More is less

I just watched this video The Paradox of Choice - Why More Is Less from a talk the speaker Barry Schwartz gave at Google. I have to admit this was a much better experience than the talk here at Google NY that I went to last month.

Anyways, so this video has really set my mind racing, it's actually one of those rare occasions when you can see a theory relating so directly with life. The speaker talks about why more & more choices are weighing people down with a heavy cognitive load in terms of deciding between all the options, why affluent societies are experiencing more unhappiness than ever before, why striving for the best next gadget or the best address in town is so self-defeating....

But aside from the philosophical overtones of less consumption & simple living which will never lose their appeal for me, there's a lot of food for thought here:

• as digital designers, there is a whole lot we can do for users here: not just by creating simpler, meaningful products rather than falling into the trap of feature-bloat, but also by practising a concept this speaker cites, namely libertarian paternalism. In simpler terms, it means that we as application designers can make choices for users that are in their best interest, at the same time giving them the choice to reverse it. The theory ( & practice too) goes that people are likely to stay with the decision you have made anyway, but would have been confounded had they been given a choice. Is this true for you, or would you rather have every choice offered to you so that you can actively choose one?
• Professor Schwartz also talks about the concept of the agent playing a very important role in shielding the customer/ client from the burden of choice; the agent picks a single or small number of choices from the vast array available. This brings to mind the great job the small pop-and-mom grocery stores in India do for their customers: unlike walking through aisles full of similar products as one does in a typical American supermarket, I can just call up my kirana store asking for the best deals in say cooking oils or in laundry detergent; he quickly offers 2 or 3 of the best choices I have, & the job is done. When you couple that with totally personalised service (delivering the stuff to my doorstep, no matter what the value of the total order; always greeting me as bhabhiji, a very sweet Hindi word that means sister-in-law), it is not hard to see why these kirana stores will survive & thrive in India, despite all the fears of big business houses joining hands with American retail giants to take over the Indian retail market.
• The recent explosive growth of India & China is seeing unprecedented waves of consumerism engulfing these places. In fact, to paraphrase Kaushik Basu's recent article on the BBC website, on a trip to China & then India, he is astounded by the huge consumption trip these two countries ( at least the urban areas) are on. He jokes that it would appear in comparison that to get away from the vast-scale consumerism, one would need to go west, to Europe & America!
  I myself have sensed this on my recent trips to India: a craving for the best brands, the latest gadgets, the flashiest car & home. Weddings & even birthdays warrant conspicuous displays of wealth. The sprouting of the umpteenth shopping mall still has people all agog with excitement. Restaurants are always full, even the expensive ones ( By the way, most of them are, expensive that is. The boom is digging deep into the average Indian's pocket, just as medical tourism has resulted in locals paying three to four times what they earlier paid for basic services such as blood tests & xrays.

Let me what you think about all this!