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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Design for Emotion, for Empowerment

November 3, 2011
Aimee Mullins legs collection

I use a cane to get around, a consequence of an unfortunate encounter with a taxi many years ago. I have many different canes (each heel size, for example, requires its own cane). All are cool. Some have animal carvings, some have silver, some have gold, some are complex in design, some are very Deco in style, and one has a sword (another a compass and a secret compartment). I get stopped on the street all the time — people love my canes and always comment. I was even told once that my limp is sexy — whatever… What I don’t have is an “old woman” cane — the kind you buy at a pharmacy. I’m just not that...
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Explaining SEO to Clients

October 31, 2011

I’ve been in meetings where SEO was thrown around like some magic power word — feel like you need to make your arguments stronger? Just say the word! So it’s good that Google made a nice, unthreatening video (note the pink tee-shirt) explaining its position on SEO — “It’s not spam!” — (good to know), that can be shown to clients. Google’s authority on this matter helps alleviate some of the clients’ fears and makes developers’ job a bit easier… Enjoy:
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Intel i5 Core Commercial: When a company just doesn’t get it

October 26, 2011

Sometimes, a company just doesn’t get it: it’s not about what a product can theoretically do, but what it can do for the user. Intel has a history of making a particular type of commercials — “the power inside” commercials, I call them. Intel marketing people use the following mental model: people/men like muscle cars; people like powerful things; thus if we emphasize the power “on the inside” people would like our computers. And so their current commercials for Intel i5 Core look like this: So what’s wrong with this? It’s all about them, it’s not about me. I don’t care what’s inside the machine, I care what it can do for me. Or, more accurately, what I can...
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Socially Constructed Beliefs

October 19, 2011
Socially Constructed Beliefs

American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) came out with a strong recommendation against the use of bumpers in cribs. The September 2007 issue of The Journal of Pediatrics examined deaths and injuries attributed to infant crib bumper pads: “Twenty-seven accidental deaths reported by medical examiners or coroners were attributed to bumper pads. The mechanism of death included suffocation and strangulation by bumper ties. Twenty-five nonfatal injuries were identified, and most consisted of minor contusions. All retail bumpers had hazardous properties.” AAP has finally announced that it is formally against bumpers. That certainly took a while. And, amazingly, the bumper pads are still for sale by all major baby room outfitters, and parents are still buying them and using them with...
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Passionate Interface: Siri Inspires Love

October 18, 2011

You know your product is succeeding with its users when, within days of its launch, they write love songs to your work. Check out this love ode to Siri, Apples latest interface update.
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Rewired Brain

October 15, 2011
Rewired Brain

Our kids have grown up in the world where computers were always present and always on. They can’t conceive of a time when they can be cut off from the Internet (vacations in the Internet-dead zones are definite no go). Our kids are the generation of fully-connected always-on Internet users. What about the kids that are born right now? Not the Millennials, as they are being called, but these babies born in the age of the iPad? The iTouch Babies? How are their brains being rewired from the experience of having the iPad as their first toy? Check out this video of a baby girl growing in the iTouch World.
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Innovation 2.0

October 9, 2011
Coca Cola Ad 5 cents from 1900

In my book on product design, Interfaces.com, I talk about a shift from evolutionary product design to the current model of version numbering. There has been a murmur of disappointment this last week when Apple issued iPhone 4S instead of the expected iPhone 5. The new features of iPhone 4S are exciting, new, and unexpected (think Siri). So what’s the problem? Is it really that the version number is too low for our expectations? In the days of yore, no one has ever heard of version numbers. What hammer do you own? Is it version 1.0 or 5.0? Do you care? We have many different types of hammers in our garage, but we don’t think of them in terms...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...
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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...