To engage in a Design process requires a belief that the process will provide the answer. Testimony is not enough. One needs to experience it.
Category: Culture
When did software lose its softness?
Does software provide a way for anyone to customise the way they interact with the services and tools we make?
Somewhere between saviour and selfish
What do men gain by embracing gender equality? What do men lose by perpetuating historical views of masculinity?
Hybrid working isn’t a middle-ground
A hybrid model doesn’t mean less work, it means more. Even partially distributed teams means you need to understand and nail how distributed teams, properly.
The problem with being problem solvers
What happens when the default world view becomes one where there is a solution to every problem? Might there be another way?
Let’s innovate!
Are internal innovation labs putting the cart before the horse by focussing on the technology before the problem?
Software wants to disrupt everything but itself
The relationship between software and regulation is broken, but software is more likely to be able to fix it. It’s just… it doesn’t want to.
Faith in tech-knowledgey
Whether we know it or not, we all believe in something and many of us think that Technology will save us.
The deepening of intergenerational digital and social exclusion
The role of software designers in the deepening and widening of social exclusion.
The misleading connection between art and design
Why do most people still think there’s any sort of link between design and art?
Creating a culture of inclusivity in a society of pervasive masculinity
Why do we congratulate people using such violent words like kicking goals and killing it?
What am I supposed to do with privilege?
When one happens to be born as privileged as can be, how are we supposed to use that to eradicate privilege in the first place?
I don’t hate work like I should
This was first published on cogent.co Sometimes I feel bad about the fact that I like my job. I hear it all the time from my friends and from my family.“Work sucks! I hate my job! Urgh, I have to go back to work on Monday.” It’s pretty depressing to know that the people I… Continue reading I don’t hate work like I should
The grass is greener on the front lawn
English and French aristocratic values expressed in garden design are quite literally the incorrect application of a design solution for a context that’s not the right fit. We use resources like water in a place where water is becoming increasingly precious in order to maintain an ‘ideal’ that we’ve been trained to believe is the ‘right’ way.
We’re all writing our own story
Whilst I cannot speak for Tolstoy, Dickens or Bronte it’s clear to me that writing is about more than just the language or verse, it’s about more than hard work and endless hours of writing and re-writing – it’s about recognising that our own stories are important and interesting enough to tell.
Pleasure in waiting: A lesson from the seasons
If “patience” were an animal, the world would be up in arms. Sir David Attenborough would be called in for a special documentary to broaden awareness of its plight. The World Society for Protection Against Animals would be accosting people in the street asking for donations to fund an initiative on behalf of the species. Funds would be found in government departments to assist in trying to bring it back to life and no doubt, some sort of international committee would be formed to help spare us of its demise. No, it’s not a cute cuddly critter nor is it a starving African child. Patience however is becoming extinct and technology is the assassin.
Cue, Saturation, Blindess: How we consume the new
I deal with the Hue, Saturation and Brightness (HSB) colour system on a daily basis as a creative professional, forever trying to achieve the perfect balance of these elements in order to tell a story and communicate a message. I was quite surprised when I discovered then that humanity seems driven by a similar but much more powerful set of component parts – Cue, Saturation and Blindness. These three elements work together and bring about emotion and change as well as a lasting impact upon how we live our lives.
A rose by any other name
Design is bigger business than ever before. As businesses try to to get a grasp of the digital revolution, designers have found a gap in the market where design is no longer needed. Selling the idea of design and other simple, everyday concepts is a lot less effort and a lot more profitable, provided you’re a wordsmith and have the personality and the pie charts to back it up.
Well-read is well-fed
If reading is exercise for the brain then my brain is morbidly obese. The birth of a new year helps a lot of people focus on losing those few extra pounds that showed up in the mirror over the Christmas break. My problem hasn’t been the physical but the mental. I haven’t been looking at the world with the same set of eyes over the last 3 or 4 months and my ability to articulate my thoughts has been akin to an obese person trying to climb a flight of stairs.
The role of weight in luxury
Are we sacrificing our sense of ‘touch’ and ‘feel’ for convenience and portability or will touch just take on a different meaning now? Are we about to witness a revolution in making our multi-touch devices more tactile? The quilted back of the Kobo, the plethora of leather, wood and felt cases for all our current mobile devices, make it obvious to me that I’m not alone in wanting a more comforting digital experience. It’s clear that humans find comfort in tactile experiences, what interests me going forward in my professional life is how we’re going to address this need if our content is trapped within the confines of the 2D, gloss-coated LCD.
Journalism’s role in shaping the way that we think
When was the last time you left the front door of your home open and unlocked while you pottered about the house doing your weekend chores. Or when was the last time you let your children play in the street, eat mud pies or go out with their friends without a mobile phone? Have our largest online news sources unknowingly become propogators of societal fear, constantly reminding us of how dangerous today’s world is and how we can make ourselves safer by not catching public transport, putting up higher fences and wrapping our children in cotton wool? Is gen-y really the worst, most violent generation yet?