Emotional Design

Commented on: TBA

This book was writen by the ever popular Don Norman. Unlike his other works, this one is writen as a correction to his previous book, The Design of Everyday Things. In his previous work, he talked of devices in a purely behavioral approach. People liked things that worked, and hated things that didn't work. In Emotional Design, on the other hand, he decides that people like things that are pretty, or that bring back memories. 

I didn't like this book. Just like his other books, there were a lot of words that didn't say anything or that said the same thing over and over. He seemed to talk about visceral, behavioral, and reflective design for far too long. He got his point across in a chapter or two, but for some reason, he kept on talking about it. 

The Design of Future Things

comment: I, II, III

So, this is another book by Don Norman, and it is similar to his Design of Everyday Things, but this book seems to be less about complaining, and more about actual solutions. He talks about devices such as cars, and how they can be designed to be more effective when humans use them. He mentions a lot about how humans and machines end up fighting for control over each other. One example is how "intelligent" machines will sometimes take over control of your car if you pull up to close to another car. This causes problems when you switch lanes really fast, but your car senses another car is too close, and then slams on the brakes. This becomes really dangerous. His solution is more of a feedback system where the car is resistant to running into other cars, similar to a horse avoiding running into objects. This allows you to have control, but keeps you from making careless mistakes. Another point of the book is that when devices are made to be too safe, people get used to not thinking about the device. This means that if it fails, then people will be unprepared and unable to correct the mistake. This could be disastrous in vehicles. By making some devices less safe, people are better prepared to correct any problems, leading to less accidents.

I liked this book. Although it seemed a little repetitive, it had some really good points. The ones mentioned earlier, I especially liked. I feel that if cars handled similar to horses, people would still be required to focus on their driving, but would get that tactile feedback from the steering wheel letting them know that they shouldn't keep going that way. I agree that when machines take over control, it is more likely to cause problems, but then again, humans tend to make a ton of mistakes themselves.

My Ethnography on Facebook

Comment: one, two, three

My ethnography was on how people use facebook. The goal was to find the areas of facebook that are used the most, and those that are not used often. This information could then be used by the makers of facebook to know which areas of the site to focus on. The study followed 8 individuals and how often they used each of 10 features of facebook. Their use was followed back one month. 

I found through this ethnography that the 3 main features used are status updates, wall posts, and picture posting. The 3 least used features are application boxes, fan pages, and events. Using this knowledge, facebook can direct their attention towards those features. For the most used features, facebook should try to make them easier to use. An example is the picture posting. Earlier in facebook's existence, the uploading of pictures took a lot of time and effort. Now, it is extremely easy to upload a ton of photos. They could continue this by making tagging and other things quicker. For the least used features, they need to find out how to make them more accessible and noticable. I've noticed that facebook will create events and have notifications of these events on the side of the page. This appears to be a way to make events more popular. Even though observing only 8 people doesn't give enough data for proper conclusions, this can easily be expanded to get results that are a better representation of the entire facebook population.

ILoveSketch - UIST Paper 2008

Commented On: 

1, 2, 3

Link to Video: http://vimeo.com/1669862?pg=embed&sec=1669862

The UIST paper I read was about an application called ILoveSketch. It is used to draw 3D images in a way that mimics pencil and paper drawing. There are many applications that do this, but ILoveSketch introduces a lot of functionality aimed at making the application more like a sketch pad. The first thing is that it mimics ink drying. Many times when sketching, artists will draw a few lines or curves very lightly, and once they draw a curve they like, they will make it darker, and then erase the other curves. ILoveSketch mimics this by drawing light colored curves that change color as they simulated drying. This means that an artist can draw a curve multiple times until they like the shape, and then the preliminary curves will be erased, and the wanted curve will stay as a "dryed" curve. The next feature is for combining curves. Usually, if an artist draws two cruves that are touching, they are meaning for them to be one combined curve. So a 'c' shape on top of a backwards 'c' shape should be combined into an 's' shape. ILoveSketch automatically handles this. Occasionally, this isn't wanted, so it allows the user to undo it by a motion of the pen. The last main feature is the automatic paper rotation. They realized that certain curves are easier to draw when the paper is rotated a different way, due to hand position and movement. To decide if a user is in an uncomfortable position, they measure a pause between the first stroke of a multi-stroke curve as a sign that the user is having trouble drawing the curve, so an automatic rotation is applied. This seems like a great idea, but whenever you automate, you are taking a chance that you will annoy the user. Later on in the article, when they bring in someone to test their product, he does find the automatic rotation to be annoying, since he likes to pause occasionally to look at his sketch.

Overall, I liked the article. It mentioned a number of useful features for making the interface much more intuitive than existing applications. I especially liked that they based their features off of natural mappings. Pen and paper drawing is used by almost everyone throughout their entire life. By appealing to something almost everyone knows, they can greatly increase their usability. The ink drawing and curve connection appeared to do this incredibly well, while the automatic rotation does a bad job by assuming what the user wants, and then forcing itself upon them. The main points from this article that everyone can take, is that automation must be used very carefully, and that natural mappings are the most intuitive form of control.