More importantly, they require a lot of intense training to use. Most people doing web design do not have the luxury of putting a vast array of functionality flat on the page and knowing that your users will be trained and intimately aware of each and every function.

I really want to challenge this notion. Just having a lot of information on the page is, I am arguing, not as big of a problem as we make it out to be. I already gave several counter examples of this.

I am arguing that: Making the UI understantable is orthogonal to information density.

Of course, it is possible to have a complete unorganized mess of information plopped on the screen with no rhyme or reason behind the layout, but a well designed and logically grouped UI full of information isn't going to make it difficult to use.

I test drived a car days ago. I turned on the engine and the radio started playing pretty loud. I tried to turn it off because I wanted to listen to the car during the test and talk with the seller on the passenger seat. The two of us started fiddling with the touch screen and the buttons around it. He eventually managed to turn off the screen which had the side effect of turning off the radio. I joked about doing the same while driving and crashing into something while my eyes were where they shouldn't be.

Contrast that with the cars of a car sharing service I'm using. They have a big circular button with the usual on/off icon close to their screen, encircled by a volume gauge. You understand what it is as soon as you see it.

What you describe is one of my bigger pet peeves, and is why that as much as I enjoy experiencing new technology, I'll almost certainly be driving a comfy older Toyota forever and ever. This must be what it feels like to become old... currently mid-thirties and feeling out of touch if these new interfaces are truly desired by the new generations.

It’s not about information density, it’s about control density. The yellow pages have very high info density but very low control density. Having fewer controls is absolutely easier and less overwhelming for new users without training.

I'm not sure about that. Information on a single page with only a mouse or finger input is limited to only the things directly visible. Add in even one mechanical input system, say a keyboard, and the amount of information easily accessible from a single page increases dramatically

The problem with modern web UI's and UI's in general is that they're optimized for a minimum amount of inputs at one time, usually one, that is directly accessible in a visible way.

This I think, is what most people are actually complaining about when they complain about 'mobile centric ui's or touchscreen inputs.

The greater the number of direct inputs available for any given single screen, the higher the information density and usability can be. Touchscreen and mouse centric designs ie. most modern web design, are designed with one, maybe two direct inputs, correlating only with things directly visible on the screen, at a time.

Other fun names for relatively standardized HOTAS switches include the "castle," "paddle," and "hedgehog." It's cool to be able to hop into the cockpit of an unfamiliar aircraft and understand intuitively what most of the major controls do based on their location, color, and shape. Multifunction display menu navigation, on the other hand...

How many different fighter plane cockpit UI's were built up until now? Hundreds? Thousands? Compare that to millions of websites that are used by millions every second. I'm not sure if lack of refinement is at play here.

Sure, but the audience and use cases for the fighter plane cockpit are much more narrowly scoped than that of all the websites that have ever been created.

The difference is that websites are not built for the end user, they are built to exploit them. I can buy a top tier Nikon camera and the UI is similar to the fighter jet, all buttons external, high quality, tactile, built for thousands of daily operations.

> "... they are built to exploit them."

Just a little riff on exploitation--

Banking sites need to provide the necessary and sufficient data about your balance and transactions.

To some degree ecommerce sites need to deliver on your expectation. If a site tricked you to buy something you didn't like, you wouldn't return.

Regardless of the end goal, shouldn't millions of something result in greater refinement? Of course, an argument can always be made that sites are not refined on purpose to confuse the end user. But, then again, there's also a good portion of websites that are not trying to con the user.

And bigger penalties when you get it wrong.