I feel stupid for not looking into this Jakob Nielsen character before I was told to look into him. It should have occurred to me to wonder "who is this guy, anyway?" But I didn't, and that's just another sad example of my complacency and (somewhat) blind faith in my instructors. I trusted that June had a good reason to get us to read about Nielsen.
Now that I've done a little research, I'm still a little puzzled. Although he was one of the first experts on human-computer interaction (ie useability), he certainly isn't the last. This website certainly has some interesting things to say about the possibe outdatedness of Nielsen. The author of this website certainly wants to discredit Nielsen, and I think that he has some interesting things to say. He certainly has a point when he says that "Nielsen's personal website defiantly retains its 1997 look and feel." Nielsen apparently has defended himself by saying that he isn't a "designer". Um, no kidding.
But that brings up an interesting point (which is also discussed on the Demystifying Useability website): why doesn't Nielsen focus on designing a useable and beautiful website. Surely the two qualities are exclusive; surely they could be combined effectively.
However, he'd be a little late, this website, Design Observer, seems to handle this quiet nicely. It's not perfect. The homepage is awfully long. But I believe that there are enough breaks throughout the homepage that it doesn't get to be too much. There are always interesting articles and discussions about design on this website.
____________
Now about Crawford Killian: It's amazing how much of his advice has been taught to us in other classes (but at greater length and complexity). The concept of exformation is incredibly close to the concepts of background information and knowledge structures that we learned in Diana Wegner's classes. It's a risky concept in that you have to assume, correctly, how much knowledge your audience already possesses AND you have to assume, correctly, what bits of information will trigger that background knowledge. But this point reinforces the underlying message: know your audience. It's a difficult thing, but it is important.
Speaking of difficult and important...here's a photo of my dog in the snow.
Now that I've done a little research, I'm still a little puzzled. Although he was one of the first experts on human-computer interaction (ie useability), he certainly isn't the last. This website certainly has some interesting things to say about the possibe outdatedness of Nielsen. The author of this website certainly wants to discredit Nielsen, and I think that he has some interesting things to say. He certainly has a point when he says that "Nielsen's personal website defiantly retains its 1997 look and feel." Nielsen apparently has defended himself by saying that he isn't a "designer". Um, no kidding.
But that brings up an interesting point (which is also discussed on the Demystifying Useability website): why doesn't Nielsen focus on designing a useable and beautiful website. Surely the two qualities are exclusive; surely they could be combined effectively.
However, he'd be a little late, this website, Design Observer, seems to handle this quiet nicely. It's not perfect. The homepage is awfully long. But I believe that there are enough breaks throughout the homepage that it doesn't get to be too much. There are always interesting articles and discussions about design on this website.
____________
Now about Crawford Killian: It's amazing how much of his advice has been taught to us in other classes (but at greater length and complexity). The concept of exformation is incredibly close to the concepts of background information and knowledge structures that we learned in Diana Wegner's classes. It's a risky concept in that you have to assume, correctly, how much knowledge your audience already possesses AND you have to assume, correctly, what bits of information will trigger that background knowledge. But this point reinforces the underlying message: know your audience. It's a difficult thing, but it is important.
Speaking of difficult and important...here's a photo of my dog in the snow.
2 comments:
Hi.
You couldn't post this in your normal blog?
What makes you so special?
I never check this blog for comments. I don't know why I chose to do them separate...maybe it's an ego thing.
Post a Comment