How to use User Illusion to get users

User Illusion is an interesting topic talked by Tor Norretranders. We never realize that we only accept a tiny bit information in our consciousness from what our sense organs get. It makes me think that we just live in a very very small point of the universe. As a matter of fact, we miss a lot of information everyday, most of them are useless, or they are not affect our regular lives. Even though, the fact is that we really waste a lot of information that the universe gives us. Therefore, maybe we can use this special character, User Illusion, to attract users in our products or something else.

It reminds me a mobile game which named Hill Climb Racing, I have to say it was an amazing racing game, but when I found the mystery of it, I found it not as interesting as I thought. In fact, the car you were driving didn’t move. However, the really moving thing is the ground. It used an illusion to make users feel that the car was moving moving. However, when our eyes lied to us, we were interested in this lie. If the real reason was showed, most users will drop this game, and then find a new game to play, maybe the most popular one nowadays, Temple Run.

Another thing I thought is when I travelled to Orlando last semester, in Universal Studio almost everyone had to go to the Harry Potter’s Castle. The most attractive ride there is let guests sit on a cart to imitate flying with Harry Potter. In fact, the cart just moved in a small range, but the scene on the front screen seemed like to make the cart fly. The first time I played, I was excited, and I wanted to play it again. The second time, when I tried to find out the reason why I got this feeling, I was really frustrated because of the simple, even a little fool method.

That’s the illusion. However, there are many ways caused these illusions, but the most important thing I want to say is that someone or some companies have already used it to get profits. Just as I said, we can use this to improve user experience. The User Illusion can get much real feeling to users. If we improve the uses’ experience, users will enjoy our products or our services. However, we need to do it more delicately to avoid our users finding out the reason.

All in all, Norretranders’ book provides our media people a great way to think. Besides what I talked above, the three media examples also remind us how to make full use of media to serve us.