tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-109935042012-02-22T17:03:41.208ZAn occasional listing of notes and anecdotes on user-centred design<br>Alison Blacknoreply@blogger.comBlogger469125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10993504.post-17073298267328585502012-02-22T16:28:00.000Z2012-02-22T16:28:51.949Z2012-02-22T16:28:51.949Z

MIT Building 20 Another piece, this time by Jonah Lehrer, that casts doubt on the effectiveness of brainstorms for idea generation. One of the points he misses, although he talks about the productive strengths of collocated interdisciplinary teams, is that brainstorms are often a microcosm of those teams, bringing together  people who work together, are comfortable with one another and share a

<br>Alison Blacknoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10993504.post-8171912885991634572012-01-15T16:51:00.000Z2012-01-15T16:51:58.855Z2012-01-15T16:51:58.855Z

Here. Lots of clever detail. Read more from its creators, Ralph Lengler and Martin Eppler, publishing in 2007, here. [Via Jack Schofield from Visual literacy.org]

<br>Alison Blacknoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10993504.post-24472991675930509512012-01-11T11:12:00.000Z2012-01-11T11:12:34.815Z2012-01-11T11:12:34.815Z

A little while ago Bill Wessel, of Foviance, blogged on how the iPhone and its successors had changed mobile interaction in a way that couldn't have been envisioned, as recently as 2006. The shift in expectation was brought home to me over the holiday as I tried using a basic Kindle, and found myself constantly wanting to interact directly with the display, and frustrated by the tedious process

<br>Alison Blacknoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10993504.post-14727641921989661542012-01-06T16:28:00.000Z2012-01-06T16:28:06.317Z2012-01-06T16:28:06.317Z

John Naughton reports a NY Times article on wireless bandwidth consumption. Not surprisingly, 10% of users are consuming 90% of the bandwidth...and Finns consume 1 gigabyte of wireless data a month; 10 times the rest of Europe.

<br>Alison Blacknoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10993504.post-86802499175233963842012-01-06T15:25:00.000Z2012-01-06T15:25:24.921Z2012-01-06T15:25:24.921Z

From I am not these feet by Kaisa Leka ...not what you might think, but the use of comic techniques in health and healthcare communication. Ian Williams, Welsh GP and graphic artist, has a web site dedicated to this growing field and has written this article, describing its development. [via Dentsu]

<br>Alison Blacknoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10993504.post-73486028535375021162012-01-04T16:28:00.000Z2012-01-04T16:28:52.884Z2012-01-04T16:28:52.884Z

Fastco debates the ethics of user research in developing communities, to help global companies target their products. The discussion is sparked by Jan Chipchase, once a researcher at Nokia, now at Frog, who has made a career of reaching otherwise unresearched locations and whom I suspect may have been in Don Norman's mind when he wrote critically of the relevance of user research 'you get to go

<br>Alison Blacknoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10993504.post-76987670551516208122011-11-28T20:09:00.000Z2011-11-28T20:09:07.253Z2011-11-28T20:09:07.253Z

Direct quote, 'Zuck says: email's end is nigh. I say: LOL'. Precisely.

<br>Alison Blacknoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10993504.post-8163954827524179832011-11-28T18:18:00.000Z2011-11-28T18:18:20.740Z2011-11-28T18:18:20.740Z

Steve Silberman writes about the sketch books of Susan Kare, who designed the first icons (and proportionally-spaced font) used in the Apple GUI. Silberman discusses how Kare sketched her ideas first on paper, there being no drawing programs available at that point. A nice reminder of how designers' working methods have changed with the development of digital tools. [via Jason Kottke]

<br>Alison Blacknoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10993504.post-56340047940837495772011-11-21T20:37:00.000Z2011-11-21T20:37:00.847Z2011-11-21T20:37:00.847Z

Nature discusses Australia's policy on cigarette pack design and notes that the effects of the new packs are anticipated to take effect across generations. Smoking among Australian teenagers is now the lowest it has ever been, thought to be the consequence of a full ban on tobacco advertising in 1992, more than ten years ahead of the UK. The article points out how the resistance of the tobacco

<br>Alison Blacknoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10993504.post-71593843215925015442011-11-20T21:12:00.000Z2011-11-20T21:12:49.231Z2011-11-20T21:12:49.231Z

MindHacks can't see Elvis in this potato crisp (picture from a study by Voss et al.) but he's certainly there. A great example of pareidolia.

<br>Alison Blacknoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10993504.post-83822094320750112132011-11-16T13:53:00.000Z2011-11-16T13:53:56.918Z2011-11-16T13:53:56.918Z

Martin Weller encapsulates the doomed, entombed and marooned viewpoint. [via John Naughton]

<br>Alison Blacknoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10993504.post-40059431232270335292011-11-13T15:53:00.000Z2011-11-13T15:53:00.347Z2011-11-13T15:53:00.347Z

Hugo Andrade and David Parra Puente, of the Pacoche Nature Reserve in Ecuador, are trying to connect birdsong with identification information, using QR codes as a mediator between the two: something like Shazam for birdsong. The QR code step may seem a bit clunky but it allows a two-way interaction from song to book, and vice versa, recognising the limitations of typical birdsong descriptions ('

<br>Alison Blacknoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10993504.post-61493958715211883232011-11-10T23:23:00.000Z2011-11-10T23:23:34.516Z2011-11-10T23:23:34.516Z

or this? That Microsoft productivity video gets a pasting again. This time from Bret Victor who comments 'Yes - you've got arms! And shoulders, and a torso, and legs, and feet! And they all  move!....with an entire body at your command, do you seriously think the Future of Interaction should be a single finger?'. Takes me back to Don Norman's comments on the arbitrary nature of current gestural

<br>Alison Blacknoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10993504.post-16566615495363680272011-11-06T21:29:00.002Z2011-11-06T21:41:51.297Z2011-11-06T21:41:51.297Z

A very direct approach to weather forecasting. For me, 'No' is fine but 'Yes' isn't enough information. How much? When?

<br>Alison Blacknoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10993504.post-54763550945740287252011-11-04T14:25:00.000Z2011-11-04T14:25:09.647Z2011-11-04T14:25:09.647Z

"I often feel like a halfwit, sure, but I also get to make amazing discoveries." Science writer, Cassandra Willyard, describes the chagrin she felt when she discovered, 15 years after its launch, that the Hubble Telescope was in space. Having been brought up near Jodrell Bank my mental image of a telescope is always something grounded and cup shaped, so I can understand her assumption. Her point

<br>Alison Blacknoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10993504.post-49935743124954347202011-11-01T20:49:00.000Z2011-11-01T20:49:59.023Z2011-11-01T20:49:59.023Z

John Pavlus, of Fast Company's design blog compares the utopian (dystopian) corporate video style of a recent Microsoft promotional video, Productivity Future Vision, with the innovator/craftsman style, usually showing clever bits of technology embedded in familiar, everyday life, adopted by Berg. Ouch. On a different tack altogether, it's lovely to see this little piece of video nostalgia to

<br>Alison Blacknoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10993504.post-3045503137449581932011-10-31T17:47:00.000Z2011-10-31T17:47:20.541Z2011-10-31T17:47:20.541Z

Tokyo commuters will now have access to local WiFi entertainment and information on their journeys, including being able to see carriage crowding and temperature along their train. It will be interesting to see the impact of that information on passenger behaviour. Would you sacrifice pole position for the platform exit (London Underground passengers bunch up in specific carriages in order to

<br>Alison Blacknoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10993504.post-55213412153219858662011-10-19T23:10:00.000Z2011-10-19T23:10:10.796Z2011-10-19T23:10:10.796Z

Simon Jones (Guardian Datablog) considers the causes underlying poor quality data visualisation, including the availability of free visualisation softwares, such as Wordle, which generates word 'clouds' (known as the 'mullets of the internet'). But he also links to an unusually interesting word cloud, constructed from American inaugural presidential addresses, in the New York Times. Fascinating.

<br>Alison Blacknoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10993504.post-23515907624437756062011-10-18T22:07:00.000Z2011-10-18T22:07:53.847Z2011-10-18T22:07:53.847Z

This and many more at STSS. [via John Naughton]

<br>Alison Blacknoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10993504.post-61053025691161750172011-10-18T21:53:00.000Z2011-10-18T21:53:46.646Z2011-10-18T21:53:46.646Z

Yesterday's tabloid press (led by The Times) exposed Tesco's 'Big Price Drop' as a bit less dramatic than Tesco have claimed. Prices that went up a couple of months ago have been reduced, yielding a relatively small, if any, price drop from the original price. This evening I noticed something else going on. The label above implies a comparison of £1.00 with £2.02, whereas the true comparison is

<br>Alison Blacknoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10993504.post-64595300773991349252011-10-13T22:51:00.000Z2011-10-13T22:51:22.505Z2011-10-13T22:51:22.505Z

"Email is a wonderful thing for people whose role in life is to be on top of things. But not for me; my role is to be on the bottom of things. What I do takes long hours of studying and uninterruptible concentration. I try to learn certain areas of computer science exhaustively; then I try to digest that knowledge into a form that is accessible to people who don't have time for such study."

<br>Alison Blacknoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10993504.post-66982356613043808252011-10-11T22:41:00.001Z2011-10-11T22:50:52.532Z2011-10-11T22:50:52.532Z

Honestly. Test your kerning against (other) typographers. [via Jason Kottke]

<br>Alison Blacknoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10993504.post-15371354261342053342011-10-09T11:04:00.000Z2011-10-09T11:04:01.121Z2011-10-09T11:04:01.121Z

From yesterday's tea party at the Museum of English Rural Life, to launch iMuse, a collaboration between the museum and the charity AACT (Access Ability Communications Technology) to make museums accessible. In the picture, an attendee is shown how to use QR codes to find out more about the museum's exhibits.

<br>Alison Blacknoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10993504.post-54549346481481595062011-10-06T20:03:00.000Z2011-10-06T20:03:54.505Z2011-10-06T20:03:54.505Z

Couldn't let the day pass without some comment on Steve Jobs, without whose contribution I and probably many others might still be finding IT awkward but necessary. This quote comes from an interview in Wired in 1996. What's the biggest surprise this technology will deliver?The problem is I'm older now, I'm 40 years old, and this stuff doesn't change the world. It really doesn't.That's going to

<br>Alison Blacknoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-10993504.post-5484992081561964062011-10-04T12:23:00.001Z2011-10-04T21:15:56.632Z2011-10-04T21:15:56.632Z

...the link between the two. Seems to be a bit of a meme, appearing in many forms (this one here). I can't find the origin. [Thanks to Laura Laamanen]

<br>Alison Blacknoreply@blogger.com0