Monday, October 26, 2009
Jewish Scots Tartans
Well folks, it's official. The Jews of Scotland now have a genuine certified Tartan for all their kilt, scarf and mug/pen/mousepad needs!
Monday, September 7, 2009
Ole to you Elizabeth Gilbert!
I once got into a spirited discussion with an old friend about Elizabeth Gilbert's Eat, Pray Love. We disagreed about the value of her perspective--too self absorbed and fairy tale to be worthwhile or valid and legitimate for the compelling message no matter the context. Either way, Gilbert shines in this enlightening talk about her thoughts on the creative process from the last TED Conference.
Ole' !
Wednesday, August 12, 2009
30 seconds of advice for novice designers (but equally applicable to all)
I couldn't agree more with the sentiment. I'm trying to live it and push myself in this direction daily:
Ryan Sims from MFA Interaction Design on Vimeo.
Sunday, July 5, 2009
What is browser?
The folks at Google asked that question one day in Times Square..... watch what happened!
The power is in your hands.... (soon)
Otto is a new prototype that enables real-time manual beat slicing. The brainchild (and master's thesis) of Luca De Rosso, made using open-source hardware. Check De Rosso's site for more info.
OTTO ~ demo.01 from Luca De Rosso on Vimeo.
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Finally. The WineRack. Why Didn't I Think of That?!
It's like a CamelBack waterpouch, except its worn as a bra, and adds TWO CUP SIZES to your bust! Here's how it works...
Monday, June 22, 2009
KINO and Victor Tsoi
One of my all time favorite (Russian) songs. Ever.
This is from 1986 and he's singing in allegory, sort of, about the corrupt Soviet system. The chorus, "Mi Hotim Tantsivat" means "We Just Want to Dance."
This is from 1986 and he's singing in allegory, sort of, about the corrupt Soviet system. The chorus, "Mi Hotim Tantsivat" means "We Just Want to Dance."
Emotional Design
LUNAR Design, based in Palo Alto CA has this great presentation (a version of a Pecha Kucha slideshow given last January in SF) loosely based on Don Norman's ideas of emotional design.
Take a look...
Think, Behold and Act: Clive from lunar on Vimeo.
Sunday, June 21, 2009
Disturbing events in Iran. Warning, disturbing content.
Neda, a 16 year old girl was watching the peaceful demonstrators with her father on the sidewalk, when she was shot in the chest by a Basij paramilitary sniper from a nearby rooftop:
Warning: this disturbing video shows Neda moments after she is shot and killed by the Basij bullet:
.
Saturday, June 20, 2009
The Softer Side of Design
Ever wondered what kind of thinking (sometimes, I wonder if any) goes into making new stuff?
Well, here's a a few of the 'softer' tools used in industrial design to make better stuff.
**********
Deep dives
Exploration into behaviors, trends, unmet needs, and aspirations for the purpose of developing people-centered innovation strategies around an experience topic.
Usability Studies
Benchmarking product ideas against user defined criteria.
Trend Mapping
Tracking trends in social, cultural, technological, and aesthetic domains.
Co-creation Workshops
Helping cross-functional teams synchronize their vision for innovation.
Ethnography
Observing and documenting people and their behaviors in their natural environment.
Participatory Design
Engaging your consumers in hands-on activities that enable them to imagine and express their desired solutions.
Flash Immersion
Exposing product innovation teams into the context of use followed by fast track brainstorming.
Deployment Studies
Evaluating the potential impact of new technologies or products by deploying them in the context of use and then studying how people use them over an extended period of time.
Tuesday, June 16, 2009
Handy Dandy Gmail
This may be old news to some, but a neat little discovery for me. Check multiple emails from Gmail with a custom "From" identifier.
There are two steps to make this happen:
1. Set up mail forwarding or fetching
Many email providers offer free auto-forwarding to other accounts. Log into your non-Gmail account and set your Gmail address as the forwarding target. If your other account doesn't offer forwarding but supports POP3 access, you can use Mail Fetcher in Gmail to automatically check your other account for new mail and download it to Gmail.
2. Set up custom "From:"
Gmail's custom "From:" feature lets you send mail with one of your other email addresses listed as the sender in place of your Gmail address. There's a good step-by-step for how to set this up in the Help Center, but the basics are adding the address you want to use and then verifying that it belongs to you. Once you have your custom "From:" set up, you can pick which address you want to reply from in the "From:" address drop down while composing messages.
P.S. If you're a recent grad and want more tips on how to use Google during this transition period, check out the Google for Students Blog, where we'll be posting more tips like this weekly for the next couple months.
[Via: Gmail blog]
There are two steps to make this happen:
1. Set up mail forwarding or fetching
Many email providers offer free auto-forwarding to other accounts. Log into your non-Gmail account and set your Gmail address as the forwarding target. If your other account doesn't offer forwarding but supports POP3 access, you can use Mail Fetcher in Gmail to automatically check your other account for new mail and download it to Gmail.
2. Set up custom "From:"
Gmail's custom "From:" feature lets you send mail with one of your other email addresses listed as the sender in place of your Gmail address. There's a good step-by-step for how to set this up in the Help Center, but the basics are adding the address you want to use and then verifying that it belongs to you. Once you have your custom "From:" set up, you can pick which address you want to reply from in the "From:" address drop down while composing messages.
P.S. If you're a recent grad and want more tips on how to use Google during this transition period, check out the Google for Students Blog, where we'll be posting more tips like this weekly for the next couple months.
[Via: Gmail blog]
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
Tuesday, June 2, 2009
The Vendor-Client Blues
This great, funny/unnerving video clip takes the typical design cient/vendor shenanigans and puts them into everyday situations like paying for a bill after a nice dinner or buying a DVD at a video store.
Using Color to Convey Ideas
NASA's Color Usage Research Lab (!!) has put together this great site on the use of color in display graphics. Lots of great stuff, explore...
omg_wtf spectrum
Behold the Power of Visual Thinking!
David Armando has a great visual thinking photo set on Flickr. Definitely worth seeing in whole.
David Armando has a great visual thinking photo set on Flickr. Definitely worth seeing in whole.
Wednesday, May 20, 2009
Ethnographic Research for Business - The Basics
Brianna Sylver has a great overview of the various ways to conduct 'market resrearch' as related to business. I'm most interested in her straightforward explanation of Ethnography for Business:
Ethnographic Research
Use: Offers direction for strategy and product development
Cost: $$$
Average time: 3.5 months
Ethnographic research is an emerging, qualitative research method and, quite possibly, the least understood. In its purest form, ethnographic research is about entering the natural habitats of your users, seeking to understand through participation, listening, and observation the behaviors, values and motivations of a culture. When used appropriately in a business context, this methodology can be very powerful in providing direction for strategic planning and product development initiatives. Yet, the continued bastardization of the method in applied settings has qualified practitioners of the approach continually backtracking—trying to validate its strength and value—as the price tag for ethnographic research projects tends to be higher than that for your average focus group.
Contrary to popular belief, ethnography is not just about doing an interview in someone's home. Nor is it about taking a video camera into a person's work and, voilà , you now have all the contextual data required to successfully develop your new product.
In order to reap the maximum rewards possible from ethnographic research, you first need to exploit being in the user's natural environment (i.e. home, work place, or place of leisure). You need to immerse yourself in the details, from the step-by-step tasks performed to accomplish the goals of an activity, (like "preparing dinner") to noticing areas of people's homes where they've channeled their earnings. Attention to detail is what will give insight into what your users value and aspire to. This, coupled with what they tell you, helps create a holistic understanding of who your customers are, and consequently, how your offering might need to align with their needs, behavior patterns and values.
Fieldwork is a bit messy, as the protocols for ethnographic research are largely non-directed and unscripted. So it's only in the analysis of that data that you uncover the real nuggets of information that offer the AHA! and new insight into who your customers are.
Additionally, sufficient time for analysis needs to be given to ethnographic-based initiatives. Fieldwork is a bit messy, as the protocols for ethnographic research are largely non-directed and unscripted. So it's only in the analysis of that data that you uncover the real nuggets of information that offer the AHA! and new insight into who your customers are. Expecting recommendations to be delivered immediately after fieldwork is complete is not only unrealistic, but if acted on, seriously compromises the depth of insight yielded.
To recap, ethnographic research is best leveraged in product development, when needing to:
- Define both articulated and unarticulated needs of your user
- Get an up close and personal look at your user's context—the environment in which they'll use your product and the meaning that it might offer to their lives
- Uncover micro-trends in customer behavior that could impact the market's acceptance of your product
- Learn the differences between what people say they do versus what they actually do
User insight gained from ethnographic research can be very powerful in:
- Identifying new growth opportunities for your organization
- Defining target markets for new offerings
- Developing "design criteria" to scope and prototype the development of a new product or service
Listening Labs
Use: Assess the customer experience provided by an offering
Cost: $$
Average time: 2 months
Listening labs (or product walkthroughs) are another emerging, qualitative method that has proven to be useful in product and service development. This method works best when leveraged to understand the customer experience that one has with an offering.
Oftentimes, this approach is confused with usability research. Yet, there is stark difference in how a usability test is conducted versus a listening lab. In a listening lab, specific tasks are not assigned to users, nor are the tasks time-based as they are in usability tests. Rather, the overarching goal of the service is stated, such as "book a hotel room" (in a reservation system). The learning is gained through seeing the non-directed paths that users take to accomplish that goal and hearing how the customer experience at each stage of the process aligns or is in dissonance with their expectations.
When used only as a "last check" technique—as is often the case—the true rewards that can yield from listening labs are short-changed.
Listening labs are an excellent methodology to leverage once functional prototypes of your product or service exist. To be of most value within the product development process, it's important to leverage this method early and often. When used only as a "last check" technique—as is often the case—the true rewards that can yield from this approach are short-changed. The focused feedback gained in this methodology has the power to transform an experience created around an offering, often making the difference between an experience that is perceived as just being "OK" to one that people talk about positively amongst their peers.
To recap, listening labs are best leveraged in the product development process to understand the experience that your customer has interacting with your product or service. User insight gained through this method can inform the:
- Definition of a product or service's information architecture, features, form and/or function
- Development of "design criteria" to inform next stages of a product or service's development
Handlebar Basket
Simple, beautiful, practical. These integrated handlebar baskets are patented prototypes by Goodmorning Technology. Now who will design one from bamboo?
Full review at NotCot.
Tuesday, May 19, 2009
Hardly Davidson - defined.
Hardly Davidson. noun.
Definition: imitation, imposter
Usage: That Gucci purse is such a Hardly Davidson!
Kiev
S to the T to the L !!
wow, who knew there's a site detailing the myriad ways to generate ideas!
it's pretty straight forward.
Idea Generation Methods compiled by one most excellent gentleman, Jack Martin Leith.
The thorough list with explantations and applied examples range from Be the Problem to the Walt Disney Creative Strategy. Neat!
Ace Hotel NYC
came across this and just wanted to share.... ace hotel is a new arty hotel chain with four of five locations. the premise is cheap, stylish and fun. as if you were staying with a friend with really good taste, is what the review said....
bamboo and bikes
My friend Mandama recently got a very schnazzy bicycle, and is now spreading the bike gospel. Knowing my penchant for sustainable materials, and chunky-monkey aesthetic, she guided me to the bamboo bike studio. they hold classes in new york for interested people to make their own bamboo bikes under BBS supervision and safety testing, with all parts and components included in the $1000 price tag for the one day course.
Seeing the bamboo sport bikes reminded me of a more utilitarian version that the Bamboo Bike Project (started at Columbia U's Earth Institute) has been working on for the developing world. Also really neat.
As it turns out the two projects are affiliated! BBStudio in New York conducts product development and testing for the non-profit BBProject!
hmmm.... would people pay $1,200 for their bike class if the extra $200 would make micro-loan funds available to a Ghanian villager to buy a bamboo bike for commercial purposes? Once the money was paid back, it could be reinvested into more micro-loans, or returned to loan-giver...
Monday, May 18, 2009
mac junkies/zombies
i recently bought a mac notebook. several techie friends suggested to only buy a mac through the apple refurbished gear program which has even stricter QC process than factory and a full year apple care warranty. i got a great deal on a supermax (that's euro for awesome) notebook!
still, i sort of wish i had seen this awesome site for all sorts of Apple/Mac deals before i bought mine through Apple. Don't let the name fool you: Low End Mac.
Thursday, May 14, 2009
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Evanston apt for rent: vintage one bedroom (1BR) two blocks from Northwestern University
Vintage one bedroom (1BR) two blocks from Northwestern
Apartment Amenities:
Incredibly spacious (sunroom, huge living room, large bedroom, oversized eat-in kitchen, full renovated bath)
Brand new renovated bathroom
Southern exposure sunlight all day in living room and sunroom, northern exposure in bedroom and kitchen (ideal!)
Sunroom for studying, lounging or entertaining
New refrigerator and stove
Back porch balcony/patio/fire staircase perfect for BBQ and sitting with friends
Ample storage (coat closet, bedroom closet, original built-in kitchen pantry, kitchen cabinets cabinets and huge kitchen storage closet
Two tone wall paint (cream walls with white crown moldings and trim)
Building Location and Details:
Beautiful vintage red brick building on corner of Simpson and Sherman in beautiful Evanston, IL.
Literally two blocks from Northwestern University campus.
Lease details:
One year lease, $1,100 / month
Available for move-in on June 7 but dates are flexible.
Covered Utilities:
Heat and hot water included in rent
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
