HCI Goes Mainstream in the Comics

Abstract

HCI issues now appear in the content of comics and comic books, signalling a greater awareness of HCI/UX concerns, terminology, and accomplishments, and shortcomings. In the history of civilization, the role of a court jester, or jokester, has a long, colorful, and significant role. With humor, things could be said that might present issues or concerns that could not be expressed in other ways. Former USA Vice President Al Gore stated as much in praise of Jon Stewart, a comedian with a nightly cable "news" show, who often pokes fun at government, social, and cultural issues of the day. Another realm of humor lies in the daily cartoons of newspapers as well as Internet-based publications. itself has turned to this medium on occasion as a way of commenting on frustrations with technologies, products, and services. I mention cartoons because, in an earlier Fast Forward essay, I stated that CHI concepts and concerns would definitely have achieved mainstream status if there were a sitcom or soap opera that dealt with issues and content near and dear to our hearts on a frequent, perhaps daily basis. I have also referred in the past to Dilbert's explicit use of the term "user interface" and his whimsical (?) notion that bad user interfaces can cause death, or at least dementia. Well, we may have come closer to achieving this status of contemporary comment than I realized, at least in the form of cartoon humor. I've noticed in recent months that topics closely related to the CHI community have often appeared in newspapers' daily cartoon strips. The frequency, variety, and topics were quite noticeable during a daily inspection over a few weeks' time in the syndicated comic strips that appear in many newspapers in North America and in other parts of the world. I think the phenomenon is noteworthy and deserving of as much attention as the presence of specific user-interface techniques of communication and interaction in movies or on television.