For the seventh year running the dConstruct conference played host to some of the industry leaders in interaction design, mobile design and computing, with an array of new and familiar faces. The Orange Bus UX team managed to grab tickets for the one day event in Brighton last Friday which sold out within 7 hours!
This year centred on “...how designers can bridge the gap between the physical and digital world in order to make better, more human experiences.”
Strong themes from all speakers were around:
- The rise of multi-platform devices (desktop, mobile, ipad, TV) and responsive design.
- The big picture, designing for the whole ‘system’ looking at the experience across multiple touch points.
- Time and how it affects and evolves the products we make.
- Personalisation.
Emotional Design for the World of Objects - Don Norman
First up to set the tone for the day, Don Norman (whilst his wife played Sudoku - clearly she’d heard the rehearsals!). He chose not to use slides but to talk to the audience about points which really got you thinking. Like Baz Luhrmann’s Everybody's Free (To Wear Sunscreen) Don hit us with the revelation that we are not Google’s users, advertisers are Google’s users, we are their product. There has been some criticism that this is not a mind blowing insight, however it certainly got you thinking about audiences and who a big company like Google consider in their products. Don went on to explain that the future is ‘Systems’ - understanding how a product or experience fits into the big picture and the potential in all the touchpoints - something Google do well.
Don believes an experience lasts a moment, a memory lasts for years. By providing a reminder of our memory, then the experience can be held onto for a lifetime. For example, Disney souvenirs and photos let you relive the fonder memories of the park experience whilst pushing the long queues and prices to the back of your mind.
He moved onto great happiness and success coming after a negative. Don explained, if we think about the way things unfold through time such as games - you want challenges and failures so successes seem triumphant and you are engaged in an emotional response. We related Don’s point to thinking about a product life span. Over time we can predict on the first release that there will be negatives (i.e. features people expect which are missing, interfaces which can be improved, the compromises we know we have had to make). From these negatives, a positive and uplifting experience can unfold as features and improvements develop. For example, Twitter just provide the platform, the users develop the content and have formed how it is used i.e. hashtags and retweets.
Don finished by demonstrating that we’ve come full circle with our interface designs and the gestures of tomorrow are set to change, to ensure consistency across devices, as there is now no distinction to a user from the Internet in their pocket to their Internet at home.
- Command line Memorise everything to interact and achieve results
- Graphical User Interface (GUI) Less efficient but easier to use and no need to learn
- Gestures Memorise everything e.g. how do you undo on an iPhone?
What to take from this:
- Systems are the future - look at the big picture, understand where your product or experience fits and its potential in its system.
- An experience lasts a moment, a memory lasts for years - provide the triggers for people to hold onto that memory.
- Time, think about the way things unfold - great happiness and success comes after a negative. Make sure you can recover from the negative.
- Consistent gestures and actions are coming across all the devices we use to aid with learnabilty of gestural interfaces.
Web: www.jnd.org Twitter: @jnd1er
Beyond Usability: Mapping Emotion to Experience -Kelly Goto
By far our favourite talk of the day. Kelly demonstrated the importance of research and insight which allows her company to create ‘addictive experiences’ through empathy and looking at the spaces between the experiences they are creating. Kelly explains that you cannot create addiction, but you can understand peoples rituals and craft an experience to fit into their lives through research.
Kelly challenged the audience to “help people to stay upright”. Instead of encouraging users to be super-glued to their screens, its time for a shake it up and re-engage with the world around us.
Covering her research methods Kelly explains, contextual research, observations, and in-depth interviews can tell us how people live their lives, traditional market
research such as surveys and focus groups tell us how people think they live their lives. For example, a focus group asking ‘Do you wash your hands when you go to the bathroom?’ will demonstrate peoples behaviour influenced by the group, how do they want to be perceived? What are other people saying? What is the ‘right’ answer? Observation in practice is where we really find out what people actually do.
What to take from this:
- Help people to stay upright - Get back to creating experiences with real people, get our heads out of devices
- Understand the value of research and understanding the audience’s rituals
- Keep asking why - why is it important to you? why do you love it? why did you do that?
Web: gotomedia.com Twitter: @go2girl
Letting Go - Bryan Rieger & Stephanie Rieger
The Riegers’ (I’m going to use the collective name as they both contributed) took us on a historical journey of how ideas have developed, from sharing knowledge through books, to patent systems to protect our knowledge and ideas, through to modern day where those ideas evolve and grow when let loose online.
The Riegers’ demonstrated that we are in a time of rapid technology shifts. Traditionally, an audience of 50 million would equal market penetration. It took 40 years for radio to reach this, it took TV 10 years, You Tube less than 6 months and Google+ is at 25million after just 3 months. Rapid technology growth means the traditional ‘generation gaps’ are no longer generation gaps and that people 2 - 4 years apart are having to adapt to different technology.
Bryan Rieger explains that we can’t expect customers to interact with our creations in a linear, exclusive manner anymore. Users no longer have to wait for the experiences we create for them, they can get to the end and they will evolve it into new experiences themselves. Bryan gives Instapaper# as an example, which takes the websites we lovingly create and takes the design, content and layout down to a stripped version which provides the content into a better experience for reading. The best example we could relate this to was Little Big Planet 2, where Sony have thought about the experience over time and what happens when their audience reach the end of the game (the experience Sony created). Sony have provided the means for users to create their own levels/experiences and share these with others to provide longevity.
The Riegers’ ended on the point that we should be enabling pathways for users to find meaning and enrich their lives, through experiences they create themselves.
What to take from this:
- Think about the lifetime of the experience we are creating
- What we create does not have to be the finished article but it should not be sub-standard
- How can we facilitate and encourage users to take things further?
Web: bryanrieger.com stephanierieger.com Twitter: @bryanrieger @stephanierieger
Slides:Letting Go
What Is the Shape of the Future Book? - Craig Mod
The award for strangest presentation lies here. We can’t say we now know the shape of the future book, but Craig did tell a well structured story around a very large, book-like artifact which is uncovered and explored through generations.
What to take from this:
- Stories are excellent at capturing peoples attention and explaining a concept (it’s the only part of Craig’s presentation we can remember)
- Don’t make stories too long, as we did switch off near the end. Lunch time may also have been a factor there...
Web: craigmod.com Twitter: @craigmod
Part 2
Continue reading about the Orange Bus UX team at dConstruct 2011 - Part 2
We had lots to write about!