14-12-2006 by Fabio Sergio

Patrick Jordan interviewed on Design & Emotion.

Design & Emotion has a nice interview of Patrick Jordan, author of “Designing Pleasurable Products, An Introduction to the New Human Factors “, a book that ever since 2002 has introduced many designers to the nexus of design and emotion:

“The ‘Four Pleasures’ is a framework developed in the field of anthropology.
I thought that if we applied the framework to understanding people and what they wanted from products, it could provide some useful insights and help guide design, marketing and branding decisions as well as business strategy.
Tools like the Four Pleasures are there to help designers understand their user better and get insights into their lives in a structured way. I think that this is the advantage of most design tools – helping designers to structure their approach. However, in the end, the designer’s creativity, intuition and talent is still invaluable and no tools can ever replace that.

I think it is important for designers who are interested in this area to have enquiring minds. There is a lot that we can learn about people and design from other disciplines and other professions.
One thing I really enjoy about spending some time in universities is having the chance to learn from academic people and explore new areas. I don’t think all research needs to be of the solid academic variety though.
We can learn a lot just by trying to put ourselves into the user’s world and learning about their lives. That can mean being up to date with trends and popular culture, keeping abreast of what’s popular on TV and in the media, understanding why people like the things that they do and what that can tell us about their values and aspirations.“

Posted in Human Centered Design | No Comments »

12-12-2006 by Fabio Sergio

Don Norman on simplicity.

In “Simplicity Is Highly Overrated” Don Norman stirs controversy by turning a critical eye onto the real value of simplicity:

“‘We want simplicity’ cry the people befuddled by all the features of their latest whatever. Do they really mean it? No.
Features win over simplicity, even when people realize that it is accompanied by more complexity.
You do it too, I bet. Haven’t you ever compared two products side by side, comparing the features of each, preferring the one that did more?
Why shame on you, you are behaving, well, behaving like a normal person.

Why do (companies) deliberately build things that confuse the people who use them?
Answer: Because the people want the features. Because simplicity is a myth whose time has past, if it ever existed.
Yes, we want simplicity, but we don’t want to give up any of those cool features.
Simplicity is highly overrated.“

Posted in User Experience, Human Centered Design | No Comments »

11-12-2006 by Fabio Sergio

The complexity of simplicity.

In “The Complexity of Simplicity” Luke Wroblewski looks at how simplicity, often hailed as the holy grail of interface design, is quite hard to get right (if at all):

“Many of us carry a few preconceived notions about simplicity. We assume things that are easy to use don’t have a lot of options and, as a result, shouldn’t appear cluttered when we first encounter them.
Conversely, a perception of complexity can turn customers, clients, or business stakeholders off before they ever actually use a product.
Cultural context can also sway people’s perceptions of simplicity.
Regardless of the specific biases of individuals, notions of perceived complexity can prevent potential users from discovering the simplicity of a product’s actual use.

While there are many reasons why keeping things simple is difficult, I’ve encountered the following three causes quite frequently:
1.
Perceived simplicity can often conflict with actual simplicity of usage.
2.
Actions that provide real value, and drive revenue, often have formidable learning curves.
3.
Gradual engagement, the most frequently cited solution for managing complexity, is actually quite difficult to design and build.”

Posted in Interaction Design, User Experience, Human Centered Design, User Interface Design | No Comments »

01-12-2006 by Fabio Sergio

The Design of Future Things.

Don Norman is writing a new book, “The Design of Future Things”, but you can already take a sneak peek at the first chapter, which reveals quite a bit of what it will likely be about:

“We need our technologies to aid us, not control us. We need more devices that act as servants, as assistants, and as collaborators. It is time for a humane technology.
We fool ourselves into thinking that we can solve these problems through even more intelligence in the devices, even more automation. We fool ourselves into thinking that it is only a matter of communication between the devices and people.

I think the problems are much more fundamental, unlikely to be solved through these approaches. As a result I call for an entirely different approach.
Augmentation, not automation. Facilitation, not intelligence.
We need devices that have a natural interaction with people, not a machine interaction. Devices that do not pretend to communicate, but face up to the fact that they do not and cannot.
It is time for the science of natural interaction between people and machines, an interaction very different than what we have today.”

(via InfoDesign)

Posted in Human Centered Design, Books | No Comments »