Bill Moggridge at National Design Museum recently wrote an article about what bad and good design is, and to illustrate his point, he used the often confusing TV remote control as the bad example, and the iPhone 4 as the good example.
Well, I beg to differ.
Out of the 3 things in the article, the remote control, the iPhone and the modified remote control, the best design is the last one.
We did the exact same thing for grandma at home.
What’s “useless” for one person can be useful for another person. An inexperienced video gamer would argue that a gaming controller has too many buttons, but an experienced person would say the otherwise. The biggest problem of a TV remote control is not the design, but the marketing and sales expects everyone to use every single feature of the TV, as equally and as frequently.
Meanwhile, the iPhone is not any simpler. How is a flick and a tap simple if not because you had been taught to do so, either through a video, another person, or an Apple Genius? A person who had never touched a screen before would not expect to touch the screen. The iPhone is successful only because the marketing of the product generated enough faith in its users to try to tackle the interface.
Either design is actually not really good or bad, but ironically, as a designer, I’d say that marketing plays a huge part in whether a design will succeed or not. There, I said it. 
For example, if somebody comes out with a flying car, and the popular trend is that every user should know every single nuisances while flying, then a dashboard with a million meters and controls will be a good design. The same applies in reverse. The word ‘good’ is a heavily subjective term based on culture.
Apple gets the hype and praise these days and easily everything they did becomes great, despite all the antenna flaws, lack of intuitiveness on certain screens, multitasking, etc. Users become willing to learn and accept the flaws despite all these problems… just like how users are willing to accept a poorly designed remote control because the TV delivers great entertainment and funny pictures.
Back on my very first point. The best design is the remote control covered with paper because the act of covering it with just paper is both clever, and sensitive to the user’s needs. It makes every button easily understandable with clear and concise language. It is flexible as you can remove the cover easily to reveal advanced settings. It is also personal with the handwriting, which shows the amount of care a child would give back to their parents. No mass-produced designs can top a personalized design, period!