29 Sep 2006 1205H

Japanese interface design tip

… for the day when we design products to be used in Japan. From Peter Payne, proprietor of J-List, a purveyor of porn and exotic orientalia from Japan to lonely westerners:

The shape of a circle nearly always means “yes” or “good” in Japan, which causes an interesting problem: many electronics from the U.S. have a switch with a 1 for “on” and a 0 for “off,” which seems very odd to the Japanese, who expect the zero to turn the device on. My wife has trouble turning on our American coffee maker because of this.

So, O = good, X = bad. Here’s another article about Xs and Os in Japan from About.com, of all places. I have sometimes used the “dame” (dah-meh) sign myself.

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