Blog
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Evolving the Glass House Conversations Online
March 17, 2010
Derek Chan, part of the Glass House team, recently stopped to talk with us about the team’s progress on the Glass House Conversations:
With the team going through the information architecture phase of the project, the revised direction we went with, which took elements from both earlier conceptual directions, “The Exchange” and “The Table”, became the students’ focus for a few weeks. As we delved more deeply in the architecture, we ensured throughout our process that the concept of the site remained easily recognizable, while also providing key structural elements that could help support it for returning and new visitors.
The team explored multiple rounds of wireframe designs and discussion. As the site evolved through this phase, we were also thinking of how the site would function on a day-to-day basis. We debated questions such as, how users would interact with our conversation model, what role past participants at the Glass House would have, and how technology would drive all of our proposed functionality in a scalable way. All of these questions and concerns were eventually rectified as we pointed at the essence of the site – what is a conversation, and what does it mean to have one? Ultimately, a lot of the complications faded as we thought about this some more, because as great as a lot of our ideas were, many seemed to have gotten in the way of just having a simple conversation.
Originally, we had taken “The Table” direction’s idea of hosting three conversations at once, each on a different timer. The big change was that we ended up simplifying things by just hosting one conversation at a time, (which was similar to “the Exchange’s” conversation model). The one question a week became our new core component to the website, and soon after, the design of all other pages fell into place to support it.
We explored different ways to experience a conversation. The simplicity of the one-conversation-a-week model afforded us to experiment with new methods of displaying that conversation. We ended up with three models: the free-form conversation, the debate model, and the video conversation. Each of these models had their own unique visual metaphor and functional elements, but with enough consistency amongst each other to remain true to the website concept.
The production of all subsequent sub-pages happened over the course of the next week after the decision was made to go with the one-conversation-a-week model. The team is in the Design phase, creating visual compositions of the Glass House Conversations site.
Wireframe sketch for a Glass House Conversation homepage, demonstrating an active and past conversations.
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Keeping Tabs on “The Tablet”
March 16, 2010
Photo credit: Gene Lu. Dot Dot Dot Lecture Series take place at the Galapagos Art Space.
With iPad’s first day pre-sales figuring at 120,000, it may not be surprising that last week’s Dot Dot Dot “The Tablet” was our most successful event yet. If you missed the talks by our wonderful panel of experts, stay tuned to the blog for a video recording of the event soon. Meanwhile, speakers Matt Jacobs and Alexis Lloyd have summarized key points from their talks, and if that weren’t enough to relive the night, they’ve also made their slides available.
Thanks to those who came, nerded out, and maybe even left with a book on user experience design from our gracious sponsor Rosenfeld Media. We hope to see you next month for “The Entrepreneurs.”
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Liz Danzico on Jazz, Improv, and Lessons Therein
March 5, 2010
In the latest issue of Interactions Magazine, Liz Danzico breaks down the value of improvisation for designers in an essay entitled “From Davis to David: Lessons from Improvisation.”
From its roots, to present day applications adopted by leaders in the arts, design, and online communities, to improv’s effect on the present day information consumer, Danzico points out that improv is, “in fact, a structure. As loose as its name suggests, its very constraints liberate participants. These constraints, and the potential freedom, are what make improv rich for designers to examine.”
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Interaction10 New York Redux
March 5, 2010
For those who missed Interaction10, including Chair Liz Danzico’s talk on improvisation and design, and faculty member Chris Fahey’s presentation on the human interface, the department will be hosting IxDA NYC’s Interaction10 Redux this Saturday. The event is sold out, but you can try the waitlist in case space opens up.
All IxD10 videos and slides can be found here.
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Student Apps Project Featured in GOOD Magazine
March 1, 2010
In her latest design column for GOOD Magazine, Alissa Walker shares the goods on an apps project students created for the Interaction Design Fundamentals class last semester. Initially inspired by the NYC BigApps competition, students developed different concepts using at least one source of data from the NYC.gov Data Mine.
Read the column for student concepts and insight from faculty Chris Fahey for the NYC BigApps project. Find out more about this assignment in our new projects page created by Katie Koch.
Clint Beharry created NY Loves U based on Richard Layard‘s Big Seven factors of happiness.
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Nicholas Felton Designs Department Business Cards
February 26, 2010
Data visualizer and summer faculty Nicholas Felton recently designed department business cards for students and staff. Like his infamous Feltron Annual Reports where order, through maps and graphs, emerges from the disorder of daily life, Felton’s play and assembly on the department identity by The Heads of State reaffirms a sense of unity through the chaotic.
The business cards have already been with students to Interaction10, and will be sure to make more cameos at conferences, events, and presentations to propel students forward. We want to extend our gratitude to the designer, and will be honored if we could end up as “just another statistic” in his next Annual Report for “kind deeds performed.”
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Liz Danzico Interviews Scott Berkun
February 24, 2010
In the latest issue of A List Apart, Chair Liz Danzico interviews Scott Berkun, author and fall semester guest lecturer of Confessions of a Public Speaker, on the fear of public speaking, and how to overcome it. Below is an excerpt:
Liz Danzico: Public speaking is thought of as one of the worst human fears, right up there with sickness, death, and fear of heights. What’s to be scared of?
Scott Berkun: The bar is very low for public speaking. It’s a tragedy here in 2010 that people still regularly fight to stay awake in meetings and conferences all over the world. Technology has not saved us from boring people. Or, perhaps more accurately, from interesting people who become boring when standing in front of a group.Part of the problem is people worry about the wrong things. They fear they’ll be laughed at or they’ll say something embarrassing, but as I explain in the book those things rarely happen. The most common mistake is not preparing wisely. Most speakers bore their audiences to death by rambling and stumbling through their lazy thinking, problems easy to avoid if you frame the challenges correctly, which was the goal of the book. It’s not that hard to speak well if you think about the challenges in the right way.
Liz Danzico: When you watch other people give talks, what’s your biggest pet peeve about others’ public speaking baggage?
Scott Berkun: I’m extremely sensitive to having my time wasted. If I feel I’d be better served reading their blog, or their book, I’ll get up and leave. If I feel the speaker hasn’t thought hard about their topic, and hasn’t practiced their material at least once, I will get up and leave. People who “ummm” every sentence, use jargon (or invent their own), cowardly hide behind complexity, talk about themselves and their accomplishments endlessly, or who seem to have no idea why the audience is there, also piss me off. Anyone who earnestly shows they care and has clearly put the effort in to be useful keeps my ass in my seat. The surprise is nearly everyone can do this, but few do. Again, the bar is really quite low. -
Live Layer Tennis: Vinh vs. Felton
February 18, 2010
Fall faculty Khoi Vinh, Design Director of NYTimes.com, will play against summer faculty Nicholas Felton of the Feltron Annual Reports in tomorrow’s Coudal Partners’ Layer Tennis match. Additional commentary will be provided by Adobe blogger John Nack.
Tune in to this live design exhibition tomorrow at 3PM/EST for 10 volleys worth of frenetic visuals made using video, animation, sound, photos, type and lots more.
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Student Project: Interaction Design Education
February 15, 2010
Sparked by a keynote speech by Kim Goodwin at Interaction 09 last year, students Derek Chan, Carmen Dukes, and Katie Koch recently embarked on a self-initiated project to bring a design education program to New York City schools starting in fall 2010.
In their latest stage of research and exploration, the team met with Katherine Schulten, editor of the Times Learning Network for some advice. Katherine recommended the team to begin their study in a K-12 classroom, and start by observing the teachers and how they engage students. She shared her own “secrets” of engagement including “hands-on” activities, as well as finding ways to make classroom materials relevant for students to connect on an emotional level.
To follow this project from development to implementation, visit the Interaction Design Education project blog. Find out more about the inspiration behind the initiative, and why it’s important for the design industry at Derek Chan’s blog.
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New SVA Summer Intensive Program: Impact! Design for Social Change
February 12, 2010
The new SVA program Impact! Design for Social Change launches with the help of Interaction Design student Colleen Miller, who designed its website. Co-founded by Steven Heller, Co-chair of MFA Design as Author and Mark Randall of Worldstudio, the program is a six-week summer intensive that will “introduce participants to a growing field of design for social advocacy.”
Impact! invites professionals, educators and students in the disciplines of graphic design, product design, information design, interactive design, fashion design, photography, and illustration to participate. Applications are being accepted now until April 31.
For more information, visit the Impact! website.
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Student Redux: Interaction 10
February 11, 2010
Through rain in Georgia and snow storm in Virginia (on the drive back), students have returned from three inspirational days of Interaction 10 to synthesize what they have learned from the industry’s best and brightest. Here’s what they remembered most about the conference and the city of Savannah:
What was your favorite session at the conference?
My favorite session was Ben Fullerton’s talk on Designing for Solitude. At the session Marc Rettig asked “We’re blazing into overconnectedness that was created by us. How do we protect the people who we affect with our design decisions? - Gene Lu
I loved Greg Vassalo’s talk, 10 Things I Learned About Being a Design Consultant While Living in the Hospital For a Year. The relationship he created between our family lives and our work drove home the value of empathy in interaction design. - Katie Koch
Jon Kolko enthusiastically and clearly explaining the pillars of IxD as they relate to social change, which brought together many of the concepts we have learned at SVA so far. - Colleen Miller
My favorite session was Richard Banks with his talk about how memories will be passed down through the generations and how that media will change over the course of time. - Evinn Quinn
Co-chairs of the conference Bill DeRouchey and Jennifer Bove introduce Interaction 10.
What was the most interesting idea you learned about at the conference?
Consumerism isn’t dead, but it needs to be so we can move on to a path that is innovative, sustainable, and profitable. (Nathan Shedroff) - Stephanie Aaron
That we should be designing our products to reflect human behavior, not mimic it. (Chris Fahey) - Derek Chan
Design something meaningful. - Angela Huang
Interaction design manifests itself in ways beyond websites. - John Finley
Thinking about designing objects not to be quickly turned over, or even just sustainably replaced, but to attempt to design for longevity — to make electronics that get better with time, not just more out-of-date. - Jeff Kirsch
Your work will change culture, so do work that is meaningful” (Jon Kolko) - Beatriz Vizcaino
What was the best thing you did in Savannah?
Arriving exhausted after 14 hours of driving and then heading to a ghost tour pub crawl with a hilarious tour guide was the best welcome to Savannah I could have hoped for. - Clint Beharry
Meeting a lot of amazing people who I plan on begging internships from in the near future. - Russ Maschmeyer
I had an amazing meal at Mrs. Wilkes’ Dining Room. I think I’ve finally had authentic southern food! - Eric St. Onge
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Interaction 10: Day Three
February 7, 2010
From mobile apps to the responsive city, Eric St. Onge recaps the final day with Day Three’s highlights.
The historic Trustees Theater at SCAD
I started on the third and final day of Interaction 10 with a presentation from Jeff Blaise, who talked about designing interfaces for mobile devices. He was able to use some of his experiences as a designer at Sapient to give some helpful advice on the process of designing and developing mobile apps.
After that, I went to see Peter Morville discuss the Future of Search. Peter recently published a new book called Search Patterns, and he used examples from his book to demonstrate some of the behavioral and design patterns that have appeared in user interfaces for searching. He also talked about how he thinks that we’re going to see more multisensory forms of searching in the future, including better visualizations for search, audio search, and image (and video) searching. He ended his talk by describing his idea that search should to act as a microscope, a telescope, and a kaleidoscope.
Next, I went to see Rob Nero demonstrate his TRKBRD project. In the process of developing an idea for his thesis project at Malmo University, he used Arduino to develop a trackpad that sits on top of his laptop’s keyboard: a “trackboard.” The project was a good reminder of the Physical Computing course I took last semester, but it was also fascinating to see the social effects of what can happen when you publish your work in progress. I look forward to seeing his thesis work on stacked input devices.
After a lunch break, I went to see Gretchen Anderson of Lunar talk about the importance of facial features when designing products. She demonstrated how the first things you notice about an object can strongly communicate what you think the potential of that object can be. You can design these “facial features” into products to create a good first (and continuing) impression.
Finally, the last keynote speaker of the conference was Dan Hill. Dan writes the blog City of Sound and works as a designer at Arup in Sydney, Australia. He spent much of his talk sharing some of the “civic-scale” visualizations he’s designed, which hope to move some of the private data about infrastructure and city usage out into the public. He showed many examples, including graphics showing water usage, wi-fi in libraries, public transit systems, and responsive architecture, among many others. I found the talk very inspiring for thinking about ways to make invisible data visible, and ways to improve the design for public spaces.
And that was the end of the conference. After three days of big ideas, fried chicken, and sweet tea, I was on my way back to New York, and on my way back to homework. After the amazing experience this year, I definitely hope to attend Interaction 11 next year in Boulder, Colorado.
Thanks to the students for covering the conference! We’ll see you again in Boulder.
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Interaction 10: Day Two
February 6, 2010
Sunshine, student competitions, sparks from Tom Igoe, and a stunning finish from Paola Antonelli, Evinn Quinn recaps Day Two’s highlights.
Today kicked off interaction 10 Day Two. There were even more things to do, and the weather cleared up. Today we started off with the opening keynote by Enzio Manzini, and then swiftly moved to Shelly Evenson. I was interested in the talk that she gave. I was preempted, by my cybernetics teacher Paul Pangaro, to observe her talk. She spoke about systems and the conversation, which is a very interesting and relevant concept that is involved with our studies.
Tom Igoe again sparked thoughts of interaction design through the use of physical computing. Speaking on intellectual property and how product manufacturing is a combination of multiple lines of intellectual property and how it is becoming dispensable. He views this as a problem, suggesting that because things are privatized and copyrighted, there is more development and waste of things that accomplish similar goals. He views this as a primary reason that the landfills are progressively getting bigger.
I was also very interested in the student competition. The students were to apply with a concept that was to be judge upon entry. The second phase of competition was to attend a design charette, which is a design competition, focused on a specific topic. The topic for this challenge was social networking. The students had 8 hours to come up with a concept. Social networking can mean many things.
In the context of these projects it could be as physical as a concert or as literal as this conference were attending. The content was great and the presentations were awesome. Followed by the presentations was the final speaker for the evening Paola Antonelli, curator for the Museum of Modern Art, in our very own New York City spoke about design and interactive art can communicate with us in various ways and the roles that designers play in that space. It was a good talk to end the evening. Now, on to the Microsoft-sponsored event!
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Interaction 10: Day One
February 5, 2010
Reporting live from rainy Savannah is one of thirteen MFA Interaction Design students attending the Interaction 10 conference. From a packed days of lectures to a rain-soaked walking tour of America’s first planned and designed city, Stephanie Aaron recaps the day’s highlights.
The historical Cotton Exchange building from the walking tour of Savannah
Nathan Shedroff kicked off the conference this morning with a challenge: innovate and create meaning. For him, meaning is the deepest connection one can make with the user, and all design is the process of evoking meaning. His key point for the future? Consumerism isn’t dead, but it needs to be so we can move on to a path that is innovative, sustainable, and profitable. Nathan left us with three key questions to ponder: What does a more sustainable world look like? What does a more meaningful world look like? What does a post-consumer world look like?
After Nathan’s talk I went to hear our own Liz Danzico speak on, and lead an experiment in improvisation. She also asked that we creating meaning in the products and services we design. Her talk, ranging from jazz to neuroscience, showed how frames can allow consumers to be co-creators.
Greg Vassallo launched the third talk of the day with a moving segment on lessons he learned while living in a hospital for a year and how he applied them to being a design consultant. His ten lessons include useful tips such as “lighten up,” “it’s okay to ask for help” and “treat the patient, not the illness,” which encourages all to step back and consider the big picture, to ask ourselves, “are we solving the right problem?”
The morning was capped with a rain-soaked walking tour of Savannah—America’s first planned and designed city. The city has not one center but 24 squares, each is a self contained unit consisting of all walks of society, from richest to poorest. The streets surrounding the squares have no traffic lights, and is a self regulated system. There are two overlapping grids, the back streets contain services such as electricity, telephone poles and sewage, etc. and the front streets are of homes, shops, and civic institutes.
Students will be covering the conference over the weekend. Check back for posts to come.
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The Awl: A Conversation with Paul Ford
February 4, 2010
In a recent interview with The Awl, associate editor of Harper’s Magazine Paul Ford talks about why he thinks paywalls are necessary, what he envisions for the Harper’s website, and what he would do with ten million dollars.
An ad promoting online subscriptions from the Harper’s Magazine website.
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Recently
- Evolving the Glass House Conversations Online
- Keeping Tabs on “The Tablet”
- Liz Danzico on Jazz, Improv, and Lessons Therein
- Interaction10 New York Redux
- Student Apps Project Featured in GOOD Magazine
- Nicholas Felton Designs Department Business Cards
- Liz Danzico Interviews Scott Berkun
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