragmatic, purposeful, and clutter-free.
With this approach, users will no longer have to waste focus and time shifting through unused and unneeded content, or be forced to wear a half-heartedly desired product. In an ideal world, devices become whole, complementing the user’s attire, dedicated to prescribed behaviors and functions, communicating with the world around us. Hardware must be simple, attractive and appealing, as it acts as a blank canvas for the portal of digital integration.
Embracing a New Perspective.
Technology is shrinking, becoming more accessible, and being worn everyday. With technology’s ubiquity and the inevitability of wearable products, it is time to embrace a new perspective on tech. The future of wearables will be realized in its approach: wearables must be beautiful, easy to use first — the gizmos and gadgets can come later. We must remember this is not a case of “Form over Function.” Although the function remains, there seems to be too much function, while form goes on misunderstood. Wearables are devices that act as a gateway to a set of more expansive capabilities and functions; the products that house and deliver these manifestations will become even more significant, yet must remain invisible at the same time. The product is no longer only or just mainly hardware or software, the product is the result of both, the product is a system. As a result, technology must be filtered and perfected while simultaneously balancing form. The fewer devices you have to own, and the less you have to see or touch, the more wearable “Wearables” will actually become.