Dmitriy: Hello, Apala…We met during User Experience Russia in 2007. It is very nice to hear you again.

Apala: Absolutely, I remember, it was a very nice event.

Dmitriy: We’re actually planning to have a new conference in October and this time we’ve united our efforts with UPA (Usability Professionals Association). And I think a lot of people are coming to us from UPA Europe.

Apala: OK, that’s great!

Dmitriy: Yes. It’s going to be a big event. We hope it’s going to be as good as before, perhaps even better.
So, what’s going on in the usability world? What are the major projects that you’ve been working on in the last few years? What are the most recent developments?

Apala: Are you talking about recent developments in usability in general? Or in Asia or India?

Dmitriy: Let’s narrow it down to Asia and the most interesting projects you’ve done there.

Apala: I think there’s a lot of work going on in Asia because it (technology) is major part of the emerging economy there. A lot of work we’ve done has been with people who’d normally not bother with any kind of technology. So to companies in the Western developed world, these people are usually not considered very important for them to design products and services for.
But in emerging countries like India and China, for example, where large numbers of people are poor by Western standards, everybody is very interested in designing products and services that can fit the requirements for this section of society.
So that kind of design requirement is very different, it’s very challenging and very interesting. There’s a lot of work going on in terms of designing for the disadvantaged, for the bottom of the pyramid, whatever you choose to call this section of society.
The second project is the one I really want to talk about which is emotional design. This means to design not just for efficiency, which is what usability does, but makes the design very efficient for the user. However, now there’s an increasing need to design for emotional satisfaction as well. And that is very, very interesting because emotional satisfaction can sometimes require the designer to produce something that actually contradicts a usability principle. It’s a very interesting new area in which I see a lot of work being performed not just in Asia but across the world. But there is a lot of that happening right now in India and in Asia in general.

Dmitriy: When you last visited Russia and participated in the conference, you gave a very exciting report on cross-cultural issues. I remember in particular your excellent humorous example of how Indian customers use their washing machines. It was a very funny and very good illustration of cross cultural differences. I recently read an article that you published on the Human Factors website. I found some more excellent examples of cultural differences, especially about the phone with the flashlight together with many other illustrations of how important it is to know the customer.

Apala: Absolutely.

Dmitriy: So, what are the more recent findings of your cross-cultural studies? Are there other interesting insights as to how people differ in terms of how they use websites, or how they use products?

Apala: We’ve found some very interesting examples when we examined the cultural differences between Americans, Chinese and Indians from the same property/income category to see how these cultures embrace and use entertainment technology. There are differences in the way people in these countries look at home entertainment.

It was fascinating because we found that in China, although the section of the population we were looking at was the lower-middle class, their homes were full of the very, very latest home entertainment gadgets, the largest plasma TV screens you can think of, multiple television sets, multiple computers, multiple CD players, and so on. But even though the apartment was very small and in fact quite shabby, the kind of home entertainment devices, my God we were amazed!

However, for the same income group in India it was quite the opposite story. People had just one television set, usually an old one, and they had very few entertainment devices, all shared by the entire family. It was not like they had multiple DVD players, multiple CD players and radios – it was not like that at all. The main objective for families in India was to spend money on educating their children. So they would rather spend all their money trying to get a good education rather than spend on anything like technology and media devices.

In America, for the same low income segment, interestingly games were the most important thing. In those families we found multiple versions of the same video game – and all were the latest version. It was very interesting to discover why this was the case, so we explored the issue. In the lower-middle income group of families that we targeted, both parents were working and were out of the house for the entire day. They could not afford to hire a maid or nanny. Nor did they have any other family members who could take care of their children after school while their parents were at work. So what they found was a replacement for the grandmother, for the nanny, by buying all these games. The children would just sit in the house and play games and would be safe. They would not step out of the house and get into trouble. So that is the reason that the American lower-middle income group of families we looked at spent most of their money buying a lot of games.

Dmitriy: That’s very, very exciting. It’s very interesting to know that.
Now, I know you have not studied the Russian market but just give us a guess. Maybe we can prove or disprove your theory later. But do you think that Russian families would be more like Indian families, trying to spend their money on education? Or would you consider Russians more like Americans who would try to find the replacement for a nanny or grandmother? As I know, you’ve been to Russia only once. But based on television, and based on your experience, what do you think the Russian home entertainment profile would look like?

Apala: It’s very difficult to answer. I don’t think Russian society would be like Chinese society with a lot of gadgets. And I don’t think Russian society would have a lot of games meant to replace a nanny. I somehow think that Russian society would emphasize how to improve their quality of life by being entrepreneurial as I think there are many opportunities outside (of technology based entertainment). So maybe the answer is that Russians would instead pursue education and aspirations for a better life. I also think Russians are very fond of cinema. So I presume there’s a lot of film viewing in Russia of one kind or another. Therefore I would put Russia somewhere in-between. India likes very theoretical education and I think Russians like a more practical education. Following this I believe they would want to do something with what they study and would spend a lot of effort in doing so.

Dmitriy: Maybe someday we can study this and try to confirm your hypothesis. It sounds reasonable to me.

Just another question about users. You know we all talk about the changes in the financial climate. We all talk about the global crisis and the bad economy. Do you think that internet user behavior patterns have changed because of this shift in the global economy? Do you think that anything is different now?

Apala: We found that many companies in India are using their limited budgets, which have been lowered or slashed, to use the internet and other primary channels to more effectively market themselves rather than use any offline channel. As a result we find a lot of companies more interested in discovering how they can use the internet for digital marketing and strategy. But when the economy was really good they were not as interested in the internet as they are now. That’s one change I see.

Dmitriy: And because of that change do you think it’s now easier to sell usability services both inside and outside of the company?

Apala: Yes, I think it’s definitely easier now.

Dmitriy: You’ve been a very active participant of User Experience Russia in 2007. What subject would you suggest we discuss during the next conference in October? And what is your message to the participants?

Apala: The subject that I suggest for the conference is Design for Emerging Markets vs. Design for Developed Markets. And my message to participants is: The emerging economies of today, Brazil, Russia, India and China (BRIC), are leapfrogging into the future faster than the developed economies with regards the innovative use of technology. If you want to understand the future of usability and technology, understanding the emerging economies is critical.

Dmitriy: Thank you very much for your thoughts, Apala. We look forward to the pleasure of meeting you again soon.