User Operation Prohibited

Ever noticed that at the beginning of most commercial DVDs you’re forced to sit through a number of warnings and disclaimers before you can watch the movie or get to the menu? In many cases if you try to fast-forward or skip ahead using your DVD player’s menu button you see a message along the lines of “I’m sorry Dave, I can’t do that.” This is the result of a special tag known as “user operation prohibited”, and it’s frightfully bad.

UOP tags are embedded into the DVD during the authoring process, and they lock the user out from controlling the DVD player for periods of time, making certain segments mandatory to watch. You can’t fast-forward or skip through sections when UOP is active. There are a few reasons why this is a terrible idea. UOP is:

• A violation of one of the basic principals of interface and experience design: enable user control. In any good interface user needs are supposed to come first, and software/device needs come second. The dog wags the tail, not vice versa. Use of the UOP tag is like the DVD author saying to users, “Hey, I don’t care how much of your time I’m about to waste – you’re going to sit through these disclaimers and anything else I want you to see – whether you like it or not.”
• Potentially aggravating to legitimate users, but ironically only a minor nuisance to pirates (more on this below)
• A supreme waste of users’ time. I think it’s fair to assume that most DVD renters and purchasers already “get” what the movie studios are trying to tell them: piracy is bad, we’re not responsible for anything so don’t sue us, buy more DVDs. Is it really necessary to force users through these messages yet one… more… time?

Just plain rude

The way in which UOP is implemented on most DVDs is often just plain rude, though some are worse than others. UOP tags are most often employed as a way of forcing users to watch:

• The “FBI Anti Piracy Warning”. I don’t know about you but I’m skeptical this message is going to stop any pirates. However it’s mildly insulting to law-abiding consumers. The underlying message here seems to be, “We know you’re thinking about making copies of Ishtar for all your friends. You’d best back away from the computer and keep your hands where we can see them.”
• The Interpol anti-piracy warning (in some cases, in multiple languages). Apparently movie studios have also deemed it necessary to remind you that Interpol will be waiting for you if you should try to sneak a copy of this DVD into Europe, for example to boost morale among the Paris resistance.
• Legal disclaimers. Many DVDs also require that you sit through a warning advising you of various content disclaimers, for example that “extras” like commentary and outtakes do not necessarily reflect the opinion of the movie studio.
• Lengthy production titles and intros. BBC DVDs are especially bad on this point – at least with some domestic DVDs you can skip through the section in which every production and finance company involved gets to display their little logo and sound button. Not BBC though, apparently they believe that each and every time you pop in Prime Suspect, you need reminding of its origins. Keep in mind that many of BBC’s DVDs contain multiple episodes, increasing the chances that you’ll pop the disc in on multiple occasions. They don’t seem to mind forcing views to sit through this reminder each and every time.
• Previews. Some DVDs are set up so that users can’t easily bypass previews of other movies and upcoming releases.

Let’s look at UOP in the context of a similar “real world” experience: the movie theater. I think it’s interesting that if you go to a theater you rarely see an anti-piracy message before the movie starts. And you’re certainly not subjected to the “if you’re ever offended by anything we’re not responsible” messages. You do sometimes see previews (and increasingly, advertising). But somehow the act of taking a DVD copy of the same movie into your own home changes the rules as far as the studios are concerned. Perhaps there are already specific laws that protect movie companies from liability arising from public viewing? I don’t know, I’m not a lawyer.

One amusing thing about UOP is that some copy utilities (like 123 Studios’ old DVD X-Copy, no longer made) strip DVDs of their UOP tags when they make a copy. And I’m pretty sure that folks who download movies illegally aren’t sitting through these messages either. So added to the initial insult of telling users how they may use their own DVD players you have the irony that making an illegal copy fixes the problem and gives users the freedom they should have had in the first place. I don’t think that’s a very effective way to discourage piracy, do you?

What’s the lesson here?

There are a few. Business and legal objectives are obviously important, but they must be balanced with user needs – failure to ignore user needs leads to frightfully bad products. Give careful – truly careful – consideration to how users will interact with the product, what they might find appealing, annoying, delightful, and downright obnoxious. Think through your primary use cases (are you listening, BBC?) and design the interface accordingly. If you must present legal disclaimers find the least invasive ways to do so. And please – treat users with respect, not like criminals.

Photo credit: dichohecho. Creative Commons licensed.

• 

No related posts.

Tagged as: DVD, Product design