A few weeks ago, TRAI created a beta microsite where it compares telecom tariffs based on what users want. And this is what it looks like: Eesh. In HBO's Silicon Valley, the startup Pied Piper creates a revolutionary compression tool and circulates it among friends who are also coders and get feedback. Everyone responds with glowing reviews. Only Monica Hall, who works for an angel investor's office and has no background in coding, is sceptical about the tool. And as it turned out, the beta tanked. Turns out, if you create a tool that has a UI that is only simple for its creators, and people like them, then it's going to have a hard time taking off. So! Since TRAI's tariff site is on a beta too, in the spirit of feedback and consultation, here are a few suggestions to the regulator on how to make its compare tool easier to use. Rethink the whole format TRAI, honey, what are you doing with all those sliders and radio buttons? First of all, they don't work — really, they literally don't work. The sliders snap and options snap right back to their defaults as you go about configuring them — especially if you choose an ISD or Roaming pack. What's more, they conceptually don't work. Put yourself in the shoes of an informed telecom consumer — would they rather configure, in a single screen, a bunch of criteria that are all specifically important to them, or are they going to want…
