I ran across this pretty great quote about simplicity:

“Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex and more violent. It takes a touch of genius and a lot of courage to move in the opposite direction.”

It’s a powerful truism, something to which any of us who believe in simplicity can relate.

It was attributed to a famous German physicist. Immediately, I wanted to share it, but something made me question the attribution.

When I discovered it might have instead been a quote from a less famous (but still German) economist, E.F. Schumacher, I was less interested in sharing it.

The words are no less powerful. Or are they?

The physicist was, of course, Albert Einstein. His name has become a shortcut to communicate importance. So, even if it was Schmacher’s words, Einstein seems to have played an integral role in making their meaning.

Via Etre

Are you lazy? You’d probably say no. You go to the gym, ride your bike, and sometimes get outdoors for a long walk. But when it comes to using the Web, we’re all lazy.

So, I can’t see why companies insist on treating us any other way. In a moment of weakness, I clicked “Live Help” on the US Airways website. That’s something I’ve been trained not to do, because the Web really doesn’t have real-time down yet. But I clicked it this time, and I was unsurprisingly disappointed.

Catch that? Close this window… Click the ‘Live Help!’ link again. I know they can’t have an agent at my beck and call, but the least they could do is retry for me automatically.

I followed their directions. I closed the window and clicked again. I did that exactly once. When I got the same window, the one that doesn’t acknowledge that I’m lazy, I gave up.

Bad service is as expected from an airline as it is from a credit card company. For that reason, I was surprised when Capital One gave me a lazy option the last time I logged in.

First, a little back story. I have two Capital One cards. They each have separate logins, which makes it sort of a pain. But dangit, I’m just happy to have access to them online, where I can avoid long hold times and pitches for payment protection. So, imagine my delight when I saw this:

The process took a couple of clicks. They did almost everything for me, and now I have access to both accounts from one place. How’s that for simple? And lazy.

A pretty basic assumption of this site is that keeping things simple is better for you and better for your customers or users. As part of that assumption, I think companies that focus on simplicity will be most successful (though they need to do it well).

Bob Sullivan says complexity is profitable:

“Most people just kind of surrender in the face of all this confusion. And a confused consumer is a profitable consumer. It’s much easier to make people pay extra and lose a whole lot of money when they’ve given up keeping track of what their real costs are.

There’s a great interview with Sullivan on NPR’s Fresh Air. He talks about hidden fees, unethical term changes, and email scams.

Complexity, like a magician’s banter, is a distraction for big company sleight of hand.

Via Josh.

Simplexity is a term being used to describe the relationship between simplicity and complexity. Without that label, it’s something I’ve thought about for some time.

A simple interface can hide a complex system. Think of how little I know about how my car works, yet I’m able to drive it without problems. Anything that cuts through the clutter is a simplexity solution. A popular Web example: a search engine ranking the best resources for your input, choosing from millions of pages.

The Laws of Simplicity say that simplicity and complexity need each other. Without complexity, there can be no simple solution. Or, rather, there would be no complex solution to make better.

For more “head in the clouds” thoughts on this topic, see how simplicity and complexity are alike.

Via Duffy

The problem: getting wind power to third world countries. Standard wind turbines are too expensive, especially since they need to be massive and near heavy winds to work efficiently.

“In a conventional wind generator, gears help transfer the motion of the spinning blades to a turbine where an electric current is induced. The Windbelt is simpler and more efficient in light breezes—a magnet mounted on a vibrating membrane simply oscillates between wire coils.” — Popular Mechanics

In the video below, see 28 year-old inventor of the Windbelt talk about his cheap, simple, and innovative device.

via Josh