Read

A brilliant set of case studies from The Human Half. Andy Whitlock

I’ve been thinking for a while that case studies should offer more value to readers than soft fluffy marketing pieces (ideally, even honestly exploring the challenges and things that went wrong and were learned from). This set is the kind of thing I’m thinking. Great to see Andy actually doing. Inspiring stuff. Get to it, Mathew! 

Tim Urban: Why I Brought My Toddler to Watch SpaceX’s Flying Skyscraper

“What I have is a little two-foot-tall, 19-month-old gnome. Many times over the course of the weekend journey, I asked myself the same question. Why did I decide to bring a toddler with me?”. A lovely piece by the ever positive Tim Urban. Forget the negative figure at SpaceX, and think bigger, like Tim “…the reason rocket launches make people emotional [is] the feeling of swelling pride that comes from being in awe of your own species.

I should probably look back and think about what I’ve learnt so far. Alex DS

Always good to read honest reflections after a years work, or spent in any situation. I like “Working with a hybrid team slows everything down because it slows down how you build trust.” Not heard that perspective on that challenge before. And I respect, “Be good at having the conversations no one wants to have.” That’s a particularly hard part of leadership. 

“UX is a joke, and it’s inexcusable”

A bit meta. Or just indulgent to include myself in my own link. But I was very pleased that Rob asked to republish this piece on the newly relaunched Design Week. 

Four Takeaways: The DBA’s Design Effect event. Design Week

Some great takeaways in this round up, but not a single thing I’ve not heard before or arrive at thinking myself many times before. ‘1. Designers can, and must, shape the future’ – Yup, we’ve all been preaching that forever (so we should be need to changing the signal of how we broadcast this). ‘2. Think and talk like a client’ – This one is age old. The idea that we need to talk and sell to clients in their language is the only way commercial design can happen, but most designers really do lack ‘business nous’ (so we need to address design education and add business modules and stop turning our nose up at teaching vocational skills). ‘3. Design teams need to change the way they are seen internally’ – As above, young designers need to under stand this need (so as above, we need to get more strategic thinking into the origin story of design education). ‘4. Should designers be thinking bigger?’ – Yes. As per point 1, most designers do already think big, but without understanding the bigger economic systems and needs in the world, all we’re doing is hoping that nice creative thinking will solve everything (so again, let’s review design education and start empowering designers with the real world skills they need to make more opportunities for themselves). Given all my thoughts, it’s exciting then to read of Vuokko Aro, VP of design at Monzo, and her active strategy for “helping frame business problems as design problems.” Wonder what that looks like as a consistent and sustainable practice within the Monzo design team? 

You know what I DON’T need? Your message suggesting every 2 mins that I use the website or app instead. Helen Barnard

Who could possibly disagree with this exclamation/prayer to banks to not constantly tell us to download their app while we’re on hold? No one. Another case of a highly experienced issue that seems to escape so many services. Evidence of the still mostly disconnected nature of digital content and UCD strategy across web, app, and phone teams. 

Government is not an app, or a website, or a chatbot. Richard Rope

This follows on well from the above two reads. Saying good things, but nothing that a lot of people haven’t been saying for years already (albeit, clearly, ineffectively). For me, there’s also a missing point (that’s maybe implied), about needing to address the way we ourselves act – as designers – in selling this aim of connected experiences. Which leads me back to actively educating designers and teams about the how, rather than just hoping posts like this passively permeate the mindset of our industry. 

[A very basic tact that I encourage designers to employ in this area, is to try not to use the words website or app or chatbot etc. when thinking and talking about solutions, because it’s mostly just another language game. As soon as you raise the names of the platforms, everyone applies their focus to them and away from the user need. This worked particularly well with clients also – asking for websites. “Forget ‘the website’ for while, as there might be something better we can use. Let’s just think about what we want to happen]. 

Watch 

Why the dyslexic brain is misunderstood. Vox

Rewatching this one which I enjoyed finding last year. Thought I had already linked to it, but no. I ended up re-watching as I remembered this video containing more sources to references than any of the articles I can easily find in which people extol the ‘gift of dyslexia’ alongside a list of superpowers. It’s part of my wider researching into cognition and teaching methods, but also a personal quest as a dyslexic, wanting some harder evidence about it than I’ve learnt via anecdote and legend. 

The Biggest Myth In Education. Veritasium

Spoiler: That people have a single and specific learning style. We’re either a visual learner, an aural learner, a reading/writing learner, or kinesthetic learner (VARK). Except we’re not. We’re a mix of all four. Rewatching this for references to read more into also, as related to the above Vox video. 

What if Earth grew 1cm every second? xkcd’s What If?

Always brilliant. It never ceases to amaze me how real science can be more fascinating and feel more imaginative than what we see imagined in some science fiction. Space lasers destroying planets. Pfft! So basic. 

The Legend of Ochi | Official Trailer HD | A24

This looks really promising. Hope it’s a family friendly film and doesn’t have some crazy scary ending or twist as I would expect from A24. It has slightly 80s feels of Gremlins, ET and The Goonies.

Look 

Hey

I remember seeing this years ago and loving it, so looked it up again. Same goes for Everything is Connected by Peter Liversidge. There’s just something about big signs like these, mounted on metal scaffold, and totally out of place, that really makes me smile. Would love one in my garden. Or deep in a woodland. Don’t know why. Just would. 

Reclaim The High Street – Sign Language

Love this collection of photos (art, pieces, provocations, disruptions?). Shared kindly with me after I posted about a sign I saw in Dalson in 2014 by Mobstr. Adds to my thoughts about signage and how often we don’t even see it when it’s screaming in our faces. Maybe constant surprise and ‘change’ is the only way to ‘keep’ attention. To catch attention as we say. It’s not, to tire attention, is it! 😅 

Listen 

Is Screen Time as Poisonous as We Think? Freakonomics 

A worth while listen as a parent with increasing worries about screen time. And as ever with the people at Freakonomics (who I’m aware a lot of people are really not fond of) have had a go at investigating both sides of a theory and not just running with what we all feel is surely(!), surely(?) an obvious case of what’s causing teens to feel so bad these days. Something quickly covered that I was also pleased to hear discussed, is acknowledging how inconsistent, unspecific and unhelpful our conversation is around this matter: When you say ‘screen time’ do you mean all screen time? TV, YouTune, Games, social media, chat, photo or video editing, animation? And for me, when you say social media even, do you mean one to one chat, group chats, image feeds, video feeds, YouTube comments, stream comments? As ever, we need to be more connected on our definitions if we’re to investigate this, let alone fix any issues we feel might be related. 

In Praise of Maintenance (Update). Freakonomics

Yes, yet more Freakonomics! I’m catching up on a lot of missed episodes (while catching up on a lot of missed chores). I remember relating to this episode in 2016, and I’ve recommend it loads over the years, so pleased to see it updated a bit. Loads much to provoke thought in here. And particularly interesting to revisit after engaging even more with the Ends book and the related Endineering course that I recently completed. Maintenance is essentially about prolonging the end, and seems as neglected a subject as designing for endings. Prolonging the end. 

Brilliantly Boring. 99% Invisible

A good episode of a firm old favourite podcast. Worth it alone for the reiteration of why it’s called 99pi, and the revisit for me to the beauty of Japanese manhole covers that I first learnt about in 2013 via Kottke, then learnt even more about in 2023 (kottke.org is just one of the best websites ever). This episode also ties in well to ‘In Praise of Maintenance’ above, and to the idea of endings. Specifically I this line toward the end that made me take a metaphorical pause…

Even though concrete has the illusion of permanence, it’s not that way at all

‘The illusion of permanence.’ That’s such a big problem with how we see all design. Or rather, how we don’t see it, and instead just imagine and get fooled by it. In reality, most things are boring, then they slowly crumble, even when we struggle to maintain them, and they end. That might feel like a downer to end this post on, but as the title says, I think it’s interesting. Finding ways to continue to tackle, address, and acknowledge it all.