Welcome to Interfaces.com

This blog is dedicated to product design issues.

I hope this online collection of notes would prove valuable not only to me but to all students and colleagues looking to develop innovating and interesting products. This site focuses on product design, conceptual design, interaction design, interface design, and failure analysis.

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Memory and the Brain — Videos from Scientific American

March 18, 2012

Scientific American did a nice little video demonstrating where in the brain information is processed and remembered. And here’s one that explains perception and social cues. Unfortunately, Scientific American still uses Flash, so this might not work on all devices.
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Special Preview: Activity Theory

March 13, 2012
Special Preview: Activity Theory

Once again, we get an early preview of the next chapter of Interaction-Design.org textbook: Activity Theory. The author of the chapter, Victor Kaptelinin, did a wonderful job of summarizing decades of research in educational psychology, cognitive science, and HCI — from Vygotsky to Moran. If you’re unfamiliar with the theories, research, and thinking that brought us to present day HCI design, this is a great place to start (and includes all of the references to the relevant literature). Adopting an activity-theoretical perspective has an immediate implication for design: it suggests that the primary concern of designers of interactive systems should be supporting meaningful human activities in everyday contexts, rather than striving for logical consistency and technological sophistication. While this...
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Information in the Age of ICT: the Guardian Newspaper 3 Little Pigs Ad

March 12, 2012

The 2012 Guardian newspaper ad really captures the flow of information in the age of ICT (Information Communication Technologies). The ad retells the story of the 3 little pigs, their houses, and the big bad wolf. It shows how stories change with spin and through propagation through social media: twitter, Facebook, email, etc. Well done!
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McGurk Effect — Synesthesia in Action

February 29, 2012

McGurk Effect is synesthesia in action. The sounds you hear depend on the visual information you’re getting through your senses! This is an amazing little video demonstration. Imagine if all your senses were so interconnected — perseptual information tangled up mid stream…
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Special Preview: Disruptive Innovation

February 18, 2012
Special Preview: Disruptive Innovation

Interaction-Design.org The folks from Interaction-Design.org have just completed their newest chapter: “Disruptive Innovation” by Clayton M. Christensen. This chapter is an excerpt from Dr. Christensen’s 1997 book “The Innovator’s Dilemma: When New Technologies Cause Great Firms to Fail,” published by Harvard Business Press. His newer book, “The Innovator’s DNA: Mastering the Five Skills of Disruptive Innovators,” published in 2011 on Kindle, is a follow up to the ideas in the first book and those expressed in the Interaction-Design.org chapter. Disruptive Innovation The main idea of this chapter can be summed up by Donald A. Norman’s graph (see below). This is a graph of product performance over time — think of “product” is its most expansive form. When the product...
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US Rio+2.0 Speed Geeking Session

February 6, 2012
US Rio+2.0 Speed Geeking Session

So I’ve learned a new word: Speed Geeking. It’s like speed dating but for geeks to quickly present their ideas to a small group. You have five minutes strict, and then move on to the next presenting geek. It was a very interesting format, but it clearly had accessibility issue: I walk with a cane and I found it very hard. It would have been impossible in a wheelchair. And others with disabilities clearly had issues with this format. But that said, I’ve learned a lot. Below are my notes on the Speed Geeking event at US Rio +2.0. Noel Dickover — Senior New Media Advisor, Office of eDeplomacy, U.S. Department of State — introduced Speed Geeking and ran...
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US Rio+2.0 Breakout Session on Environmental & Conservation Education

February 6, 2012

Below are the notes from the US Rio+2.0 conference hosted at Stanford last week. The notes are from the Education: Environment and Conservation breakout session. US Rio+2.0 Breakout Session Education: Environment and Conservation Attendees: Prof. Anthony D. Barnosky: Professor and Curator, Department of Integrative Biology at University of California Berkeley Wali Modaqiq: Deputy Director General (DDG), National Environmental Protection Agency (NEPA) of Islamic Republic of Afghanistan Dr. Khalid Naseemi: Chief of Staff & Spokes Person for National Environmental Protection Agency (NEPA) of Islamic Republic of Afghanistan Julie Noblitt: The Green Ninja — Climate-action Superhero Prof. Robert Siegel, M.D., Ph.D.: Associate Professor, Microbiology & Immunology Human Biology/African Studies at Stanford School of Humanities and Sciences Dr. Beth Stevens: Senior Vice...
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Memory and the Brain — Videos from Scientific American

Scientific American did a nice little video demonstrating where in the brain information is processed and remembered. And here’s one that explains perception and social cues. Unfortunately, Scientific American still uses Flash, so this might not work on all...
Read More »

Special Preview: Activity Theory

Special Preview: Activity Theory

Once again, we get an early preview of the next chapter of Interaction-Design.org textbook: Activity Theory. The author of the chapter, Victor Kaptelinin, did a wonderful job of summarizing decades of research in educational psychology, cognitive science, and HCI...
Read More »

Information in the Age of ICT: the Guardian Newspaper 3 Little Pigs Ad

The 2012 Guardian newspaper ad really captures the flow of information in the age of ICT (Information Communication Technologies). The ad retells the story of the 3 little pigs, their houses, and the big bad wolf. It shows how...
Read More »

McGurk Effect — Synesthesia in Action

McGurk Effect is synesthesia in action. The sounds you hear depend on the visual information you’re getting through your senses! This is an amazing little video demonstration. Imagine if all your senses were so interconnected — perseptual information tangled...
Read More »

Special Preview: Disruptive Innovation

Special Preview: Disruptive Innovation

Interaction-Design.org The folks from Interaction-Design.org have just completed their newest chapter: “Disruptive Innovation” by Clayton M. Christensen. This chapter is an excerpt from Dr. Christensen’s 1997 book “The Innovator’s Dilemma: When New Technologies Cause Great Firms to Fail,” published...
Read More »

US Rio+2.0 Speed Geeking Session

US Rio+2.0 Speed Geeking Session

So I’ve learned a new word: Speed Geeking. It’s like speed dating but for geeks to quickly present their ideas to a small group. You have five minutes strict, and then move on to the next presenting geek. It...
Read More »

US Rio+2.0 Breakout Session on Environmental & Conservation Education

Below are the notes from the US Rio+2.0 conference hosted at Stanford last week. The notes are from the Education: Environment and Conservation breakout session. US Rio+2.0 Breakout Session Education: Environment and Conservation Attendees: Prof. Anthony D. Barnosky: Professor...
Read More »

Compensations and Accommodations

Compensations and Accommodations

Product design is a careful balance between building accommodations for different users and hoping users would compensate for aspects of design that are not well-suited to them. The power of good design is to know where this balance is...
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Pipsqueak Articles

Special Preview: Affective Computing

Some 25 years ago, I came up with tiny application: each day, a person...

Cultural Differences through Time

There’s been a shift in our culture (at least in US) towards seeing medication...

Coming Unzipped

Art or craft? Creativity or public nuisance? Sometimes, the line between these is so...