nicely done
The Short and Simple Story of the Credit Crisis.
Crisisofcredit.com
 |
« February 2009 | Main | April 2009 »
March 26, 2009
March 21, 2009
Why design is important - reason 1001
"Design is the organized arrangement of one or more elements and principles (eg. line colour or texture) for a purpose."
but as we know Design is not always about reason and logic or what it easy.
It is also about emotion, instinct and universal principles and of color, typography, balance and gestalt .
Emotion causes the wow - and the subtleties are the thing that moves the needle from things people use to things people *love* to use.
People don't buy cars like The Cooper Mini because of logic - there are lots of little cars in the world - people buy them and love them because... they are cute, iconic and cool. iPod not the most usable thing in the world, it probably would have killed off in a focus group the first round - but it succeeds because it is appealing on a visceral level. People create the logic to justify the decision if the whole of the experience is compelling enough. Its human nature.
There are tools designers can use such as design principles documents to avoid falling into this trap of analysis paralysis because it can help to frame design decisions and create a mechanism to have something entire teams can use as a way to "gut check" design.
I found this:
"Seven years is a long time to run a company without a classically trained designer. COMPANY NAME had plenty of designers on staff then, but most of them had backgrounds in CS or HCI. And none of them were in high-up, respected leadership positions. Without a person at (or near) the helm who thoroughly understands the principles and elements of Design, a company eventually runs out of reasons for design decisions. With every new design decision, critics cry foul. Without conviction, doubt creeps in. Instincts fail. “Is this the right move?” When a company is filled with engineers, it turns to engineering to solve problems. Reduce each decision to a simple logic problem. Remove all subjectivity and just look at the data. Data in your favor? Ok, launch it. Data shows negative effects? Back to the drawing board. And that data eventually becomes a crutch for every decision, paralyzing the company and preventing it from making any daring design decisions."
March 18, 2009
Sheep LED
March 13, 2009
Design is a management discipline
Design should never be seen as a last minute superficial packaging
March 09, 2009
Polar bears, soldering irons and user flows
I just found out today that myself and a team of four were qualified for Arctic UX Challange in Longyearbyen, Svalbard, Norway this October. I am very excited about it.
March 06, 2009
Miss Valencia on Valencia Street
March 05, 2009
we are what we eat
Certain foods, like meat and cheese, suck up so many resources regardless of where they're produced (a pound of conventional grain-fed beef requires nearly a gallon of fuel and 5,169 gallons of water) that you can shrink your footprint far more by changing what you eat, rather than where the food came from. According to a 2008 report from Carnegie Mellon University, going meat- and dairyless one day a week is more environmentally beneficial than eating locally every single day.
March 03, 2009
Market Street Future Vision SIMS
nifty and practical
As yet unseen footage of the first stable version of levelHead, an augmented-reality spatial-memory game by Julian Oliver.
You can read more about levelHead and how it works here: http://julianoliver.com/levelhead