I liked reading this article because it is something that the current college generation has essentially grown up with. By the end of the 90's I was 11 or 12 years old and even though I wasn't aware of the changes going on around me, in retrospect I can see many of the user interface changes that were mentioned. What I find interesting is how computers, the internet, and things we used everyday didn't seem to gain much traction with my grade until middle school, at least in my experience. That was right around 2001, 2002 that everyone started getting involved in the internet.
I compare this to my 10 year old sister who has been using a computer for years now. She has learned to use computers since user-interfaces had become important so by comparison, she doesn't know or remember the dull boring screens of old computers or the sounds of dial-up and AOL. I on the other hand remember all this and how the interface was not important as a kid. Looking back I can see how they really did disguise the interface because I thought of nothing when navigating through programs as a kid, of course these programs were all games like Math Blaster and Word Muncher.
The example of phones is great because when it comes to owning a phone it really has become as much of an experience as it has a function. To reference my younger a sister again, she's been asking for a phone for at least 3 years now, so since she was 7 years old she wanted a phone. The desire for her to have a phone wasn't about calling her friends and saying hi, not at first. At first she just wanted them because of how they looked, how she could play with them. Where I saw a means of communication, she saw a toy that she could play with.
Overall the evolution of UI is very interesting and has become a part of the consumer experience, at least here in America. Whether or not this is a good thing or not is another question. While consumer-friendly experiences sell we may be forgetting about functionality, we may be losing the ability to really decide if an object is worth buying or not. With such an emphasis on pleasing the consumer aesthetically we may become so accustomed to aesthetics that we forget what really matters, function. And I believe this applies to more than just technology. Take televised news for example. There has been such a focus on making it more aesthetically pleasing that all anchors are young, attractive people. The news has become filled with irreverent pictures, sounds, and people all to try and draw the consumer in through appearance rather than functionality and content. Think of all the news outlet persona's they have created which make it more attractive for media viewers. The news never used to be about people, to be about Anderson Cooper, but now the person telling the news is just as important if not more important than the news itself. It becomes an experience catered to viewers that they experience Anderson Cooper up close and in your face. The same goes for tons of other outlet persona's, even the popular ones like Jon Stewart. It's part of the "news" experience that you will laugh.
