There are many designers in this country who use IT to produce usable programs and material. This year, the South African World Usability Day Initiative wishes to recognise outstanding examples of quality and creativity from amongst these.

To do this, the World Usability Day Initiative, in collaboration with the CSSA, presents The making life easy usability competition.

This competition strives for the highest degree of excellence in using IT to assist the broader South African population to make their life easy. In doing so, it hopes to raise the standards and quality of design industry-wide.

Designs of nearly every type and size will have the opportunity to be recognised as entries will be categorised.

Any event that brings user experience to the forefront of people's minds is a good event for World Usability Day," says Elizabeth Rosenzweig, principal, Bubble Mountain Consulting, and co-chair of the event. "The goal is to create a critical mass of enough interesting stories that will capture the collective imagination of innovative people around the world."

"It is not enough to have and use technology such as the Internet, cellphones, PDAs, digital cameras and just accept that sometimes it does not do what you want or thought it should. People need to see that technology is not driving us, but we are crafting and using technology to serve us. It is an important and simple message. Technology should always be usable," she adds.

With thousands of products and services to choose from, ease of use is still a bonus factor rather than a norm, and those that possess this elusive quality often go on to dominate markets, she continues.

The companies that succeed will be those that learn from the pioneers in the field of usability and, ultimately, put the user at the centre of their approach, she adds. It seems that making something easy to use is not as easy as it seems, she concludes.