Yesterday I saw an article on 37 signals about how Apple has just released a new icon for interaction with iTunes on the iPhone. The placement of the icon is directly above the iTunes button to the far right hand side. It’s displayed there when a common pattern to follow would be to place it in the next available spot on the left hand side of the display.

Now there are many purists who would say that it should remain consistent and stay on the left hand side. Even though I am consistently trying to stay consistent, I can see how this makes sense. It surely makes sense from a proximity point of view. Why not put the interaction icon as close as possible to the tool that will be using it? There is also much to be said about some of the arguments for “it just feels right”.

I think because it’s a iPhone makes a difference also. If it were a desktop it would be one thing, but since this is a portable piece of hardware the interface is focused more on accomplishing things quickly and with as few touch points or reaches as possible. Makes sense to me.

What’s more is that if you look at the iPod Touch it’s consistent with the placement of it’s iTunes. So the constancy is across devices.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 2nd, 2007 at 11:54 am and is filed under Accessibility, CSS, Design, Reviews, Standards. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.