Design Thinking Digest

One of my favorite things: STM

I'm a bag snob. But in a dorky way. For me it's all about computer bags. I cherish nylon. Generally I've focused on Brenthaven and Tumi over the years and as I'm not in much more of a jeans and t-shirts culture (Jack Victor was sad when I left IBM). I've found that my computer bag tastes have changed too. My current favorite bag company is STM. I have the bag pictured to the right. It's a perfect laptop bag and and economical bag to boot.

If I weren't in technology (or rather when I get tired of it this would be my dream gig, making the cool crap to carry my cool crap.

Design Inspiration for my IxDA Talk

At the upcoming IxDA Interaction 08 conference in Savannah I'll be giving an abbreviated version of my classic design talk. I'll play spoiler here and say that much of what we think is pioneering today had it's roots and was even mastered far before most of us were here. In light of that of that I'll simply provide a link to this video that shows how much of our past is related to our present and our future in ways that are far more compatible than we think.

Special thanks to former colleague John Tolva, whose earlier post on his blog  served as inspiration.

Where there's smoke there's air: Thoughts on Super Tuesday

One of the challenges with media in general and the blogosphere in particular is the worship of celebrity and the great story. In fact, in user experience we always talk about the story and what a critical part of the experience that it. But none of this matters until you get the experience part right and getting the experience part right is all about execution.

When we hire someone to do something we typically want to see what they've done before, we look for evidence of the ability to execute.

What's interesting about Super Tuesday is that we've got some difficult choices to make, on the one hand we've got some candidates with great stories that resonate with a lot of folks, but if we poke deeper we see there's not a lot of evidence of execution or the ability to execute. On the the other side we see candidates with great experience but we just don't understand the story, or it's simply a story that's not very exciting. It's important to understand that it's important to have that experience and ability to execute nailed before a great story matters. We need to look no farther than the past eight years to see evidence of when our ambition and aspirations get ahead our abilities to actual deliver on a great story.

Chicago and the Olympics

Jason beat me to the punch on this but the quote he uses over at Signal Vs. Noise is exactly the one that popped in my head when I heard that Chicago would be the United States' nominee for the 2016 Olympics.

“Make no little plans. They have no magic to stir men’s blood and probably themselves will not be realized. Make big plans; aim high in hope and work, remembering that a noble, logical diagram once recorded will never die, but long after we are gone will be a living thing, asserting itself with ever-growing insistency. Remember that our sons and grandsons are going to do things that would stagger us. Let your watchword be order and your beacon beauty. Think big.”

-Daniel Burnham, Chicago architect. (1864-1912)

Chicago's pulled off similar feats of ingenuity in the past. I'm excited.

Chicago-based agency VSA partners in the creator of a nicely nuanced logo (Note the John Hancock outline in the torch.

Picture from VSA Partners. 

RIP Kurt Vonnegut

“Hello, babies. Welcome to Earth. It’s hot in the summer and cold in the winter. It’s round and wet and crowded. At the outside, babies, you’ve got about a hundred years here. There’s only one rule that I know of, babies — ‘God damn it, you’ve got to be kind.’ ”

From God Bless You, Mr Rosewater (1965)
by Kurt Vonnegut

I am shocked, shocked to find that Apple is polluting.

I know what you're thinking. Well of course Chris is going to jump on this. He's a paid corporate hack for Microsoft. But you're wrong, I'm in a contrarian mood today. First, for you unmotivated linkers, it points to an article in the Independent which notes that Apple has been rated among the worst of major electronics firms for environmental policies. The real story here isn't how bad Apple is or isn't but how myopic this view is in the first place. It's akin to having a discussion about a gang of murdering and pillaging pirates and figuring out who murders and pillages the most-does it matter? And I understand what Greenpeace is trying to do here by singling out Apple but I think it's akin to how we fight the war on drugs in the US. We presume that if we kill the source or the supplier that people will stop doing drugs neglecting the fact that many people WANT to.

The truth is that the high-tech industry and consumer electronics in general, along with our insatiable need to purchase this crap (I am guilty as charged) is just about uniformly evil. As John Thakara has noted more on one occasion the amount of raw materials that goes into a laptop (any laptop) is about 10,000 pounds of resources. How many computers have you owner over your lifetime? Here's a tip if you want to help the environment and reduce your footprint. Instead of saving up for the Prius stop buy a new laptop every two years. Ahh but you see this sucks, because technology and services are what make our little world go around right?

Sure there are some folks that are saying "Zero is the new black." (I'm surprised we  don't already have to give Seth a nickle overtime we say that, it's a clever tagline for what's starting to happen). But the reality is that most of us haven't wrapped our head around that. Does sloppy code have an environmental cost? It might if your or my bloated, crappy application requires more powerful and resource consuming infrastructure to run. Who would have thought that playing World of Warcraft or tooling around in Second Life would have an environmental cost too? We're measuring the wrong things today, I wonder how bumpy the ride is going to be for all of us as we come to grips with this.

I'm off for a week but I'm doing a Podcast

Those of you that look at the frequency of my blogging posts might suspect I go on a meth jag before I post and then I'm off recovering somewhere when I go a few days or a week without a post. I'll never tell. But truth be told it's time for a break. I'll be off with the family for the week. There will be no laptops, no email, no twitter. Go read a book while I'm gone.

I will however this Friday be joining my Microsoft peer Will Tshumy and friend Steve Portigal for a podcast that will be posted at Core77.com about my role as a User Experience Evangelist at Microsoft. We'll be drinking, we'll be talking. I'll post up a link to it when it's ready.

Note, there's been a change to this post to correct a typo made during late night posting and to correct the presumptions that I'm a luddite and have people print out my emails for me to read (I wish!). So instead of saying I'm doing a 'broadcast' I've changed the the title to correctly say 'podcast'.

Things that happen when you travel too much (Continued)

As I sit on a plane flying across the midwest I've  decided I'm not done with this topic (thanks to Windows Live Writer and a strong battery I can get my thoughts down while they are fresh). So, it continues...

• No matter where you go people drive crappier than they do in your home town. I'm from Chicago, everybody drives like they are in a funeral procession compared to how we drive in Chicago, if you see me and you're not from Chicago, get out of my way! You are going to slow. In fact, the only cities that really have it on Chicago are New York City and LA. I can hold my own in LA but even I don't drive in New York. (Bonus tip, never tell a cabbie in New York to step on it. They will think you mean business and scare the crap out of you.)
• If you're in the Southern parts of the country beware of rain and snow, both bring drivers to standstill. I don't get it.
• The barbeque is better in Memphis than in Austin (Sorry Austin!)
• The more clothes you pack for working out the less likely that you actually WILL workout.
• If you pack a jump rope and it has aluminum handles (like mine) and you wrap it up tight (like I did) it looks alot like two sticks of dynamite on the X-Ray machine at the airport. Don't do this.
• In Indianapolis? Go to Shapiro's. Get the Reuben.
• Travel is easier when you don't have to wear a monkey suit. Dressing like you're going on an expedition or camping is much more comfortable. A fleece and good travel clothes (like Officio) are your best friends. Be like Mister Rogers when you get ready for travel. Lose the tie, put on your favorite shoes, grab your fleece or sweater. Be comfortable. But, some clarity. Do not consider this an endorsement for tanktops for dudes, those are in the same categories as dickies and paisley. All women I know seem to have the chromosome that enables them to dress properly for travel--but pack and don't wear the capri pants on the plane please.
• Buy good (but not necessarily) expensive luggage that you can carry on a plane. Pack light, always carry on if you can. It makes your jaunts in and out of the airport more pleasant and less stuff brought means less stuff to pack and worry about on your way home. Ironically, liquid bans mean it's easier to carry on now than it ever was if you don't go nuts.
• Buy a cheap bag for when you need to check luggage, If your dropping over hundred bucks for it you're paying too much. It will get destroyed after you've checked it about 15 times or so anyway. But remember checking is for amateurs and international travel only.
• If you are of the ilk where you have to shave daily make sure to shave before you get your passport, I didn't and I look like a relative of someone that looks dangerous, it does me no favors at the airport.
• If you can't afford noise reducing headphones invest in a good set of earplugs, they can turn a miserable flight into a bearable one.
• It's too risky these days to do a sameday flight for a critical meeting, fly out the night before if it really matters for you to be there.
• If you can drive somewhere in four hours, it may be better to drive than fly if time and predictability is the primary concern.
• Navigation systems are your friend. Rent one or buy one if you have the means. Live Local and smart phone can save your bacon in a pinch, but don't be driving in front of me trying to punch in an address on your phone (see previous post on this).
• Do you really need to recline your seat all the way back on the airplane? You do not. Don't do it.
• A smaller computer that does a few things well travels much better than a big one that does everything. Bring an extra battery.
• There is a level of volume that humans engage in during the course of normal conversation, your 'phone' voice should be no louder.
• That Bluetooth earpiece, take the thing out of your ear when you're not using it. You're not at a Star Trek convention and you look ridiculous with it.
• Are you a superhero? Are you in law enforcement? If you answer no to either of these you shouldn't treat your belt as a utility belt. Put your phone in your pocket.
• Beer in Mexico and store bought beer in Colorado has (in general) a lower alcohol content than it does in most US states. Be aware.
• Drinking BEFORE you get on plane seems to get you drunker than if you have a drink on the plane. Why is this?
• Don't drink when you fly.
• See somebody from out of the country visiting? Be nice, you are an ambassador for the US, we have enough problems without having you add to our perception problems abroad (also see last bullet).
• Do you like music? Speed metal is good for masking out background noise and it also makes people hesitant to interrupt you. These are good things, you've got work to do.
• Turn around and look at what you're doing. Someone is trying to get by. Let them.
• You're in a public place, you're swearing too much. Oops is it me doing that? Sorry, I need to work on that. Do you?
• In a city where you can walk, get a hotel a few blocks away from where you'll be. Walk.

You're home finally. Do you have a significant other? Do you have kids? Good friends you haven't seen in awhile? Your exhausted, right?. You want a home cooked meal. Bullshit. Tell your family or friends the trip was terrible/boring/work and that you missed them greatly. Tell them to pile in the car because we are going OUT! Cherish and focus the time you have when you're home. We carry our work with us 24/7. Don't do this. Compartmentalize. Recharge. Focus on what's important to you.

Things that happen when you travel too much

Since by the end of March I will have had about 21 nights logged in on the road. Thankfully the last five of these will be when I'm skiing with my family. But funny things happen when you travel this much. To whit:

• I always forget what floor my hotel is on.
• I forget what color my rental car is.
• You learn which hotels you can 'trust' with wake up calls.
• It's better to sleep in a room where the curtains can be open so you don't wake up in a sensory deprivation chamber.
• Embassy Suites is not the 'best' hotel but it's the most predictable in terms of quality and consistency of experience.
• You don't really need a gym to get a decent workout when you're on the road, a book of core body exercises and a jump rope will keep you out of trouble (now I have completely no excuse for being the out of shape being that I am).
• If someone gives you silly putty and you play with it all day you'll get a blister on your thumb.
• A Whole Foods is a great substitute for a restuarant for dinner.
• If you don't have a fork to eat a salad in your room ice tongs will work in a pinch.
• You can use hair conditioner as a shaving aid if you run out of shaving cream.
• If you've got a smart phone you can use live local on your computer to beam driving directions to your phone that you forgot to print out. If you get to a site early you can then use it to find the nearest Starbucks.

New calling cards

So, I've been a fan of GapingVoid for so long that I finally needed to get off my butt and get my own blog cards for Design Thinking Digest. I debated going with the Blue Monster but decided on another design.

I'm hoping to see Hugh's panel at SxSW next week.

Please don't tell the wife what I spend on these. Totally worth it, though next time I'm springing for the matte finish.