The Engineer Behind Microsoft's TV Strategy

Carl Bialik from the WSJ writes "A high-energy engineer named Joe Belfiore, age 37, has led Microsoft's Media Center team for four years. The effort has gained momentum in the past year, the Wall Street Journal reports, bolstering Microsoft's defense against a challenge from Apple's Front Row for control of home-entertainment software. 'The Apple threat seems menacing, in part because of recent history: Its iPod was a late entry in an established field of digital music players but soon stole the lion's share of the market,' the WSJ writes. At Microsoft, Front Row is already causing ripples: [Bill] Gates in an email to Mr. Belfiore asked why Apple's remote control had just six buttons. The standard Media Center remote from Microsoft has 39 buttons. (Mr. Belfiore's explanation: Front Row computers don't have TV or digital video recorder functions and thus don't need as many buttons.) At stake is more than just another piece of software for home computers. Both companies, and others, are trying to build the foundational technology for all home digital entertainment.'"

Comments

Not too bright, are they?

[tinpan]

If neither Mr. Gates nor Mr. Belfiore can figure out how Front Row could have TV and digital video recorder functions without adding buttons to Apple's remote, Microsoft is in sorry shape.

Re:Not too bright, are they?

[vought]

Mr. Gates is bright enough (chances are he scored higher on the SAT than you, and I mean chances are... He scored a 1590, and the 99th percentile is a mere 1450...) to know HOW to do it. What he wonders is WHY they've done it. There is a big difference there: between how and why.

I think you're about 90 degrees away from the real reason. Gates and Company never design something like the Front Row remote the first time they set out to design an "easy-=to-use" product.

At Apple, products are not designed to look stylish, although they often end up stylish because of how they are designed. The aesthetic at Apple is clean but complex, a bit like the plastic engine covers that became popular with the German automakers in the early 1990s. The covers had little functional value beyond cosmetics and making the vital bits (dipstick, coolant level, washer fill) stick out more clearly. To a degree, the plastic engine covers made the car user's job easier and cleaned up what had for many years been a confusing wasteland of hoses, belts and wires by eliminating those items from sight.

Microsoft applies conventional controls to existing problems; Apple more often applies aesthetic improvements that also benefit the user by eliminating the surface complexity of a product.

One example on the iMac's remote control is the forward/back/up/down button.

Functionally and aesthetically, there's no good reason to have four separate buttons when a centered round four cornered button will serve just as well. Apple places a fifth "action" button inside the round button because it's a short jump when navigating by thumb - the natural digit for this work.

By placing the round button in the center of the remote control, it falls to hand easily for both right and left-handed folks, and provides equal-reach thumb/finger control of each function under the single button.

This isn't a matter of how Steve Jobs or Bill Gates thinks, or what they scored on their SATs, but a true measure of how each company approaches problems.

After a thoughtful look at Media Center PCs and a few days of using a 20" iMac, it's clear the Microsoft designs controls for feature sets while Apple feature sets include pleasing product design.

Apple's ability to create functional designs is not something Microsoft, Creative, or anyone else is going to be able to "figure out" easily. It's not a math problem or a supply chain issue that can be reasoned out in the Silicon-Valley meeting room culture.

While seasoned designers can create stunning enclosures or cases, they have not shown the kind of human-centered thoughtfulness Apple has always been good at. And it's not just the physical product design or OS "theme". Everything at Apple, down to the styrofoam in the box is _designed from the get-go, rather than being grafted to a marketing requirements document.

Apple writes their own rules (and succeeds in a style-sensitive market) because they've got their own language.

buttons buttons BUTTONS.

[DrWhizBang]

Gates in an email to Mr. Belfiore asked why Apple's remote control had just six buttons. The standard Media Center remote from Microsoft has 39 buttons. (Mr. Belfiore's explanation: Front Row computers don't have TV or digital video recorder functions and thus don't need as many buttons.)

Personally, I suspect the Apple remote control would still have six buttons even with TV and DVR. But I imagine Gates still bought that explanation.

Anyone get the idea . . .

[ElephanTS]

MicroSoft are doing a massive PR job this year?

All was quiet for a while and now it seems like a BS tsunami.

the unspoken battle

[User 956]

I think the real battle here is between the xbox and the mac mini. The Windows Media center PC is nothing more than an expensive distraction. Microsoft's real wedge into the home media center space is the xbox. We saw this towards the end of the XBOX 1's lifetime, but it's all the more apparent with the XBOX 360's capabilities. Apple, of course, realizes this, and has positioned the mac mini and its iTunes offerings (and now Front Row) accordingly.

Baby steps...

[sexyrexy]

As fun, and seemingly simple, as it is to bash M$ for being a complete failure at taking over the living room, they are taking the tried-and-true approach to establishing dominance: baby steps. Put the Xbox in the living room, and after two or three iterations of that it's pretty commonplace to see Microsoft sitting under your tv. And so on.

The line from Pirates of Silicon Valley where Bill says (paraphrasing) "You have to make people need you" is perfectly descriptive of Microsoft's philosophy. You create a dependency over time... something that seems fringe or even silly in 1995 but in 2005 everyone can't live without it. It's a long process, but it works. You might not like it, either. But it makes money. It's a sound business practice.

And even if...

[Sosarian]

And even if it did have tv recording functions, my MythTV setup for instance uses about 9, maybe 10 buttons plus lets say 12 for the number pad. 22 total

Tivo Series 1 has 33 if you count the four way hat as four.

For me it's not so much how many buttons, but whether they layout is useful.

Screw Apple *and* Microsoft

[typical]

*My* living room media box is a Linux machine with a 104-key keyboard attached. And I'll bet it's a hell of a lot more capable than *either* of the above companies' offerings.

Tactile UI design

[quokkapox]

not so much how many buttons, but whether they layout is useful

Exactly--and more importantly, whether the common functions (volume, channel, play/pause) are sensible and can be discerned by feel. Nothing worse than having to look away from the display down at the remote in your hand to twiddle the volume, something I tend to do almost constantly.

My zd8000 MCE laptop remote control is about as bad as it gets, so it's just collecting dust.

Mac Mini + Front Row

[norminator]

The mini doesn't come with Front Row, only iMac's do.

Until next week that's true, but one of the main predictions for MacWorld is a Mac Mini with a TV Tuner and Front Row software.

It's amazing to me how the iPod came into its market, took over and completely dominates. Electronics manufacturers are building entire product lines from low-end to very high-end accessories, specifically to capitalize on the iPod's success. Most major high-end distributed audio systems now support directly connecting to the iPod to allow it as a source for whole-house audio.

The Mac Mini has been used as a cheap but solid music server by many custom electronics installers. Apple is not only winning with general consumers, but for very high-end applcations (read: rich people's houses and very nice commercial installations).

It's funny to me that Microsoft has been pitching the Media Center for a few years now, and it's starting to come around for expensive custom installs now, too, but I think it's too much. Too much complexity trying to give people stuff they didn't know they want, and not allowing the real control people need.

At work I see a lot of hype about Windows Media Center, and although the menu animations look smooth and almost fancy, and it would be nice to have full Tivo-like capabilities from my PC, I think it's too bulky, trying to be the great all-purpose PC, and give you Tivo functionality, too. I think Microsoft misunderstands a lot of the higher-end market they're trying to get into, because of their arrogance and assumptions that they can just enter any market they want. At the same time, Win MCE isn't really for alot of middle class people either, because those people mostly just want to check their e-mail and browse the internet.

I won't be surprised at all to see Apple provide an inexpensive Mac Mini-based solution that consumers from low-middle class to the very rich will be excited to own and use. I think Microsoft, even though they've been in the game for a relatively long time already, should be getting ready to have their lunch handed to them. I've never owned a Mac or an iPod, but I think I might be holding my own 6-button remote soon.

Buttons?

[Rand310]

Why must there only be buttons on a remote? What about a scroll wheel like on the iPod? The 'superluous' padlock on the iPod is an easy way to squeeze numeric buttons into one scroll wheel...

Number of buttons

[Anonymous Coward]

The number of buttons on the average remote is absolutely ridiculous. Take the one that controls my set top box, for example. There's a blue button (actually, two blue buttons), 'OK', 'TV', 'Guide', and 'i', that all do the same thing in various situations. Other situations make you hit the red button for favourites - even though there's a 'Favourites' button that doesn't work in that situation, and so on.

The actual on-screen interface it controls is dire too. I don't know about anybody else, but it seems to me that the current generation of TV interfaces were designed and implemented by computer people, where the previous generation was designed and implemented by telecom people. You can tell the difference in professionalism in a heartbeat - ten years ago, the idea of something like a TV crashing would be laughable. Now, when I switch on my set top box, I'm greeted with a video explaining how to reboot it! Seriously!

PS: don't take this as a flame, I' m a computer person as well. But let's face it, our industry is full of cowboys, and it's been that way for so long, we've progressed past the point of "I can't believe those jokers get away with things like that", and we're now at the point of "this is normal, it's pie-in-the-sky nonsense to expect things not to break randomly". How pathetic of us.

Re:Why 6 bottons?

[Urusai]

N/S. I'd fire the idiot who told me that I needed 39 buttons on a remote. This is probably the same Einstein that came up with cell phones that have color screens, take pictures, have Bluetooth, play games, have downloadable ringtones, Internet surfing, text messaging, and still don't work any better as a telephone than they did 10 years ago. Heck, I can't even find an actual "ring" tone in many of these modern phones.

Re:Front Row does NOT have TV/DV record ... yet

[J. Random Luser]

psst, watch Steve next Tuesday morning

Knobs vs. Buttons

[zhiwenchong]

If Apple introduces in a click-wheel (a la iPod), along with a good on-screen UI, I think they can get away with 6 buttons (plus or minus 2).

You see, it's a matter of continuous UI (knobs) vs. discrete UI (buttons). Sometimes continuous UIs are *just* better for certain things. Most of us are used to discrete UI for TVs and such -- but that doesn't mean a continuous UI is unworkable. It just needs to be designed properly, and the best company to design such a UI is probably Apple.

I'll tell you where a discrete UI doesn't work. I have a Sony cassette player in one of my cars that has two buttons for volume control (+ and -). To me, that's a really stupid UI. To change the volume, I have to glance at the player, feel for the buttons, and press the relevant button x number of times to get the volume I want. All this while I'm driving.

A volume knob would have been so much more effortless. I can just turn to get the volume I want quickly, and easily fine-tune it too.

Re:Building the foundations

[snuf23]

"Psst. Hey geniuses. The Japanese already beat you to it."

I don't know about that. I think the Tivo user interface and remote control are excellent and a hell of a lot easier than those crapola VCR programming tools.

Simple, Easy is NIH at Microsoft.

[SeaFox]

[Bill] Gates in an email to Mr. Belfiore asked why Apple's remote control had just six buttons. The standard Media Center remote from Microsoft has 39 buttons. (Mr. Belfiore's explanation: Front Row computers don't have TV or digital video recorder functions and thus don't need as many buttons.)

I see it didn't occur to either one that the Apple remote has fewer buttons becuase the interface is simply not as complicated as theirs. Another company falling for the dillusion that "more buttons = better".

Buttons

[carlislematthew]

[Bill] Gates in an email to Mr. Belfiore asked why Apple's remote control had just six buttons. The standard Media Center remote from Microsoft has 39 buttons. (Mr. Belfiore's explanation: Front Row computers don't have TV or digital video recorder functions and thus don't need as many buttons.)

Typical Microsoft. I wonder when they'll realize that Windows XP is not appliance-ready? AFAIK, Media Center is just XP Pro with an extra app (the main Media Center app) installed. I've personally worked with XP Embedded (a componentized version of XP Professional) and it's a total BITCH. You have to hack it to make it "embedded" by setting registry settings, and installing things that click "OK" to modal dialogue boxes and so on. If I can't get XP Embedded working like an embedded appliance, what makes MS think that they can make a standard XP Pro installation work for the average consumer?

Media Center is great for people like me, and also people on Slashdot that don't foam at the mouth every time MS is mentioned, mumbling "Linux! Linux!!". It's also pretty awesome as a bedroom computerTV or for a dorm, but I just can't see it making significant inroads into the living room. Apple may change things somewhat by simplfying things, and so perhaps will the Xbox360, which is where I'm putting my money (not literally of couse).

Why only 6 buttons? Here's why.

[goldsounds]

When Microsoft created the MCE remote, they simply copied the style of VCR one-function-per-button remotes. This is stupid and short-sighted - the reason VCR remotes evolved that way is because for many years VCR's couldn't overlay fancy animated menus on the screen that give the user a sense of context.

When Apple designed Front Row, they realised that because they have visual cues all over the screen, each of the six buttons can have several functions depending on the context. They just need enough buttons to navigate a menu system, and everything else is done on the screen.

Leave it to Microsoft to cram in the technology. Leave it to Apple to see the possibilities afforded by that technology.

Dan

Re:Why only 6 buttons? Here's why.

[aristotle-dude]

Do you have all of the chanel numbers memorized? Are you really going to turn Closed Captioning on and off often? That is the key to simplicity. You do not have to have uncommon options on the remote when they are not accessed frequently. Do you also want a Widescreen and separate 4:3 button? What about a 5.1 sound button? Would you also like an optical output button?

What a Putz.

[jcr]

Front Row computers don't have TV or digital video recorder functions and thus don't need as many buttons.

With a properly-designed UI on the freaking screen, you don't need 39 buttons on the remote.

-jcr

Re:Let's count them

[jackbird]

Play/Pause/Record can be only one button. FF and RW can be eliminated if you use the Channel buttons while the media is paused. And the Menu can be selected by going to Channel number zero.

Please, do us all a favor and don't ever design a user interface, form, or procedure that anyone will ever use.

Re:Why 6 bottons?

[dgatwood]

I hope you're kidding. If you've ever used a TiVo or DirecTV or digital cable, I doubt you ever use those number buttons anymore. Program guides are a much better way of selecting shows than channel surfing because you can see a half dozen channels at once, along with program descriptions. And when you have 20 channels, remembering channel numbers was easy; when you have 700 channels... not so much.

If there is some benefit to having a numeric keypad on such systems, I have yet to see it. Having an alphanumeric keyboard to make TV show searches faster, however, would be useful for some people. It should not be required, though, since hunting and pecking on a QWERTY keyboard won't actually be faster than picking letters from a grid (TiVo-style) for some customers.

While I do agree that sometimes simplifying interfaces can go too far by removing useful functionality, the reverse is far more often the case---naive interface designers throwing in the kitchen sink when all you needed was a Wet-Nap. The trick is striking the right balance, and while I may not always agree with the point where Apple strikes that balance, they're usually not far off the mark, IMHO.

Re:Building the foundations

[dgatwood]

And yet it still has about 20 buttons more than are actually useful. (See my earlier post.)

The TiVo interface isn't the pinnacle of achievement by any means. It just seems amazing because every manufacturer prior to that deserves a permanent place in the hall of UI shame.

The TiVo lacks power-user features (and at least in the version I have, lacks a lot of basic things like soft padding, too), and there are a number of things that could easily be improved by a good UI designer. The first example that comes to mind is that two shows back to back on the same channel should not be a conflict, regardless of padding. There should be a way to make season passes migrate to a different channel when a show moves without creating a new one.

For another example, the TiVo does, IMHO, a lousy job at figuring out why I give a show thumbs up/down. I like drama, but not really old, B&W stuff. It just can't seem to understand that. It also can't seem to understand that giving a thumbs up to programming in French (Je parle un peu) does not mean that I want to see every Spanish language show on TV (No habla Español).

For another example, the TiVo recalculates scheduling when I reorder season passes, even if I move the program back to where it was before. That's a pain in the backside when I'm trying to get something done quickly, and doubly so if I want to reorder several shows. Whatever idiot thought of that should be flogged repeatedly with a wet noodle.

And what's the point of a power button? You can't really turn it off. What's the point of a TiVo button? You either are going to the now playing list (which has a button), showcases (which shouldn't even exist, IMHO), live TV (which has a button), messages and setup (with the TiVo button should jump to directly), or pick programs to record.

A sane hierarchy would be a single menu containing:

• Pick Programs to Record
• TiVo messages
• Preferences
• Setup (which should be its own menu that includes the rest of the M&S menu options).

Lousy menu hierarchy as it is now. Oh, and Standby should go away, too.

I could go on for hours. It's not a great design. It's a mediocre design. It's just orders of magnitude better than the complete garbage that existed prior to it. I hope someone can do better.

less buttons != better usability

[Jfarro]

I see alot of statements about how an onscreen UI could simplify the button functionality. However, I don't agree with this at all in practice. This is from a person that owns a media center, and has since the first ones came out.

Sure, an onscreen UI can come down and save me a ton of buttons as far as fast forward and reversing video, but when I'm trying to get to a certain spot in the video, thats an extra step I'd rather NOT do. The separate fastfwd and reverse buttons work exceptionally well.

Also, about 6 of the buttons on the MCE remote are 'quick jump' buttons. with those 6, I can get to any section of the UI immediately. I can get there the same way using the 4 directionals and the ok button, but I find myself using the quick jump buttons quite a bit.

My parents, whom I purchased and MCE for, use just the directional buttons to do 90% of thier tasks, and that works fine. As far as they're concerned, the remote only has 5 buttons that they use.

I prefer to have both the excees buttons and an easy layout, as MS has done with this remote. It's the same as my mouse..it has 5 buttons and a scroll wheel. I prefer that then to be forced to Mac's 'LCD' of one button by default. I find that as a power user the extra buttons and wheels facilitate my work (esp. in graphics apps)

More may be more complex, but is not necessarily inferior or bad design.

Why do I want any of this?

[salmacis2]

OK, maybe I'm just dense, but I just don't understand this obsession with "media centre" PCs. Why would I want a PC connected to my television. I already have Sky+, a DVD player and a stereo in my living room. Why would I want to connect my Mac Mini into all this?

Diametrically opposed views of "value of content"

[crovira]

Apple customers are capitalist in that they place a value on content. It is an asset to be protected. It may only 99 cents a song but considering the nearly 10,000 songs that barely fit on my 60 gig iPod 5G, that amounts to something.

Rhapsody customers are communist in that they place no value on the content. Their subscription fees get them nothing but access. The day its over, for whatever reason, they're left with a ringing in their ears, but nothing to listen to.

The analogies can be extended further, but I think I'll do that on my blog and in my podcast.