Out of these standards of evaluation, I currently lean towards the product-oriented view. I would like an ergonomically designed device that works well when considered as a designed object, and as a commercial product.
Of these criteria, those which I feel are most important to my product are learnability, efficiency, satisfaction, flexibility, and user in control. I would like to think that "system transparent and predictable" will nearly be a given with the kind of structural design that I'm shooting for. Maybe memorability is important too, depending on how I interpret it (literal memorability of the product... or memorability of functions of the product?).
-"effectiveness, efficiency, and satisfaction" replaced by new factors (of user experience/pleasure):
-example of Japanese (or Asian?) fetishisation of cuteness (Sanrio, etc.)
"cultural, historical, or social amnesia"
-anime cited (along with Sanrio type stuff)... can be used as an indicator/representation of Japanese culture by outsiders (at the expense of what it is that actually constitutes Japanese culture)
(what does this have to do with cuteness though? It seem to be far more related to a simple issue of stereotyping unrelated to cuteness itself... one could just as easily come up with non-cute negative stereotypes of other countries based an unrepresentative sliver of culture)
"reinforcement of negative gender roles"
cuteness can "smother dissent or edginess," ..."create a bland consistency, with a loss of true diversity" etc.
Disney World example (bland consistency of the Epcot thing with the different countries
...All of this and then:
"We might consider the sme cautions for cuteness in user-interface design"
...a vague statement to tie everything together
The Reasoning:
Cuteness in design can distract from "considering more challenging, weighty, and urgent matters"
(which leads me to wonder what kind of design this guy's thinking of that would necessitate the delicate treatment of "challenging, weighty, and urgent matters" in the first place (he's still talking about interface/product design, right?)
This attitude seems kind of indicative of the (arrogant?) idea that designers bear the great weight of the world on their shoulders. Honestly you get a lot of that kind of talk from a lot of designers, but that's about all.
My Reasoning:
Cuteness in design lends itself to a much less permenantly appealing aesthetic. A measure of visual restraint tends to be more reqarding in the long run, in preactical terms for the user/viewer.
A less cute design will also tend to give the designed object more weight and perhaps even respect. That said, there is a place for objects that are treated lightly and with little respect (cute objects), but perhaps that need is not as widespread as some designers would believe.
2/10/02
Artist's Statement: Scott Snibbe
(http://www.snibbe.com/scott/statement.html)
This particular artist's statement follows the following structure:
1. Philisophical positioning of work. In the particular instance, Scott Snibbe bases his work on a basic principle of Buddhism, on which he briefly elaborates as an interdependence between distinctly separate components (on a large or small scale).
2. A brief (and vague) description of the general principles behind his work. He declares that "bodily interaction" is a primary method he uses in portraying interdependence and that, furthermore, interaction is often encouraged between people in his work.
3. In the third paragraph, the basic concept of the first, and the functional desctiption of the second are unified thematically a bit more. Snibbe explains that he views human beings as the afforementioned "separate components" that function well in a system of interdependence. This, naturally, is why his work encourages communication and interaction between people.
4. Next, Scott Snibbe outlines the rhetorical purpose of his work, declaring that it "critiques a precept of the scientific rationalist tradition - that humans can exert unbounded control over their environment and other beings," believing instead that such control is not possible; that participants in a system are just that: participants.
5. For the next few paragraphs Scott Snibbe outlines some of the general principles behind the composition of his works, and continues to relate them to his greater purpose. The works are meant to be experienced on an intuitive level, rather thanan intellectual or rational one. A timeline (or more importantly changes in the timeline) are essential to the works. Perhaps more vague is the description that relates his work as giving "instantaneous and predictable reactions to actions that are felt viscerally," adding "the immediate rewards of these situations often evoke pleasure and delight in viewers, yet simultaneously induce an understanding of the deeper meaning and a sense of the conceptual motivation behind the work."
6. The concluding paragraph merely recognizes influences (Len Lye, Oskar Fischinger, Hans Richter, Moholy-Nagy, Robert Irwin, and James Turrell), some of whom worked in film, others in environmental art. The mystifying term "phenomenology" is introduced again.
I will look up this word now.
And this is the result: http://www.phenomenologycenter.org/phenom.htm
I should note that after all of the descpritions of the priciples and philisophical underpinings of Scott Snibbe's work, I would have no clue of what his work might be like without seeing it.
1/27/02
After browsing through my bookmarks for well-designed and highly interactive websites I had become frustrated with what seemed to be, for the most part, a large number of sites either seriously overdosing on Flash-usage or seriously looking unattractive. I remembered that I had an issue of Print Magazine lying around with a feature on interactive design, so I decided to take a look.
Hopefully it doesn't come across as a shortcut (trust me I looked elsewhere), but the site that I liked the most for its incorporation of Flash is www.lotfortynine.com, designed by Aki Nagayama, based in San Francisco.
The site avoids most of the typical visual overload that comes with most flash sites and acually, for once, incorporates a very fine sense of design (especially color). The simplicity of the layout is in fact partially indebted to the use of Flash, enabling the designer to tuck away menus when unused, freeing up a lot of space and reducing clutter.
Honorable Mention goes to the archived version of contentfree, a site with quite a bit of visual elegance.
1/12/02
The following are simple comments that I scrawled out on a paper as I read. They probably seemed somehow apt at the time, but they might not translate quite so well once transcribed (I've included excessive commas etc.).
buzzword onslaught
information less localized/no longerdictated much by geography
initial point [about info. distribution] repeated ad infinitum:
geographical boundaries are increasingly less important to the way that information is exchanged (more centralized sources with more universal access)
place of the internet:
Two views, each extreme
utopian (global community)
"dystopian" (exageration) (many media in few hands)
the cultural imperialism thing should be qualified - describes effect, but, I think, not motivation (market driven)
Cuba example aside, that is
the result though is pretty indisputable, I'd say.
the presence of company logos etc. really does emphasize economic power of U.S. all over
I'm on p. 336 now and I've seen some interesting pieces of information... some new, others familiar - does this get tied together? is this going somewhere?
so far pretty standard ruminations, just with better citation
the history of the internet is interesting, but not particularly new.
it's somewhat nice to see the various stories/observations about usenet and online comunities combined, but I don't think it necessarily provides a whole lot of new insight
Reaction
Much of the information does seem to be relevant and related. The general picture of the importance of media (text-based, visual, etc.) in the world is pretty clearly illustrated, and although there is perhaps no grand theme or thesis, the information points to two opposing views of media technology, one positive and one negative. I'd like to think that I'm pragmatic enough to recognize that most technologies have their benefits as well as their shortcomings. There is probably a little bit of truth to the "global village" theory (although the phrase has become rather trite), just as there is also cerainly truth to the idea that corporate interests in controlling media are detrimental.
Since much of the information is factual, I don't find much to disagree with. No issue is presented as completely one sided. Some of the phrases thrown around come off as buzzwords, but I'm not sure if that's the author's fault or whether they've just become overused out of context.
Further "Research"
Since it contradicted my idea that the global flow of information is not actually directly engineered as propaghanda, the anecdote about T.V. Marti caught my interest. After searching on Google, I encountered an article (poorly) written in favor of the station as a propaghanda machine capable of overthrowing Castro. What I found interesting about the article was the description of, first of all, the station as a weapon and, secondly, the description of the methods of "counter-attack" used by Castro.
I couldn't help but notice how perfectly the situation modeled a kind of "media warfare," right down to Castro's arsenal of anti-Marti Broadcasting stations. One might as well substitute "B-52's" for T.V. Marti "anti-aircraft guns" for Castro's stations (some of which were donated from the Soviet Union, it would seem).
...All of which is of course perfect fodder for someone making the post-colonialist argument about cultural imperialism.
http://www.amigospais-guaracabuya.org/oagmc133.html
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