Photo credit: Gene Lu. Dot Dot Dot Lecture Series take place at the Galapagos Arts 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.”

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.”

Read the full article at Interactions.

All IxD10 videos and slides can be found here.

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.

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.”

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.

Read the full article at A List Apart

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.

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.

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.

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