Amberlight's Hierarchy HCI Briefings Library Amberlight Whitepapers

A useful technology is one that either provides a new and valued service, or improves upon an existing provision. We know a service is useful only by talking directly to its intended audience and understanding both their opinions and their unspoken needs. We can also observe real or prototype systems in being used.

There is no reliable way to engineer useful products; it is a highly creative process. However, systems that provide value in the real world can only be designed as a response to rich user insights. The HCI approach of formally building-in user requirements and feedback allows this creativity, and also provides opportunities to test concepts and ideas before they are prototyped or developed further.

Few systems can be regarded as wholly useless, but many have suffered from poor requirements definition, such as the Apple Newton or Boo.com. Usefulness is specific to different audiences, and as such will inform marketing and product strategy.

Amberlight methods that focus on usefulness are grouped as 'requirements definition':

• Ethnographic research
• Task analysis
• Interviews
• Surveys
• Observation
• Focus groups

Being useful does not guarantee that a product will be used. To ensure this, a system must meet the criteria on the three remaining tiers of the hierarchy.