14 Sep 2012
I’ve been fascinated by some recent blog articles (like the The Best Interface is No Interface) that force you to step back and think about what you’re really doing. What are you really designing? And why?
This article in UX Magazine takes a look a the impact of designing for the experience vs. designing a memory.
5 Sep 2012
Awhile back one of our clients asked us to review and audit their checkout process. While I agree with the writer’s sentiment at the end that forms can be dull design work, it was still a fun and interesting process to go through and provide some possible solutions for the future.
This article would have been perfect timing back then as support, but I suspect that it will come in handy in the future, as well.
31 Aug 2012
With all of us focused on our work and striving to making the best interfaces, I found this post by Cooper’s Golden Krishna refreshing. It’s so easy to get wrapped up in making this amazing digital experience and even be wowed by some of the ideas, that we fail (or I fail) to step back and say “wait…why do we need this? And does this really make our lives easier?”. It’s not just about slapping an interace on it (like us Portlanders like to birds on things) and Krishna provides some really great examples in this article.
As a bonus, if you’ll be in the San Francisco care on September 19th, Cooper is holding a round table to discuss this. So you should go.
30 Aug 2012
I know what you might be thinking. This is a post about which Portland mayoral candidate I think might/should win this November. It’s not. I am by no means a political consultant. I don’t follow polls. And furthermore, I never like to talk politics (with strangers at least).
But what I do like to talk about is user experience design. And inspired by this recent article on the mobile differences between our two presidential candidates, I decided to take it local and conduct a quick usability audit on the sites of Portland’s mayoral candidates, Charlie Hales and Jefferson Smith.
27 Aug 2012
“User experience designers must speak the language of marketers in order to have a chance. They must understand the dynamics of their business, and the metrics used to measure the business’ success. In other words, the designer must not only embrace the technology of their medium but the economics of it.”
27 Aug 2012
As Republicans gear up for their big hooha tomorrow (thanks Isaac!) and the countdown towards November continues, Brad Frost of Smashing Magazine wrote an interesting blog article, not about the candidates’ stances on the economy or healthcare, but on their differing mobile strategies.
Who wins? You decide.
14 Aug 2012
At the beginning of this month, I was fortunate enough to attend the Cooper UX Boot Camp. What is unique about this course is that Cooper partners with a non-profit to identify a need they have and, in turn, give the class a real-world problem to work towards resolving. In the end, teams may “compete” for the best idea, but everyone walks away with a clearer idea of the process and the chosen non-profit walks away with all of the ideas AND a donation in the name of the winning team.
8 Aug 2012
I interviewed Veronica Pisano, senior web designer at the Brooklyn design shop OrangeYouGlad, and one of my favorite people in the world. OYG is a small multi-disciplinary design studio that makes incredibly inspiring stuff for web and print.
19 Jul 2012
This whitepaper from Box UK combines psychological research with years of experience consulting on website usability to provide valuable insight into the online activities and decision-making of users. Focusing on six key areas, they reveal how wider behavioural trends affect our online interactions and offers clear and concise recommendations on how to use this information to improve user experience.
8 Jun 2012
Awhile back we started work on a customized human verification process for one of our clients to help the cut down on the amount of spammers. It recently came up again, and as I was digging through my memory, I also ran across this article by HOW Interactive Design that same day. Coincidence?
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