This is why my mom threw her new printer across the room and why it's not her fault

In an excited rush, my mom drove to the store with the sole purpose of buying a new printer. Toe-tapping on the gas pedal, she was intent on waking up the next morning, making her cup of tea, and sitting at her kitchen table while she looked bemusedly at freshly printed pictures of her new grandson stuck to the white enamel door of her refrigerator. Little did she know of the mayhem that was about to unfold in her tiny, second bedroom turned office. After some negotiating and chiding from an “expert” sales associate in his ironed blue polyester polo shirt, she swiped her credit card and managed to just lift the heavy piece of machinery out of her cart and into the back of her well-worn grey Toyota. You’d imagine she was carrying a lost artifact to a museum, the care she took navigating the winding hills and lanes back to her house in the country. With even more effort and care, she lifted it out of her trunk and proceeded to push the heavy box across the house and into her floral wallpapered office.

The excitement of a 10-year-old on Christmas doesn’t compare to the absolute glee she experienced pulling the styrofoam packaging and plastic-wrapped components and black and grey cables out of the box. Without a second thought, she began connecting inputs to outputs and soon she stared face-to-face with her monitor as a sea of windows erupted onto the screen. “Install this!” “Check that!” “Click here!” The computer was inundated with notification after notification as her excitement turned to confusion. Luckily, she had a secret weapon! It was the same trick every parent in the last 100 years has used when facing the obstacle of a new piece of technology. “I’ll call my son!” she happily thought. Quickly pressing 1 on her speed dial, my brother's voice greeted her on the other end and the two of them set out to work. “Click the button that says ok” “Wait not that button” “What does it say now?” “Is it turned on?” “Not the computer, the printer!” After a grueling 90 minutes of sweat and a sore back from plugging and unplugging the printer over and over, my brother had to end the call to go to work. My mother was left staring at a blank screen with a printer that could only print the words “Test Page” over and over again as if that were its only purpose in life. Her kitchen alarm went off. She had set it to remind her when she was supposed to start making dinner and that shrill noise fueled her growing despair and frustration with each “beep beep beep beep”. After a minute and when the timer finally gave up she quietly reached down, lifted her brand-new printer, and with all the strength in her 5’ 7” body, threw it against the wall.

Technology should never drive us to anger. My mom’s experience is something that many of us share - the feeling of anger, frustration, and exasperation when a piece of technology isn’t usable. And this has nothing to do with you or me or my mom. It has to do with the way technology is designed. When technology fails to meet the basic expectations of its users, it’s not the users that are at fault. It’s the lack of attention to user experience, usability, and accessibility that has failed us. And when that inattention prevents a student from participating in class, an employee from doing their job, or a friend from enjoying their hobbies, it’s no longer an “option” or a “nice to have” for that technology to be inclusively designed. It becomes an issue of our basic human rights. Unusable and inaccessible user interfaces are not just a technical challenge. It’s a social challenge because it’s through our educational systems, our industries, and our politics that technology developers don’t have the opportunity to gain the skills necessary for universally and inclusively designing their products and services.

The Norwegian Authority for Universal Design of ICT says that inclusive design is “necessary for some and good for everyone”. I want to take this a step further. Universal design is absolutely necessary for some, but it’s awesome for everyone because when a programmer works with persons with disabilities to ensure their software is accessible and usable for them, it will work better for me, for my mom, and for you.