The AI scaling law says that more training data creates smarter AI. Similarly, training AI on large volumes of user research data may scale up its ability to predict usability problems and create better design in the first place. This could change the balance between predictive usability and observational usability, leading to less need for empirical studies in the future.
If we succeed in training AI on millions of hours of usability data, how do you think this will affect design diversity? Will AI-trained systems tend to converge toward homogenized “optimal” interfaces, or is there a way to preserve cultural and contextual variation in usability predictions?
I suspect, if I may, that a “Baymard Institute Factor” might emerge, with the cumulative data set skewed heavily toward e-commerce and other transactional bias; areas where poor UX has a direct correlation to money left on the table and where there’s a nonnegotiable interest in the prediction improvements AI can bring. In most of the B2B world, tolerance for just-good-enough UX may well prevail and the focus of AI based improvements may lie elsewhere. By that I mean: UX intervention is warranted where users are truly cursing and swearing, putting brand reputation on the line… all else: MVP, boom, done.
Great read, thanks.
If we succeed in training AI on millions of hours of usability data, how do you think this will affect design diversity? Will AI-trained systems tend to converge toward homogenized “optimal” interfaces, or is there a way to preserve cultural and contextual variation in usability predictions?
I suspect, if I may, that a “Baymard Institute Factor” might emerge, with the cumulative data set skewed heavily toward e-commerce and other transactional bias; areas where poor UX has a direct correlation to money left on the table and where there’s a nonnegotiable interest in the prediction improvements AI can bring. In most of the B2B world, tolerance for just-good-enough UX may well prevail and the focus of AI based improvements may lie elsewhere. By that I mean: UX intervention is warranted where users are truly cursing and swearing, putting brand reputation on the line… all else: MVP, boom, done.
and so, human UX designers may have a chance...?