interface design

Neil Cicierega's parody song 'Redesign Your Logo', played over a live backing video with corporate PowerPoint visuals. It mocks the infamous Pepsi design strategy presentation.

A short clip from the film Idiocracy showing a hospital reception computer where staff pick a condition from a board of simple pictorial buttons.

A short clip of the Simpsons episode in which Homer designs a car with absurd requirements, used here as a lesson in project requirements and scope.

A 2006 parody made by a Microsoft team that shows how the company would redesign iPod packaging, with a box piled with feature claims, logos and clutter in contrast to Apple's clean design.

A Burnistoun sketch in which a voice-recognition elevator cannot understand two Scottish men saying the number eleven. It satirizes voice interfaces that fail on accents.

Slavoj Zizek speaks at an architecture congress in Pamplona about how toilet design in France, England and Germany reflects national ideology. The clip is about four minutes long.

A REACT episode where teenagers try Windows 95 for the first time and react to the retro interface and technology.

A short clip from Star Trek IV in which Scotty tries to talk to a 20th-century computer, picks up the mouse and says 'Hello, computer'.

A short CSI clip in which characters try to track a killer's IP address by writing a Visual Basic GUI. It is a famous example of absurd TV hacking.

Brad Fitzpatrick records himself struggling to silence a set of first-generation Nest Protect smoke alarms that keep beeping and triggering one another.

The short printer-destruction-adjacent clip from Office Space built around the cryptic 'PC LOAD LETTER' error message. It pokes fun at unhelpful printer errors.

A short clip parodying Windows Vista's cancel-or-allow security prompts, in the style of Apple's Mac vs PC ads.

A roughly ten-minute scene from the movie The Pentagon Wars showing how the Bradley Fighting Vehicle's requirements ballooned through committee demands into a compromised design. It is a satirical dramatization of military procurement.

Celery Man is a short Tim and Eric sketch in which Paul Rudd uses an absurd computer interface. It is a surreal comedy bit from their show.

A satirical Onion News Network piece announcing the 'MacBook Wheel', a laptop with no keyboard where users type by spinning and clicking a wheel. It parodies Apple product launches and minimalist design.

A five-minute clip of a George Carlin routine arguing that the education system is designed to produce compliant citizens rather than critical thinkers. It ties schooling to the interests of the people who own the country.

A Saturday Night Live sketch for the Amazon Echo Silver, a smart speaker for the elderly, in which older users misunderstand Alexa. It parodies voice assistants.

A short comedic video in which a man poses as an Apple engineer talking about the 2016 MacBook Pro. It is a critique of the USB-C-only design.

A short parody clip in the 'Hitler learns about...' meme format, in which Hitler rants about git's confusing commands. It riffs on git's complexity and the Linus Torvalds and Facebook angle.

An IKEA Singapore ad parodying Apple product launches by presenting the 2015 catalogue as a revolutionary 'bookbook' device. It is a short, tongue-in-cheek spoof of Apple-style marketing.

A sketch from the Scottish comedy show Burnistoun in which two men cannot get a voice-recognition elevator to understand the word eleven in their accents.

An episode of REACT in which children try to figure out 1970s-1980s computers, including an Apple II and floppy disks. It was made to promote the AMC show Halt and Catch Fire.

A classic Norwegian TV comedy sketch from NRK's show Oystein og jeg, subtitled in English, in which a monk calls a helpdesk to learn how to use a book instead of a scroll.

The business card scene from the film American Psycho, in which executives compare increasingly refined business cards with escalating envy. It is a two-minute clip of a classic dark comedy moment.

A Community clip in which Dean Pelton explores a virtual reality environment, including a blooper moment.