Missing Features

In a previous post your correspondent pointed out a modest but annoying flaw in the dragging behavior of icons in Windows Vista. This flaw increases the rate at which you miss an icon when you try to drag a file or folder anywhere in the Windows Vista environment.

Just for kicks, let’s calculate the economic loss this little usability gaffe creates:

• Number of worldwide Vista users: at least 60 million
• Average daily use: 8 hours (combining work time and home use)
• Number of missed drags per usage day: 2
• Time wasted per missed drag: about 5 seconds
• Billable rate per hour: $100 (assumes users you can afford Vista are affluent professionals, in a global economic sense)

This little glitch wastes about 160,000 hours of time and costs the global economy $16 million US dollars every day. That is about $5 billion US dollars of time wasted annually.

Ouch.

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