How Google Cuts Out Millions Users with Poor Design

I've highlighted some tools that interface designers can use to make their applications more accessible to people with color blindness.  A simple rule designers can follow without using any tools at all is to shun red/green combinations. Looking at the U.S. male population, where color blindness is most prevalent, one finds that 7%-10% are red-green colorblind. With 138.1 million males in the U.S. in 2000, this translates into approximately 9.6-13.8 million males in the U.S. with red-green color blindness.

I am one of those millions.  I'm red-green color blind and a heavy computer user. Thus at times I'm at a loss as to why many contemporary UI designers don’t use primary colors and instead choose diffuse, easily confused pastels as well as green-tan-brown palettes that are virtually indistinguishable to millions of users.

The question is sometimes asked in the blogosphere, "Should color blind people be web or interface designers?" The intimation is that among the professions within which color blind people should be precluded, web and computer interface design is one of them.

I think a fairer question is, "Should people with normal vision be web or interface designers?"

Here is an example of poor design that would have never made it to market if color vision deficient users were consulted.

Google Calendar Offers Questionably Useful Color Label Options

Google Calendar is a tool I can not live without today. I use it for personal, family and business calendaring. Users may set a color to associate with each of their calendars.  I struggle to pick colors that differentiate my personal, family and business calendars--this in spite of Google offering me twenty-one color label choices. I've nearly exhausted the practical utility of the color labeling system becuase I cannot perceive more than about 5 or 6 of the colors as truly different. The balance of the color choices are nearly indistinguishable from each other.

Here are three examples. In each example "Event 1" is a listing from one calendar and "Event 2" is a listing from a completely different calendar.  To my eyes, and to those of millions of others, these color pairs are the same.

 

Example 1 from Google Calendar.

 

Example 2 from Google Calendar.

 

Example 3 from Google Calendar.

What Could Be Done?

1. Offer fewer color choices.
2. Offer color choices that do not draw on a green/tan or blue/purple pallete
3. Use primary colors
4. If you must use pastels or draw on color pallets that are difficult for color blind people to see, provide names of the colors with the color choices. This could be done by displaying a key either near the color choices, providing a key on a separate help page, or as a mouse-over feature where a color name label would appear when a user places their mouse over a label (MS Word does this).