Limits

Steven Frank (developer at Panic, my favorite indie mac software house) just wrote a long, rambly exploration of the state of computing — mostly focusing on the fundamentals of user interfaces. The desktop personal computer interface hasn't changed significantly in over 20 years.

John Gruber says Steven offers an "explanation for why we’re seeing far more UI innovation on mobile devices than on desktop computers, despite the fact that they offer only a fraction of the processing power, memory, and screen space."

I don't think Steven actually goes that far, but his ruminations are fascinating.

For the actual cause of UI innovation in mobile... I would argue that we are seeing innovation because mobile devices offer only a fraction of desktop computing resources. So far, every time we've created a newer, faster personal computer in the past 20 years, we've simply extended the same tired old interface, dressed up with new graphics (XP, MacOSX, Vista are the poster children for this) and better technical implementations (e.g. fully buffered windows). Only by forcing restraints upon UI designers have we finally seen technology drive new interface experiences, instead of dressing up the old ones.

Put another way, the problem is this: Given our druthers, we keep doing the same old thing.

So let's hear it for limits. They stop us from doing the same old thing.