Response: Don Norman and Tom Igoe

Don Norman’s entries covered the concept of design and how it difficult it truly is to make a design that balances out functionality and aesthetics– something covered in a different sense when I studied for my graphic design degree. I suppose design no matter where you go, follows some same rules and the like. Phones are still equally confusing as they were thirty years ago, just that now they’re smaller and more mobile.  He brings up the issue of psychology of user to effect design too, and interesting point to make things extremely clear to use, especially when the situation might mean the person is in distress. Something everyday you don’t think about, but really important. It reminds me of this open source app made for nonverbals with smartphones to project that they are overstimmed and cannot talk and provide a built in chat feature in lieu of sign language. It’s really barebones and not aesthetically pleasing but it does it job, and that’s fine. Perhaps someone on their team will pretty it up, or leave it as it is.

Tom Igoe’s entry was a nice show of what we can potentially make in class (and in our two years in general). The examples were good, but not particularly inspiring to me. Maybe I will find how to make one of those ideas mine, or maybe my inspiration will for something else. We shall see what the future holds!

(I apologize– this last week has been particularly difficult for me to retain information and trying to pick up what I can.)

Leave a Comment

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.