IxDers are like roadrollers: flatting surfaces, leaving them without slopes, tilts, or curves. The path you try to leave on your back is straight and smooth. And all the stones are bellow this flat surface, trying to get out from where they are, to create that hole you never want to see.
Maybe I should get one…
I came across this little piece of The Muppets Show and I couldn’t help thinking (apart from laughing) about the Visual Designer’s role in the design chain (YouTube, 3:22min):
The video evokes the extra value they provide to the emotional side on every interface they work with. A triangle can be seen from soo many points of view! :)
Una de las cosas que hemos aprendido desarrollando Kakoe es que hemos ido demasiado lejos en cuanto a definición se refiere: hemos preparado una interfaz muy sólida (y un back aún más) capaz de soportar a cientos de usuarios usando Kakoe al mismo tiempo, como si llegaran en masa. La triste realidad nos ha demostrado lo contrario: escasa o nula actividad. Me ha recordado mucho a lo que pasó en Google Wave:
A día de hoy la actividad en Kakoe prácticamente es nula. Y cualquiera que llegue, debido a esa falta de actividad, no se molesta en seguir trasteando, ojea unos segundos la home y después se va. Defraudado.
Cuando defines wireframes para algo que tendrá cierta interacción social, suele ocurrir que tus propuestas son lanzadas considerando a un montón de usuarios, todos participando activamente, con sus perfiles completos, etc. La actividad que se refleja en tus propuestas es frenética. Pero no defines para el “usuario 0″, ese que llega de los primeros (seguramente colega), cuando apenas hay movimiento y sólo quiere “probar a ver qué tal”:
En esos momentos en los que la actividad es prácticamente nula, todas esas propuestas donde se mostraba la energía de tu idea con fabulosas interacciones ahora casi te perjudican.
Queremos darle ese último empujón a Kakoe. Pero a sabiendas de que quizás, por no haber definido para ese usuario 0, ya sea demasiado tarde…
I know… February isn´t the right time to make a recap of the year but today was the only day I had some free time to organice 2009’s posts and put them somehow in order. And, since I am the cooker here in this blog, I´ve decided to go ahead. Sorry if you don´t like this…
2009’s main objective was to keep the same working level at Seisdeagosto.com, but also start working on a startup and create something new. Well, this became real on September, when we launched Kakoe and Voota. They are still quite young projects, but we´re pretty sure that soon or later will see the end of the tunnel. September was also the month when we moved to Finland, living there for three months (I won´t forget this experience!).
Índica is already 5 years old, with 341 posts and 730 comments. Below this level you´ll find 2009’s greatest hits… Enjoy them!
January
February
March
April
May
June
July
August
September
October
November
December
Regarding 2010, we´re cooking new challenging projects that will be showed here soon. Just need more time to confirm them.
So stay tunned!! Thank you all!
Foto: Ben Pearce
De acuerdo, el diseño de interacción ayuda a establecer una relación más cordial entre tecnología y ser humano. ¿Pero qué ocurre cuando nos encontramos con el comercial que busca a los clientes con los que tú trabajarás? Veamos:
El objetivo del diseñador de interacción está claro: optimizar toda interfaz digital e irse a dormir con la sensación del trabajo bien hecho, donde nada falla y todo hila fino (trabajo que, dependiendo del cliente, muchas veces puede llegar a ser una meta imposible).
El objetivo del responsable comercial es otro bien distinto: no sólo se trata de traer nuevos clientes a la empresa donde trabajas, sino también de mantener los que ya existen, con nuevos projectos conforme van surgiendo nuevas necesidades.
Y aquí es donde dinero y ética chocan. ¿Cómo reaccionarías cuando si un comercial te pide que la solución a ese problema al que tratas de dar solución no debe ser perfecta? Existirán más posibilidades de seguir manteniendo ese cliente si esa interfaz que tú has desarrollado cojea por algún sitio. Lo que potencialmente se traduciría en más ganancias.
De momento no parece algo frecuente (aunque puedo prometer y prometo que en algún que otro proyecto ya lo haya escuchado). Pero posiblemente este duro período que estamos atravesando provoque este tipo de actitudes.
¿Y tu? ¿Qué harías si te pidieran esto?
The gadget above this text shows the latest Elektrobit’s mobile device: the MID. I was involved by the end of 2008 in creating the concept of this device in Helsinki, while working for Fjord Finland.
I am not exaggerating if I say that it was the most challenging concept works I’ve ever done. And I am sooo happy to see this device on-line that I needed to say something here.
For those who don’t know about this company, Elektrobit is a cutting edge finnish corporation with a lot of experience in transforming technology into enriching end user experiences. They are based in Oulu but they also run offices all around the world, from the United States, to Japan, Germany or Austria.
Si hay algo a lo que aún no me he acostumbrado (aparte de al clima, claro) es a orientarme por el submundo que existe bajo el asfalto Helsinkero.
Acompañando los cimientos de la ciudad existe otra que vive ajena a las condiciones climatológicas y en la que siempre es de día, aunque sea de forma artificial. En ella puedes encontrar de todo: restaurantes, farmacias, pastelerías, supermercados… Uno puede salir de casa y entrar en la oficina del centro de Helsinki prácticamente sin poner los pies en la calle (me imagino las razones que han llevado a esto…).
Pero hay un pequeño problema: en este mundo subterráneo uno sabe por dónde entra, pero tienes que haber pasado muchas veces para saber por donde sales. Y la culpa de todo esto la tienen las señales, que carecen de la información mínima para indicarte dónde estás y hacia donde puedes ir. Un simple nombre (en finés por supuesto) y una flecha es todo lo que uno puede esperar encontrarse atravesando estos pasadizos. A veces, cuando vas con prisas es frustrante, pues piensas que conoces el camino y lo haces casi sin pensar y al salir te das cuenta de que toca dar la vuelta.
Wayfinding es un término acuñado por el planificador urbano Kevin A. Lynch y hace referencia a cómo los seres vivos se orientan en espacios físicos y se desplazan de un sitio a otro. En el caso concreto del mundo subterráneo de esta ciudad el concepto falla estrepitósamente: sólo tras varios intentos conseguirás llegar a tu destino con éxito.
Para los profanos en la materia, existe un excelente artículo que toca este tema, aunque relacionándolo más con la tecnología: Wayfinding Through Technology, escrito por la gente de Johnny Hollan Magazine. También el amigo Nacho Puell escribió en su día un interesante post: the wayfinding place. Ambos de recomendadísima lectura.
Roope Rainisto is a Senior UI design specialist working at Nokia Finland. He is one of the key interaction designers behind the UI concepts of the Maemo 5 UI, used in Nokia N900.
Terve Roope!
Juan Leal (J.L.)
Please, give us a short description about yourself.
Roope Rainisto (R.R.)
I was born in Lahti, Finland, and moved to Helsinki in 1998 to start my studies at Helsinki University of technology. I studied at the Information Networks degree programme, majoring in Human centered information systems, while really having a quite multi-disciplinary approach to studies at the same time. I finally graduated in 2007. Nowadays most of my time gets split between work, composing and playing music, photography and whatever else I might want to try my hands on. I’m great at starting new hobby projects, and not so good at finishing them.
(J.L.)
When did you start working as an IxD?
(R.R.)
I got my first job in 1998 as a web designer. Saying exactly when the page layout / web design work turned into an understanding of interaction design is a bit tricky; perhaps sometimes around 2000-2001. At that time I distinctly remember growing uneasy with doing “web site design” in so far as doing the graphical layouts to an information architecture that just got handed down to me.
The graphics and the layout are of course very important as a part of the overall experience, but in the worst case it is like Barack Obama quoted: Putting lipstick on a pig. I’ve always been very much interested in psychology, the cognitive skills and mental models that humans have and exhibit. People are willing to use visually ugly services if they either have good interaction and user flows, or they give compelling benefits for the users: basically if no better solutions are available.
(J.L.)
We know what are the good things about this job but, what´s the worst thing about what you do?
(R.R.)
Perhaps I’m bit of a pragmatist, but I don’t personally mind all the “extra IxD tasks” that I have to do, be them the endless discussions or review meetings or airings of grievances that anybody might have. The user experience is usually strong as its weakest link. I’m not a fan of any designer being in an ivory tower, drawing “the perfect user experience” in isolation and then not worrying about the problems and pragmatic issues of getting the experience implemented and realized.
I think much of the real talent of an Ix Designer comes from his skills of being able to persuade and rationalize and explain the design solutions, to find out the best possible compromises within the available time, capabilities and resources. Just as much as you cannot draw the perfect car or airplane on a piece of paper and then complain if people are unable to deliver vision, you shouldn’t settle on working on a design without a chance of this design turning into something real. Naturally all of this takes much time from “the real work” that we are supposed to do. Real work naturally makes me the happiest, but it is like the cake part of the work: eating cake every day would just make you sick and disconnected from the real world.
Then again, to try to answer the original question: the worst things are usually related to politics and decisions made by people who do not have the knowledge or competencies to make such decisions. Democracy, power distribution and managerial hierarchy are deadly towards delivering focused and powerful user experiences.
(J.L.)
Regarding your profession, what are the main differences about what you do here in Finland and the rest of Europe?
(R.R.)
This particular question might be a bit hard for me to answer, seeing that my work experience is limited to working in Finland. I guess my past years within Nokia can count for “the rest of the world” experience.
Finnish companies are a lot of affected by the culture of working and leadership within Finland: things tend to be fairly democratic, individualistic and non-bureaucratic. Naturally there are weaknesses also with a homogenic culture, but it tends quite often to utilize resources effectively and to find fairly good solutions in a cost-effective manner. Then again, Finnish companies have a really hard time “scaling up”, going international and delivering global solutions. For IxD it is hard to find examples of Finnish companies that would really utilize user centric design processes in a holistic manner… But then again, things have certainly improved a lot in 10 years.
Processes are a mixed blessing: they decrease innovation, but they allow scaling up. Many international companies have a far longer experience in doing products for consumers, with consumers, in an organized and systematic manner.
(J.L.)
How do you see the future of this profession?
(R.R.)
It is a good question. There will always be the need for somebody to do the detailed work for all areas of a product, be it graphics, interaction flows, software, possibly hardware design etc. For me personally I think the role of an Ix Designer should branch out, go horizontal: calling it the User Experience Designer would in many terms be better than calling it the Interaction Designer.
For a large product there are many experts in their own fields working for the product. The risk that the sum of the parts of the product does not add up is very high. It is very easy to do designs that would work great in their own context, but when adding them all up to a product they do not form a cohesive whole. There is always more than one good solution to any problem. The way to achieve cohesion is to work within all the parties, from the start to the finish, trying to make sure that the sum of the solutions adds up.
It is very easy for an expert in an individual area to stop seeing the forest from his/her trees, to focus too much on an individual detail while not realizing the value or the risk that the solution creates. It is also very easy for an organization to create a role for “user experience manager” and have that person far too much outside the actual design work to play a meaningful role in actually making sure that user experience is not the first item that can be compromised.
Additionally, it is very hard to be responsible for delivering a great user experience without the power to make decisions, especially without the power to say no to something. Saying no is much harder and far more important than saying yes. It is better to do a few things very well than trying to do a little bit of everything.
(J.L.)
Tell us about a colleague that did have an impact on you.
(R.R.)
There are many colleagues, but I’ll pick a few of the chief UI designers from Nokia I’ve had the opportunity to work with: Martin Schuele and Panu Korhonen. Although they have somewhat differences personalities, they both exhibit much of the same skills in being able to see the big picture, to make tough decisions and explain their decisions in an understandable manner. It takes a special set of skills in being able to lead UX design successfully, especially inside as hectic a company like Nokia.
Oh, and I have to mention Lauri Svan. You want answers and solutions? You’ll get answers and solutions.
(J.L.)
What’s your most valuable reading on your profession?
(R.R.)
I guess I should quote the standard answers of Nielsen/Norman/Reimann/Cooper, but I imagine most people having already read these books. I would say the better answer is: read the web, read the blogs, read and hear what people are talking about. Observe users, especially lead users. Arrange usability tests for your solutions, go and observe them. Try to let go of your designer ego, try to prove yourself wrong before anybody else gets the chance to do so. Try to think about how you see people using their devices right now. Know the solutions that are already out there, study competitor solutions and know the design patterns that are being utilized right now.
Innovation and creativity from my perspective is much more about utilizing known patterns and methods in new ways and combinations instead of coming up with something completely different. The word “intuitive” really often means the same as “previously known”. People are not blank tabula rasa for you to impose your designs on; they already have a wide array of knowledge and previously learned mental patterns. If you do not know what the users already know of, if you do not know what tends to work and what does not, then you’re in many ways working in the dark.
Don’t break the rules before you know them. When you know them, and you understand why those are the common set of rules, please then try to break them in order to make them better.
Las figuras de la imagen superior reciben el nombre de Lyhdynkantajat. Se trata de cuatro grandes estatuas que flanquean la entrada principal de la estación de tren de Helsinki (Helsingin rautatieasema), uno de los principales emblemas de la ciudad – aunque cueste creer que una estación de tren puede llegar a serlo así sucede aquí -.
Más o menos literalmente traducido, Lyhdynkantajat sería algo así como “Portadores de luz” (no encuentro una traducción en español más decente), pues sus brazos sostienen unas grandes bolas de luz que iluminan el acceso.
Estas moles fueron creadas en granito por el escultor finlandés Emil Wikström, nacido en la antigua capital de Finlandia, Turku.
Aparte de su imponente apariencia, me parece genial la publicidad que VR-Yhtymä Oy (la Renfe del país) ha diseñado entorno a ellas. Nos podemos encontrar a las Lyhdynkantajat haciendo deporte:
Pasando un día en la nieve:
A punto de irse a la cama:
O en la web, claro. Con su portatil:
Me parece muy interesante cómo han utilizado uno de los elementos más conocidos de la ciudad para promocionar el transporte por ferrocarril, y al mismo tiempo, atraer más gente a la capital del país. Las figuras saltan de la web a los carteles de la ciudad, o a cualquier revista local. Es un concepto que funciona en cualquier canal y eso se nota.
Es como si el Oso de Madrid, la estatua de Colón de Barcelona o el Giraldillo de Sevilla cobraran vida y empezaran a propocionar la ciudad de la cual son símbolos: paseando, comprando en tiendas, haciendo deporte… No sé. Creo que es una estrategia simpática, divertida e informal de promover el turismo de una urbe. Sé que existen intentos de este tipo por nuestro país, pero no sé si a escala tan grande.
Por cierto, estamos a tan solo 4 semanas de mi regreso!
Today we´re asking John Evans to give us an overview about what´s his point of view about Interaction Design (yes, here we talk a little bit about that…).
John is a Strategic, Service & Interaction Designer working for Nokia. He´s also the founder of Multitouch, a Helsinki based company that manufactures table- and wall-sized multitouch displays.
Let´s go to the questions! Hi John!
Juan Leal (J.L.)
Please, give us a short description about yourself.
John Evans (J.E.)
My stock answer for the past few years has been that I am a Strategic,
Service & Interaction Designer. I currently work for Nokia in a
strategic projects team with people like Jan Chipchase and Julian
Bleeker. I also happen to be one of three founders at MultiTouch which
is based in Helsinki.
J.L.
When did you start working as an IxD?
J.E.
I guess my first commercial gig was back in 1999 whilst I still
studying in the UK, but it was just a small project for an agency in
Cardiff. They asked me to create some email campaign using Shockwave
(these were the days before Flash could do things like stream audio or
had a decent scripting engine).
What I would consider my first real IxD job was a year later when I
did some work for Ragdoll, the company behind Teletubbes et al. in the
UK. I remember that gig well, I got to work with a lecturer from the
RCA in London and it was the first thing I did where we had real
budgets and a longer term view of what we were doing. It actually set
much of the tone for the the following decade because it was more
about design strategy and research than a product that would ship in
the next 12 months. I was pleasantly surprised when googling the
project for this interview that this year it finally became a TV show
called Tronji.
J.L.
We know what are the good things about this job but, what´s the worst thing about what you do?
J.E.
It would be the preconceptions about what design as a whole actually
does. For some people we are just ‘creatives’ who get all worked up
over what they believe are trivial issues like fonts or a few extra
options in a menu. For these people we just want to make things
‘pretty’ and as such I personally have been labeled the
powerpoint-maker-prettier and the arty-hand-waving-designer.
Changing these preconceptions can take months depending on project
cycles and it can be tough work. Dieter Rams in the Objectified
documentary really gets to the crux of the issue when he says that
there is only one company that really takes design seriously and
leverages it as a tool properly and thats Apple.
J.L.
Regarding your profession, what are the main differences about what you do here in Finland and the rest of Europe?
J.E.
Organization wise Finland is such a flat country that everyone and
anyone’s opinion seems to count. As a professional designer I’d like to
think I don’t deal in opinions but rather I make choices based on
research, user needs and the knowledge that comes from tens of
thousands of man hours doing what I do. I’m not saying it’s vastly
different outside of Finland but for example when a choice is made in
the UK that’s that and only someone more senior can change it for good
or bad.
J.L.
How do you see the future of this profession?
J.E.
I think people who read this are going to not like my answer on face
value, but I am sure they all know what I am talking about. I believe
IxD as a pure profession is probably a dead end. What ‘interaction
design’ means had changed over the years; for most people today when
they refer to interaction design it’s simply as a synonym for
graphic/ui design. When I was still an aspiring student IxD he scope
of the average person who called themselves an interaction designer
was much broader; it was as much about physical interaction as it was
about visuals.
If we look at the last decade whats happened is that graphic design
has encroaching into IxD becoming broader and morphing somewhat into
UI or ‘digital design’. Industrial designers and software developers
are also coming at IxD from the other end essentially squeezing the
broader definition of IxD into a narrow ever shrinking space in the
middle. This is not a bad thing of course what we are witnessing is a
new industry starting to mature.
The future for those of us who fit the broader definition of IxD lies
somewhere either in creative project management roles, strategic
design roles or more horizontal roles across bigger organizations. In
small organizations it’s as key creatives supported by small agile
teams of engineers and UI/industrial designers.
The real challenge for IxD, or whatever it might be called in a few
years, is how we integrate with the MBA’s of the world to develop not
just good products and services but also creative and disruptive
approaches to new business opportunities. Carving out those roles
isn’t going to be easy but it’s already begun to some degree at places
like Stanford.
J.L.
Tell us about a colleague that did have an impact on you.
J.E.
I’d like to be greedy and mention more than one. First Theo Humphries
a really old friend and former business partner of mine. He probably
had the biggest impact on me at university. I secretly aspired to be
as good a designer as him and that drove me pretty hard at the time.
The other two people would be Mika Raento and Tommi Ilmonen, both of
them are the kind of super scarily intelligent people you hope to meet
and work with one day, I got lucky and got to do it twice. It’s been
an honor to work with them both as they really made me realize how
little I actually know.
J.L.
What’s your most valuable reading on your profession?
J.E.
I’d say one of the best sources of inspirational material right now is
TED. They can be like a drug and I’m lucky enough to work with people
who have presented at TED. Other than that I’d say there is a wealth
of stuff out there on the web.
–
Thank you John! It was a pleasure to read your answers.
And have a good trip ;-)