Monday, May 5, 2003

More UX discussion Peter Merholz talks about what user experience is and how it's made. Peter also points to Ramana Rao's newsletter, where I found a recent discussion on flow, as defined and expanded upon by psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. A friend recommended the original Flow to me about ten years ago. The concepts took root, and I've been watching for signs of flow in my life ever since. Sometimes it's there, mostly it's not. Wondering how to pronounce Csikszentmihalyi? According to the author himself, it's "chick-sent-me-high." No kidding. 9:44:46 PM    Questions? Comments? Flames? []

Speaking of birthdays I see that nearly everyone is noting their blog's birthday recently. Well, this one started a year ago Saturday, right here. Ah, how much has changed! 1:23:55 PM    Questions? Comments? Flames? []

Gordon suggests a new universal symbol suggesting users read the manual--check out his nifty graphic: Warning! Read the manual!. The VST Zip drive comes with an interesting new warning symbol -- "please read the manual." I think we need an international agreement on how to represent this plea. [Usable Help] 11:53:47 AM    Questions? Comments? Flames? []

From Fast Company, and one of my favorite columnists, some discussion of why instant answers (and instant gratification?) make bad business practice: Slowly I Turned... The Problem With Gradual.  [Fast Company] 11:43:53 AM    Questions? Comments? Flames? []

Bumpage? Louis Rosenfeld, the information architecture guy (think polar bear book) points to both STC and DUX in his commentary on the meaning of "user experience." UX Bumpage. User experience (UX) is too young to be clearly defined as a field, a movement, a community, a methodology, or a goal. But whatever it is, there is definitely a there there. For example, Dennis Schleicher, with a background in ethnography, just sent an email to me, with a background in librarianship, about a presentation on UX made at the Society for Technical Communication's annual conference by Lee Anne Kowalski, who I'm guessing has a background in technical writing. In... [Bloug] As handy as it would be to have a definition for user experience, I'm more interested in exploring the various disciplines involved, and how they intersect and overlap, than in erecting boundaries. Let's make our definitions inclusive, not exclusive. We have too much in common to squabble over titles and definitions; granted, Louis talks about identifying methodologies more than writing definitions. 11:39:18 AM    Questions? Comments? Flames? []

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