Master Marketer (or, so he tells us), Seth Godin, put a piece on his blog today about the downside of dwelling on criticism. I completely agree that you don't want to spend the majority of your time stewing on harsh comments that undermine progress and your sense of self-worth. However, criticism does serve an important purpose: it makes you aware of perceptions and opinions … [Read more...]
Gray Powell = Red Herring?
Is it just me, or has the rumor mill surrounding Monday's WWDC keynote by Mr. Jobs been strangely quiet? Perhaps I've just grown accustomed to expectations being frapped to a foam in the days and weeks preceding the distortion of the reality field. But, this time it seems quiet... Too quiet. When the Gizmodo story broke, I thought it was odd that a top-secret piece of … [Read more...]
Prediction: Facebook will sell you back your privacy
Facebook today altered their privacy settings to tame what they called "something of a Frankenstein monster" of a privacy control panel. Facebook's claim is that the way new features had been added caused the number of privacy setting checkboxes to grow like weeds. That may be true. However, Facebook also leaned on a phenomenon regarding opt-in and opt-out behavior (first … [Read more...]
Design Traceability
Kids are notorious for asking "Why?" Each answer you provide leads to another "why." Each exchange leads closer to some central truth. With kids, that central truth usually ends up being, "Because I said so!" To designers, business stakeholders are also notorious. Not so much for asking why as they are for saying, "I think that should be blue," or, "This site needs more... … [Read more...]
Design Science
My grandfather told me a story (perhaps apocryphal) of a final exam he took in a college Philosophy class. As he told it, the professor walked in, grabbed the chalk, and wrote "WHY?" in big letters on the board. He then sat down without saying a word and began waiting for the students to turn in their essays. Around the auditorium, students began scribbling long treatises on … [Read more...]
A Salesman in Thespian’s Clothing
This may just be me, but it seems like there's a... I can't tell if it's insidious or clever... trend to make commercials appear similar to the shows during which they air. I noticed it first during an episode of "Lost." I noticed it because my wife and I almost always time-shift our viewing of the episode due to having young children and a band that needs to practice. As … [Read more...]
Touchable Holography: Just freakin' cool.
[youtube]Y-P1zZAcPuw[/youtube] … [Read more...]
Experience Design Part 1: Definition
I've been asked to present to the senior management of one of our clients the fundamentals of Experience Design, as well as some thoughts about how they could benefit from employing the tools and techniques of an XD methodology. As I put my XD hat back on and collect my thoughts, I thought I'd capture those thoughts here. I usually define XD this way: Experience Design is … [Read more...]