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Congratulations, Mini, you made the stupidest turn signals ever

jalopnik.com

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Re: Congratulations, Mini, you made the stupidest turn signals ever

#121

Post by klyrs »

gkop wrote: post #108
JoeAltmaier wrote: post #64

Wow what a circular response - people who buy the Mini have no problem with its stupid features. Of course they don't - they bought the car so you know that already. That Mini rep response sounds like a lame rationalization.

Yep plus > there should be no trouble at all for a driver to understand, when seeing the full rear of the car , which direction is being indicated. How do they propose to guarantee that the full rear of the car will be visible in all cases when the turn indicator is observed?

Like pulling out of a parallel parking spot? Don't worry, nobody uses their indicators for that anyway...

Re: Congratulations, Mini, you made the stupidest turn signals ever

#122

Post by bri3d »

snthd wrote: post #79

Is there a design advantage to flashing a single brake light as a turn signal? Conforming to the international norm of amber turn signals would seem to be an obvious win?

In the US, there's a regulation mandating the size of the lit area for the turn signal exceed a certain surface area. The European style amber signal area on most standard-sized or small cars is unlikely to comply. This (and regulations around the amount of red reflector in taillights) is the reason why most Americanized cars get terrible taillights with reused brake lights.

Re: Congratulations, Mini, you made the stupidest turn signals ever

#123

Post by chriswait »

chrisseaton wrote: post #72
chriswait wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article talks about this: "Now, I think the vast majority of drivers will understand what’s going on and treat them as normal blinking turn indicators, but these indicators hurt your brain, at least a little bit" I think you are interpreting "confused" as "I can't tell which way the car is turning", while everyone else is talking about "This UX forces me to use my brain when I shouldn't have to".

I guess I don't know what the author thinks they mean about 'hurt your brain'.

Yeah, I don't think they're literally meaning "hurt" here.

Maybe a better analogy is where you're having a conversation with someone, and they throw in a double-negative. It's not like you're literally unable to work it out, but you need to engage with it consciously for a second. In a high-stakes conversation, that's just something that's good to avoid.

A memorable example of this for me (if a bit of a tangent) was when Felix Baumgartner was doing his mega parachute jump, and they kept screwing up the comms for which direction the wind was coming from / going in: https://youtu.be/rNhmYaWiPEk?t=4200 (by convention, people talk about wind in terms of the direction they come from).

I think the whole thing here is that driving involves a lot of modelling other drivers and their intentions, so our tolerance for bad UX that requires conscious thought should be really low.

Re: Congratulations, Mini, you made the stupidest turn signals ever

#124

Post by petee »

I think the Ford/GM thing of using the brake lights also as the turn signal is far more dangerous -- when the brakes are on, a turn signal just turns the single light off. In traffic stopping quickly, and you can only see one light, you have a fraction of a second to determine if the car is stopping or changing lanes.

I see this in traffic all the time, and nearly been hit by cars that look like they are braking but actually changing lanes. Why are separate light colors not mandated?

Re: Congratulations, Mini, you made the stupidest turn signals ever

#125

Post by andrewflnr »

chrisseaton wrote: post #104
fortyseven wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, go ahead and play stupid.

To be honest I think the author is playing stupid pretending to be confused by a simple indicator light.

I think the author is more accurately simulating how his brain will feel when he's flying down the road, tracking the trajectories of the very fast metal boxes surrounding him, and suddenly encounters a non-standard ambiguous signal. Turn signal decoding should be instant and unconscious, and this mini signal disrupts that. If anything I think he's understating the risks.

Re: Congratulations, Mini, you made the stupidest turn signals ever

#126

Post by torstenvl »

chrisseaton wrote: post #104
fortyseven wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, go ahead and play stupid.

To be honest I think the author is playing stupid pretending to be confused by a simple indicator light.

Dishonesty is unbecoming.

Re: Congratulations, Mini, you made the stupidest turn signals ever

#127

Post by oceliker »

Toutouxc wrote: post #74
codeduck wrote: post #35

How hard is it to go: oh, the left hand side indicator is blinking. It's possible they might turn left. It's common bloody sense. This is honestly manufactured outrage.

> oh, the left hand side indicator is blinking. It's possible they might turn left. Not hard at all, which is why this isn't a problem if you have enough time to think all that. This is a problem in the tiny minority of cases where it's night, it's raining, you're either going too fast or maybe blinded by someone's high beams and all your brain can process in a split second is BLINKING ARROW LEFT.

If my visibility is impaired for the reasons you mention, then I’m sure I’m not seeing the “arrow” either. Blinking light comes before shape recognition in the visual hierarchy.

Re: Congratulations, Mini, you made the stupidest turn signals ever

#128

Post by codeduck »

oceliker wrote: post #127
Toutouxc wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> oh, the left hand side indicator is blinking. It's possible they might turn left. Not hard at all, which is why this isn't a problem if you have enough time to think all that. This is a problem in the tiny minority of cases where it's night, it's raining, you're either going too fast or maybe blinded by someone's high beams and all your brain can process in a split second is BLINKING ARROW LEFT.

If my visibility is impaired for the reasons you mention, then I’m sure I’m not seeing the “arrow” either. Blinking light comes before shape recognition in the visual hierarchy.

Exactly. The shape is likely only just resolvable at a safe highway following distance, whereas you'll see it flashing from further away. Arguably the visual design might even trigger the "something is wrong" reflex and make you pay attention.

Re: Congratulations, Mini, you made the stupidest turn signals ever

#129

Post by icedchai »

chrisseaton wrote: post #72
chriswait wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article talks about this: "Now, I think the vast majority of drivers will understand what’s going on and treat them as normal blinking turn indicators, but these indicators hurt your brain, at least a little bit" I think you are interpreting "confused" as "I can't tell which way the car is turning", while everyone else is talking about "This UX forces me to use my brain when I shouldn't have to".

I guess I don't know what the author thinks they mean about 'hurt your brain'.

The phrase is very common in the US. You've never heard someone say "this code hurts my brain" ?

Re: Congratulations, Mini, you made the stupidest turn signals ever

#130

Post by frutiger »

thesuperbigfrog wrote: post #81
argomo wrote: post #54

> there should be no trouble at all for a driver to understand, when seeing the full rear of the car, which direction is being indicated. This response from Mini presumes drivers have the luxury of using "system 2" logical/analytical reasoning in a hectic realtime environment where they must most rely on "system 1" intuitive reasoning. There needs to be a name for this type design fallacy, because it's not the first…

>> when seeing the full rear of the car, I suppose the Mini designers have never driven in fog, poor lighting, storms, or at night? (When you might not see the full rear of the car) Imagine if you can only see the car's taillights and you see a blinking arrow move the opposite way it points. What would you think you saw? Or better yet, if one of the taillights is out, what would a driver behind the Mini think?

> I suppose the Mini designers have never driven in fog, poor lighting, storms, or at night? (When you might not see the full rear of the car)

The full rear of the car is still illuminated.

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