Is user centred design wishful thinking design?

I have been educated in interaction design and the user centred design philosophy for four year now. It has brought me some great insights in how systems are not created for the people who use them. Usability testing with a prototype is one of the best ways I know to see if a user can do his or her tasks in a system. This sad I think the user centred paradigm is implemented in ways in which it doesn't work. It is a skill to imagine stuff in your head. I think a or at least most designers have this skill. You give them a story or a concept and they can create a image of it. It is needed to create if you can't imagine what is not there you can not create. It comes so natural to designers they forget is a skill. Most people can not experience what they have not experienced. Even harder is to put this into words. Most people aren't experts at imagining they can't even tell what makes them happy. Most of our decisions are irrational. This doesn't our decision making is subconscious it just means it isn't rational. I think not every discussion can end with we have asked the users in a questionnaire or a interview and that's why we chose A instead of B. You as a designer are responsible for the choices you make in a product. With usability testing you can test if a product is usable. Why is this so important? This is the reason why some big companies can't innovate. They ask there users do you like this new prototype. The user says no. An other company makes a real product out of this product and the user switches to the new product an the big company goes bankrupt because they didn't innovate. A great book on this subject is "The Innovators Dilemma". A other instance where I think user centered design is not the right choice is in traffic. User centred design is crowd pleasing. It does what the user want. It's goal is to make the user comfortable. In traffic this is not the thing you want. You want a user to be alert. You want to have his full attention. When you make traffic user centred the user doesn't have to think and can lead to dangerous situations. "Don't make me think" might be sensible for websites but not in traffic where you want your user on top of there game. The last example I want to give you web2.0 products. A product where the user must make content. The user must solve his own problem. The designer in this case must make the tools and maybe stimulate motivation in such way that the user wants to participate. Most web2.0 projects are developed out of user frustration and the user scratching his own back. This form of design is more focused on process instead of product. (See model below) I think user centred design in the way it is thought doesn't fit as perfect as we might think. You can't put the weight of all the decisions on the back of the user. Thoughts on how you should design for user will come next posts. A lot of thanks to Jasper Schelling who helped to explain the difference between data and process.