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Our observations of the world around us

• Interaction 10 Redux Event for Columbus by Jess Bailey on March 15, 2010

  IxDA Columbus INVITES YOU TO:
  Interaction 10 Redux Event - Saturday, March 20th 2010, graciously hosted by Lextant.

  Substantial refreshments will be provided (there’ll be punch and pie!). This is a FREE event, but please RSVP via this site to ensure an accurate head count for refreshments and seating.

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  Interaction 10 conference in Savannah GA was a fabulous convergence of great content, awesome discussion, and engaging activities with members of our community.

  IxDA Columbus is planning a recap of the sessions and talks that we observed, including:

  The Importance of Facial Features - Gretchen Anderson

  Delighting those who use our designs is a tricky thing. We all want our audience to have a love at first sight experience. This often comes down to choosing the facial features (those key things your users see first) for your product. Getting this choice right often challenges conventional interaction design methods. This session will look at ways to design those key items for a great experience and killer “thumbnail equity.”

  Designing for Solitude - Ben Fullerton

  During this session, Ben will discuss a brief history of solitude, why it’s important to us as humans, why technology is making it more and more difficult to reach, and how we might design to enable it.

  Thinking like a Storyteller - Cindy Chastain

  Storytelling is all about engagement. Designing with a narrative in mind can make a difference between a product that merely functions will and one that engages the minds and emotions of users. This session will explore how an understanding of narrative techniques can make us better designers.

  Keynote: My Heart is in the Work - Jon Kolko

  In 1900, Andrew Carnegie quietly declared that his “heart is in the work”. This talk will examine our ability to affect change at the intersection of experience, behavior, meaning, and culture, and will emphasize our responsibility to approach our work with philanthropic enthusiasm that would make Carnegie proud.

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• Why is my smart phone so stupid? by Katie Kimble on February 05, 2010

  Dear major mobile phone manufacturer,
  I think something has been forgotten in the design of the latest smart phones. It’s a phone, first and foremost, for most users. I realize that innovation has to move quickly, and that there’s a lot of competition out there in the mobile industry, but basic user needs seem to be lost time and time again. With the iPhone came major innovation. It could perform a lot more functions than anything most of us had ever seen. But with that came frustration where usability was concerned. We should be learning from this. Why is it that my new phone is still suffering from interface problems that are enough to outrage me as an interaction designer? Why aren’t we standing on the shoulders of those who have gone through this before? It seems that with my smart phone, the biggest problem is that the designers were so excited over new technology that they forgot that 90% of the time, I would be using it as a phone. The phone portion of the interface is infuriatingly difficult. I dial with my face. I mute and hang up on people anytime I try to pin it against my shoulder. As a workaround I tried to plug in a headset. Oops! I guess now I have to go out and buy a blue tooth headset because my phone isn’t built to accept a traditional ear piece. The back panel falls off leaving my battery exposed. I can’t dial with gloves on, yet I need to use the touch screen to access the voice recognition interface (so I end up having to take my gloves off anyway). But it’s ok, all I need is some duct tape, no gloves (even in the 10 degree Ohio weather) and a blue tooth headset and this phone will be all that it was cracked up to be. But hey, it sure can tell me how to find the nearest Olive Garden!
  
  When making design decisions, let’s get back to remembering how this product will be used. New innovation is amazing, this progress shouldn’t stop or even slow down, but we can’t let other features fall through the cracks as a result. Especially when these features constitute the bulk of the use cases to which we should be designing. 

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• Design Thinking by Dan Rockwell on January 15, 2010

  Last year Chris Rockwell, CEO of Lextant, wrote a tasty article for DMI’s Design Management Review magazine entitled The Mathematics of Brand Satisfaction.  It’s a very good read.  Readers can see application of multi-sensory participatory research and translation in the article.  The article was so good that its been added as a chapter in Thomas Lockwood’s Design Thinking book that’s just been published.

  

  The book is organized into three sections that focus on using design for innovation and brand building; the emerging role of service design; and designing meaningful customer experiences.

  You can find the book on Amazon and in bookstores everywhere.  Chris has no shortage of observations when comes to design and experience- if you’re looking for more goodness- check out his new personal blog, The Experience Shack.

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