ITPeed

Spiral

Mar 192012

Okay so my idea was sort stepping away from text parsing entirely. If I keep it it will only be kept as something minimal. Instead I’m thinking of creating a game-like experience that walks people through my thesis process.

I think my thesis process is just a fitting example for the whole…struggle –> failures –> growth-chain that I have been fixated on illustrating by linking journal entries. And as I was counting the number of changes I made to my thesis (6 or 7), I realized that even though each of them felt like total separate useless failures, I do think there is something I learned from each of them. Yeah, it was not efficient, but I think it was kind of just my struggle with thesis. And now the pieces are finally coming together under this new form.

I think the main goals of this idea is to:
a). make that direct parallel btwn an adventure game and life struggles cuz it helps me make that choice to see the process as an adventure vs. being a victim of circumstances.
b) it’s also still a reflective process in itself (this has been the only consistent thing between all the past thesis ideas)
c) illustrate how all the dead ends and failures are not useless, they all build you up to your final obstacle. And in some cases, the harder i crashed the more i learned.
d) I would also like to include other people in the story too, but keeping it minimal

But overall the experience should feel like a story being told in a game-like way. (An interactive story-game?)

And see it as more of a side scroller game where you are slowly working your way up a spiral staircase. I got this idea from Andi originally:

“Sometimes it feels like you’ve come full circle, but then you’re slightly offset and that would make it a helix!”

At the bottom where you start is sort of where I start with the question. And at the top is “judgement day”/presentations. There were definitely some inspirations drawn from Dante’s Inferno.

The user would probably have more of a side-scroller view with a simple point-and-click kind of interface.

This was inspired by the game Odin Sphere. I’d like each “floor” the player experiences to feel very similar. Furniture will stay the same on each floor, people will repeat, but SLIGHT changes will be made to the environment (eg. brightness, furniture moving, conversations changing)

I like the idea that most of what I go through feels the same again and again, but in fact when I look back, they were all kind of necessary to get to the end point.

The general point of the experience is more exploratory and puzzle based. The focus will be more on the lose abstractions of the thesis process and the decisions/actions the characters makes, though I think for the most part there will be a fairly linear plot.

My next steps is to hash out the details: making that parallel between the thesis process and an epic journey clearer. Also to figure out details of the plot and storyboard/wireframe the experience with greater detail.
I also don’t want it to be entirely obvious how each loss leads to a gain in the end because I want the user to experience everything falling into place bit by bit, especially at the last one. But maybe that is okay too as the point of it being a game is to encourage resilience to loss.

I am concerned that I won’t find a good enough balance for the comparison I am trying to draw.
I’m also worried that I can’t deliver a strong feeling of growth, but I think if I keep the experience true to my experience, it will come closer to it than I think.

Stand Up

DIY Health No Responses »

Dec 152011

Posture Project

DIY Health No Responses »

Nov 292011

Since the last edition, I kind of aimed to actually prototype the final, but now I’ve decided to build out the concept instead and keep it non-functional. And even more recently, I’ve decided to move my focus from exclusively posture to focus on body language.

Background:

Much of our daily conversations happen in a non-verbal form of communication and is a good indicator of our unspoken emotions. Whether we are feeling happy or sad, our bodies exhibit it whether we mean to or not. And if there is such a strong tie between our emotions and physical being, could we invoke more specific emotions by putting ourselves into specific postures?

Idea:

We smile when we are happy, and when we force a smile, we feel also happier. This is the philosophy I want to explore with postures– using postures to understand and improve one’s psychological states (and physical states as well). But how do we know what postures will elicit what emotions when body language is fairly unique between different cultures and different individuals?

I think the first step of this project is bringing awareness to an individuals body language. What shape does their body assume when they are focused and engaged in class? How does nervousness translate on the body during an interview?

Tracking:

By attaching accelerometers on the body and syncing the dynamically visualized data onto a portable device, such as a smartphone, one can track with, ideally 2D and 3D visualizations, what patterns their bodies exhibit throughout the day. By syncing their data with their daily Calendars can also give them a better idea of which postures belonged to what activity. After collecting data for a period of time, one should be able to spot abnormalities or differences in posture.

and Changing:

Having this data, one can look back on which days they felt more positive, and see if there is a difference in their body language and posture. After being able to identify different posture values, they can try mimicking the ‘good postures’ to try to bring about more positive emotions. For example, if a student is feeling tired from lack of sleep her posture might be a little more slumped than usual. Being able to manually at will or when a change or abnormality is detected by help draw smarter correlations between posture and mood. Next time the student is feeling tired, her phone can alert her to sit in an position that she doesn’t typically doze in. At the very least it will bring extra attention to her physical state after a night of little sleep.

Applications:

I think this device could be used to track many kinds of body language. It could be used for physical training for activities like Yoga or Physical Therapy. It could monitor your sleep postures or it could be used in social situations for individuals to manage their body language during social events or interviews. It can be used to provide information about posture alone, or it can be used to provide information about your moods.

Next steps:

With these systems in place, it wouldn’t be absurd to assume one could upload their data. For example, if someone has mastered the perfect golf swing, maybe an amateur golfer could download their physical data and train themselves to perfect that swing. And dancers could practice dance moves without the choreographer.

Considerations:

My biggest doubts lie in whether or not very specific and ranged postures could really greatly enhance mood. Or if the awareness alone is enough to make an individual want to change. It would increase the ability for an individual, but not necessarily motivation. The motivation has to already exist.

If some vibration feedback was built in, perhaps it would help a little, but I’d like to think people would be more fascinated to be aware of the language their bodies exhibit and try to harness that power without too many bells and whistles.

——————- slightly older idea. storyboard may still follow this flow—————————

The general storyboard will follow this order:

Intro

Goals: Probably just a quick text saying something along the lines of “increasing posture/body language awareness and adjusting one’s posture”

Benefits of Posture awareness: Diagrams and text (maybe demo)

Project

What is it?: Brief description of what the object is with images and alignment on body and how it is used and what else is required

How does the project work?: Quick break down of the technology and how it functions

Demonstration

Fred example: An in class/working example

Ji Hyun exaple: A social example or a sports example

A list of further uses: eg. customizing data, uploading, downloading

I’m currently between simply filming and directing or going with some kind of animation.

Here is also my BJ Fogg behavior grid:

A shot of one of the papers:

Posture Project Update

DIY Health No Responses »

Nov 212011

Posture Tracker

DIY Health No Responses »

Nov 142011

My idea ties back to my original fantasy device.

I was actually sitting in class listening to a lecture when I noticed that I tilt my head to a sharp right when I’m processing new/confusing information. It made me curious to see what sort of body motions my head was going through throughout the day. I also happen to have a slightly curved spine, so I also naturally tend to tilt my head to the right slightly. I also slouch a lot and have bad posture. It’s something I’ve always meant to correct, so posture and posture patterns seemed like the perfect thing for me to track.

There are actually several things I want to track. Notably things like my mood and how it corresponds to my social life, sleep, and life events as well as diet and exercise. But all of that seemed like a time-consuming goal and it’s more of a purely tracking device. But this was an idea I’ve had stewing for a while. I’ve long wanted to create something called the ‘yearblog’ where you can compare your day to what you did this day last year. It started when I bought one of those daily notebooks and started writing a quick paragraph about my day. When the year ended, I found that writing in the same book, one line down was a great way for me to reflect on how much had changed in the year. It gave me the ability to step out and back a little from the daily life and remember my longer term goals. It also let me remember and reflect on more happy memories, which always left me feeling inspired to revisit those positive emotions.

But with the posture tracker, the goal would be to wear a device, I’m thinking on my head that has a gyroscope that would measure the tilt of my head. I’m not sure if I could get it to measure with respect to a device on my back to figure out the relative straightness, but I’m kind of hoping just one on the head and maybe the neck would suffice. And after accumulating several hours of data of proper posture vs bad posture, I could process through the data and fix it. After a few runs, I could possibly also get it to alert me if I was exhibiting bad posture. This would ideally take place throughout an entire day, but if it can’t be done I can also just wear it through classes or something. The project seems possible, but a little daunting. It’s been a while since I’ve prototyped something!

Black Death meets Yellow Fever

Genomes No Responses »

Nov 092011

http://www.okcupid.com/profile/Yersinia

My self-summary

I’m often told that I have an infectious personality, but an unstoppable intensity that seems to bring a premature end to my relationships. I’m looking for a yin to my yang, someone who can withstand the fire of my affections and not leave me burned.A little about myself, I stand just a little over 4.6 Mb tall with one chromosome and 3 plasmids, but most people say I resemble a safety pin. I was also a musician and made it big in Europe, where I’m well known as the “Black Death” or “Bubonic Plague”. Everyday men and women were literally dying at my feet. But my life getting out of control, so I left Europe and kept to myself for a while.

Now, I’m a changed pathogen. I was been sequenced on October 4th, 2001, in hopes that my story will prevent others like myself from making the same mistakes. I spend most of my time with my prairie dogs and the occasional ferret. I admit my potency isn’t what it used to, but with biological warfare as a possible frontier, who knows when I could make a comeback.

I’m really good at

Leaving others breathless

The first things people usually notice about me

The multiple artworks featuring my handiwork in Europe.

The six things I could never do without

Really just fleas, vermin, and the lack of plumbing or sanitation in the Medieval Times has made me what I am today!
The most private thing I’m willing to admit

Boubon is actually Greek for Groin

MSG FROM YELLOW VIRUS:

http://www.okcupid.com/profile/gotyellowfever

Hey YersiniaP!
I saw your profile and felt like you could be the black to my yellow. I also have my own crazy history as a world traveler, not nearly as crazy as yours, but I still find myself drawn to the tropical and subtropical climates.A little about myself, my name is Yellow Fever, some of my friends call me “Yellow Jack(y).” I am 40-50 nm long in RNA form or also 11,000 nucleotides long.My personality is a bit shy. You may not notice my presence after our first contact, but give a week or so, and I will turn your world upside down.My most noticeable feature is my skin. It’s a pretty unique hue. It’s called jaundice and it’s actually how I got my name.If you’re interested I think some of your fleas should get in touch with some of my lady mosquitos. I can also be reached via monkey or human. Your choice.Hope to hear from you soon!
- Jacky

HW 6: Parafunctionality

DIY Health No Responses »

Oct 312011

I’m still a little unsure of exactly what is considered parafunctional. But I thought this would be semi-functional:

Shouting Vase

Takes your shout, muffles it to a soft noise

I think I even made a fantasy object with this function. But I would never use it because it doesn’t a.) look convincingly functional b.) the satisfying part of screaming is not feeling like you have to curb it. So I feel like this almost goes against it’s own function, but is a good idea nonetheless.

Another one that amused me, but is less parafunctional:

Stress boob

Jamie’s Thoughts on Health

DIY Health No Responses »

Oct 312011

I define health as a healthy body and healthy mindset.
I’ve always been interested in how one can affect the other when they seem like two separate mediums.

Beyond having a sound body and mind, I think what I ultimately value about my health is what being in good health allows me to acheive. Or how being mindful of the potential of my body and how to draw the maximum output for minimal input. With physical health, I don’t think there are as many shortcuts.

I want to mostly work on, is improving my cognitive functions. One thing I always struggle with is being in more control of my life. Being able to hack my motivation levels and drive. I think these are all possible from understanding your body and knowing how to read its patterns.

A healthy day would be where I am well rested, feeling like my mental capacities are functioning at full force. Learning, feeling challenged and satisfied with what I output. Have a good laugh with a group of friends. And actually, I would extend that to doing everything with good company. Eating, exercising, playing, vegging out a little. Then organizing myself and find a way to keep my schedule and surrounings meticulously and efficiently organized. (This has not happened yet. Maybe this isn’t the healthhiest of needs)

Maybe challenges, growth, exploration. Self-discovery?
Balance

Body
- yoga
- take the stairs
- taking daily supplements
- try to eat healthy
- TRYING to sleep more
Mind
- many attempts at organization (eg. to do lists)
- constantly trying to hack my productivity
Relationships
- keep tight friendships
Money
- spending money in grad school to prepare for job finding
Work
- at grad school to figure out what I’d like to do for the rest of my life
Environment
- not sure what this means?
Happiness
- engaged at school
- circle of good friends
- keeping charge of the order of my life is a satisfying but never ending challenge
- learning new skills

I think happiness, mind, and relationships are the most important to me.
I think because they’re the ones that don’t have as clear a path to optimize, but most rewarding too. I think my biggest focus has been one of self-discovery for many years now. I think I’ve struggled with defining my identity for a long time. Only now and thanks to ITP have I found that I am who I am, I’m not just what I do. I’m still curious about understanding myself. But instead of over-thinking things and falling into analysis paralysis, I try to just do and leave the thinking to the reflection portion of my actions instead.

One project that I’ve been wanting to do for a long time actually, is keeping a ‘year blog’ where I track what I’ve done everyday THIS day for years. It started where I kept a yearly diary (and still do) where I write to my future self every August. And there is little more satisfying than seeing how much I’ve seen and experienced in a single year. I feel like this could be a great way to track your own life progress. I kind of dislike how all mood/life trackers today are targeted for people have mood disorders. Why can’t my own life inspire me? Anyway, that is a project I would like to see to completion, whether in or out of of ITP.

HW 6: Use cases notes

IxD No Responses »

Oct 302011

ITPcorkboard
url: http://stu.itp.nyu.edu/~ks2407/ITPcorkboard/

PLANNING
Discuss the project’s overall philosophic goals.
Our overall project goal is to encourage online and offline conversation and collaboration. In a project driven manner.
What is it trying to accomplish in the world?
An organization of the useful information on the ITP list (but without the list)
A lot of social stuff is on the list, but there’s so much happening on the floor project wise where ppl aren’t aware of
This would be a space to ask for collabo, critique, and have a space for conversations around projects your’e involved in
functional like the icm and pcomp list
Identify what problem space they have decided to take on within that goal.
not being able to know what’s going on (more accurately and conveniently)
Assuming the project is transactional, not informational, what mental model of interaction are they using?
corkboard
How literal or abstract is their mental model?
very literal
Is the use of their interactive “handles” and cues obvious or does it or do they require overt instructions?
Different colors represent different types of post
Needs to be used before understanding what the colors mean
Looks random
Does the project use persuasion to get it’s point across, or does it resort to telling it’s users what to do?
Its uses curiosity
What are the sample personas your clients imagine using this project?

-Carlin who doesn’t come to the floor often and read the ITP list at all but who’s curious about other students’ projects
What scenarios do they image them going through?
it varies from ITP students to others like professors/adjucnts/residents or total outsiders
post something or just browse
What cognitive process is this interface attempting to support?
Posting and reading posts on a physical corkboard. Curiosity.
Problem Solving / Learning

REQUIREMENTS
Find examples of people who fall into the types of personas that your client has indicated are their target users.
Carlin (persona #1)
doesn’t use list
curious as to what’s happening on floor
reaches out on the list
may not like being on the floor
Rader/Colombo/Spike
people who are always on the floor
very vocal presence on the list (and floor)
Gabby Levine
On the floor a good amount
not super social
regular presence on floor
Find out their Goals, Frustrations, and Motivations in relation to this type of interaction.
Goals
Spark conversations/awareness around projects happening on the floor
Fun/Creative expression
Frustrations
Making it visually appealing
Photos might not make people post even more
Getting people to notice it
Getting more people to post to it
Motivations
Get noticed by other people
Get help by other people

FORMATIVE EVALUATION
Complete a thorough Heuristic Test of the project’s interface.
Use Neilsen’s 10 Usability Heuristics and your Interface Design Manual to ferret out potential design issues.
Usability Test
Create your questions for a usability test. Remember to include your disclaimer, background questions, overall impression questions and short answer questions, and most importantly, your walk through and wishlist questions.
Test 5 users (formative evaluation)
See below

ANALYSIS
How effective is this tool in accomplishing the creator’s stated philosophic goals?

Fairly successful, just need to get people into posting more.
Where did they succeed and where was there a mismatch?

Getting people to know what’s going on at-a-glance was successful.
Need more participants. People are hesitant to share when it’s not busy.
Does the interface successfully support the cognitive processes that it was created for?

Yes? Could be more organized (colors scheme could be more obvious)
How accurate were the user scenarios that they imagined occurring?

The gist was correct, but there were a lot of unique scenarios that require different things. (eg. partner approval)
How closely did they resemble the actual uses by real users?

Read above.
What Use Cases are missing from the project?

Missing Alumni, residents, teachers, brainstormers (ppl who don’t have a dedicated project idea)
What functionality or abilities does the user want or need to be able to accomplish that are not currently available?

Partner approval, timed posts, sorting by categories/date, personalized feeds
What specific interface problems does the project suffer from?

Posts could be sorted better.

Questions:

Hiye Shin
Have you visited this site before?
No
What do you think the purpose of this site is? (ie. selling, informing, entertainment, etc)
To share an idea.
ITP specific. Seems like a chatroom. Like the list but more public. Less private. For fun.

Who do you think the intended audience is?
ITP students

*Could you tell what the page was about?
This reminds me of post its, put down and idea and put it on the corkboard.

Was anything too obtrusive?
1. I posted a comment to ‘SpiceBox’ and did not register the comment count.
2. When I click the post it bracelet, i was hoping for a picture, but there was no picture. So i was curious abou twhat happens if i click on the title. The title and subtitle are redundant.
Expecting more information

Was anything too well hidden?
More detailed content for each project.
Expecting a photo, or an attached file. (

Problems or kudos on the color scheme?
I really like it in terms of design and color.

Easy to read (both font style and size)?
So far it’s easy to read, but I kind of wonder, if i post another thing, where would it fall and would it end up ont he bottom.
It’s good now at-a-glance, but once there are more posts will have to scroll

How did you find the layout of the site?
Concerns about scrolling
Colors +
I would make the title pop out more
When i click on a post it, the scroll down gets irritating, cuz it pushes everything else down.

The comments section is too large compared to the main ‘article’

How intuitive and helpful is the navigation system?
Main page is intuitive. Right way i got what the purpose is, but it was confusing going into a post it and trying to get details.

Did you notice the search box?
I noticed, but I didn’t notice right away.
It took a good five minutes.

I think they’re for sorting
I’d like it better on top not the bottom, more standard

Did you notice the Post Something?
Noticed the post something right away

What would encourage you to return to this site in the future?
If there is more information, more posts, then it means there are more resources.

Would you use this site to post ideas?
Not this early on, when more popular.

Name your three favorite things about the site, and your three least favorite
Likes:
Post-its
Colors
Layout

Dislikes:
Title
instructions: doing/seeing/reading/thinking (italicized and hard to read)

How often are you on the floor?
Everyday
How often do you post to the list?
Once every two weeks

Just noticed login button?
Confusing – wordpress

ANTONIUS

Have you visited this site before?
I walked past it, but didn’t really interact with it

What do you think the purpose of this site is? (ie. selling, informing, entertainment, etc)
To post what your working on and get input find collaborators and equipment that you would need that you could borrow.
Otherwise browsing and seeing if you could give input or offer equip.

Who do you think the intended audience is?
ITP

Was anything confusion?
The categories are confusing, bcuase there’s a N/A category, and i feel like it needs to be curated.
Some are obvoius, but i think a category should be mandatory

When i click on a person’s name, i don’t want to email them, i want to see what else they’ve done.

I would like to see a user’s history on the site first.
Would n’t mind if there was just an email button. Along side what else they’ve done. More inclined to offer if they are active member of this community.

Was anything hard to find?
Comments section is larger than actual article. My eyes go straight to the comments first. And read that before actual content.

Front page well designed, but once you go in a level, it becomes a lot harder to find description.

I want a way to sort.

Easy to read (both font style and size)?
Fonts good.

How did you find the layout of the site? Color scheme?
Color scheme is great, but not intuitive, I dont know what it means.
I like this layout. Would be better if i kenw what it meant.

Infact, I don’t want to go to a separate page when i click on a post it.
Sort by all the post its of someone’s name

How intuitive and helpful is the navigation system?
It’s great. The best part so far is i can see everything in one page.
I like being able to scroll back down and see th rest of the postits, dont’ ahve to go ‘back’
I would like a ‘read’ option for post-its.

Did you notice the search box? Categories? Post it? Change the way you nav site?
I noticed categories, find it more helpful than search box.
If the search box were uptop, I would use it more often.
Search that sorts relevant to your search query. Keep it all on one page.

What would encourage you to use this site?
It’s such a nonspecific thing, I’m not encouraged to cuz it’s so broad.
Seeing other people’s posts encourages me.

What would encourage you to post to this site?
I was goign to post something, but I wish I could save this as a draft, and let someoen else look at it before posting. Being to time when things go out so it woudl correlate to when you need someting. (boomerang)

How often are you on the floor?
A lot these days. 6 days a week. 7 hours a day.

How often do you post to the list?
Never. Once every semester.

Michella

Have you visited this site before?
No, just seen it on big winow and would post something on

What do you think the purpose of this site is? (ie. selling, informing, entertainment, etc)
Because i’ve used post its before, it hought it was a todo
I thought it was the same thing.
More an ideas thing and to get feed back.

Who do you think the intended audience is?
Students, us? Anyone who is interested int he subject matter that is posted.

Was anything confusion?
No, I thought this was just a synopsis (post it) but when clicking on it, there wasn’t more information.

Was anything hard to find?
Not really

Easy to read (both font style and size)?
It seems okay, not too complicated. The colors i’m not so fond of, but it’s okay easy on the eyes.

How did you find the layout of the site? Color scheme?
Nothing really stands out. Everything looks the same.

How intuitive and helpful is the navigation system?

Did you notice the search box? Categories? Post it? Change the way you nav site?
Arrange thing by the color from post-its.
I didn’t check out categories.

What would encourage you to use this site?
I’m more likely to respond to things that are visually appealing. I would respond to images in place of text.

What would encourage you to post to this site?
Visual appeal color.

How often are you on the floor?
5 days a week, probably more than that. Group projects that bring me to floor.

How often do you post to the list?
Not often. Once every 6 months or 3 months.

Dave Miller

Have you visited this site before?
Yes, posted out front

What do you think the purpose of this site is? (ie. selling, informing, entertainment, etc)
To update people on what other people are doing that you may not talk to all the time.
It’s a cork-board where you have different projects up and potentially get involved with them.

Who do you think the intended audience is?
Us. The ITP people.

Was anything confusion?
1. On add something page. It also has a leave a reply. Which is confusing.
2. It says 1 comment, but there should be another link that says ‘leave a comment’
3. It’s little weir that the comments box rolls the entire page down. But it’s a pretty good setup. Things in order

Was anything hard to find?

Easy to read (both font style and size)?
Font is perfectly find for the amount of text you have.

How did you find the layout of the site? Color scheme?
Wasn’t aware color scheme represented.
The layout is okay. Unsure as to what the order of the post-its are.

How intuitive and helpful is the navigation system? (search/categories)
It’s okay. IT would be nice to color code the menu or what the different thigns are. Or organize things by categoroy. So if theyw ere in columns w/ category heading on top.

Did you notice the search box? Categories? Post it? Change the way you nav site?
Saw them there, but hadn’t thought to use them. It doesn’t seem liek there are more things than i could see at once.

What would encourage you to use this site?
Getting feedback. If you post something and someone posts back.

How often are you on the floor?
Almost every day

How often do you post to the list?
Everyday

Phan

Have you visited this site before?
No

What do you think the purpose of this site is? (ie. selling, informing, entertainment, etc)
Update to what’s going on. Brainstormings, where people chip in ideas and get feedback. Part of a new crit group. Give waht their ideas are. And color coding based on categories.
If people want to collaborate, people can share skills.

Who do you think the intended audience is?
People at school.

Was anything confusion? hard to find?
Going back to home/getting back to the main page.
Is there an ‘offer help page’ (so function of ‘post something’ not obvious)

Easy to read (both font style and size)?

How did you find the layout of the site? font? Color scheme?
As long as you keep it in primary colors. I’m color blind.
I can’t tell the difference. I can see all 4 colors, but for me, if i don’t concentrate, red/green look the same. (so maybe non-color indicator/pattern etc.)
Category/search bar could be moved up, so it brings awareness to different categories.
When you can see ALL the post-its it’s definitely help to have sorting functions.

How intuitive and helpful is the navigation system?
I didn’t know. I thought there shoudl be a header per color/category. (like dave miller said)

Did you notice the search box? Categories? Post it? Change the way you nav site?
Search/categories not obvious until i saw colors changing.
Post something totally makes sense.

What would encourage you to use this site?
If i were to be looking for people to work with or people need help.
A feed relevant to your interests. (personalized feed)
Send alerts

What would encourage you to post to this site?
A little snippet or picture of what people are workign on, and a little gallery withint he post it to get a better idea/get peole excited about project.

How often are you on the floor?
All the time. 5 days of the week.

How often do you post to the list?
Maybe once.

HEURISTICS

Visibility of system status
Organization is not intuitive
Good at a glance feed
Match between system and the real world
Corkboard mental model was easily established.
User control and freedom
Navigation could be more clear. Could use a ‘home’ button.
Have to click on title.
Consistency and standards
Search and category bar was on the bottom rather than top. People expect it to be top right.
Error prevention
Not much room for error.
Recognition rather than recall
Function was straightforward.
Flexibility and efficiency of use
Shallow learning curve, therefore differences btwn exp. and inexp users are too minimal.
Aesthetic and minimalist design
Fairly straightforward.
Some design could have better organizational structure (eg. sorting)
Help users recognize, diagnose, and recover from errors
No real errors.
Help and documentation
Maybe more guidance on the sorting side.

MORE NOTES:

Questions: anonymity?
sorting?

Why this layout:
The diea of winternet wishlist website.
like the layout of ‘theinternetwishlist.com’

- a community corkboard
- harbors conversation

- make it interesting without overdesigning it
- a place to skim
- date relevant feed

- general interest in what other people are doing
- a way to connect with people at ITP you’ve never known
- browsing fun: ‘see all stupid pet tricks’

- good for students and residents. cuz no one really knows what anyone is doing.

- user who doesn’t kow this exists:
- intuitive (hopefully)
- post to the thing your’e here to work
- drop idea and go

- what are ppl working on
- i’m here this afternoon is there someoen i can help out or something i’m interested in
- Carlin: doesnt come on the floor that often, doesn’t read the list
- if carlin was sitting at home and wanted to know what was happening on the floor
- *** what projects do i get out of certain classes

- have knowledge to share

- color coordinaation:
- yellow: just announcing
- blue: need input
- pink: collabo
- green: critique
- multiple colors

- p comp list/icm list
- tones are different
- functions are explicit
- finding something really specific
- FILTER

- kickstarter esque page
Problems:
different levels of commitment i have as a poster

HW 7: Exformation Response

DIY Health No Responses »

Oct 272011

So, to be honest, the reading confused me a bit. At first I liked the idea. I’ve often been described as a very literal person. I’m not sure if it’s a cultural thing, but sarcasm is often lost on me. I definitely went through a sarcastic phase, but somehow it hasn’t stuck much! I found the exercise with the rivers kind of confusing, so I ended up doing some googling. Some interesting facts I found was the Kenya Hara is the creative director of MUJI. Muji is a ‘brandless brand’ that sells assorted things you need in your daily life. There is pure minimalism an almost complete lack of branding on all the objects. I felt like this was a good example/practice of Exformation in design. It communicates a lot about the object, the culture, and the MUJI branding without having any obvious visual evidence.
But I was still stumped as to how this could apply to health design. Looking around I found this:

But to get the impact, you don’t send a lot of information–you send almost none. Instead you rely on the knowledge you share with your reader or listener.

A Danish writer, Tor Norretranders, invented a term for this in his book The User Illusion: exformation. Exformation is short for “explicitly discarded information,” the information you strip out of a message because you know your reader already has it. The more you share with your reader, the less you have to say.

Though the idea still kind of escapes my grasp in the field of design. Designing for the unquantifiable? What’s considered ‘discarded’? Is it bringing the intangible forward into an expressible form of information? The context, beliefs, implications around information?

I guess I understand the idea of Exformation as far as a conversation goes. But I don’t really see it having a part in practical design. I see it more having part in ‘art’. The kind that makes no sense, that sits in galleries, the kind that you have to know the backstory of to find interesting.

One of the things I can see a good subject for Exformation is Premenstrual Syndrome (Or PMS). I think there is always interesting discussion around it. Saying one is PMS-ing dismisses a lot of explanation. Maybe because it’s a bit of a private topic, and not one that’s well understood, a lot of assumptions are made. According to wiki: the abbreviation is used frequently even in casual and colloquial settings, without regard to medical rigor. If I could construct a fantasy device for this. It would involve something that could identify exactly what each woman (or man with irritable male syndrome) is experiencing biologically. Then it would not longer be “I’m PMSing” or “she’s PMSing” it would be “I am experiencing 6% increase in water retention” or “my hormone levels of fluctuated.” I think this is kind of moving from exformation to information, but in doing so I think it can also filter for excuses and real discomfort.

I think another thing worth looking into is the circulatory system. I think there is a lot more tied to it than we are consciously aware of. I think I generally have poor circulation. I was born with a mitral valvue prolapse which is a very minor heart defect where the heart flaps don’t close fully, not maximizing the flood flow through the heart. It’s hasn’t really affected my life, but sometimes I wonder if I could be more alert, less cold (my extremities are always cold). The way I found out was actually interesting. My parents had been undergoing suction cup treatment and thought with my allergies this would be a good time to find what parts of my body were congested. (They have a strong and probably accurate belief that everything in the body is tied together) After going for a few treatments and looking at the darkness of the suction cup marks on my back, the practitioner kept insisting something was wrong with my heart. (To be fair she was insisting there was something wrong with me everywhere. I think it was a scare tactic, but she was usually insistent about my heart.)

So then my mom, being a mom, took me to a cardiologist and after getting a cardiogram, MVP was confirmed. This experience hasn’t exactly made me a full believer, but it made me believe that the body is able to be read without machinery. Taking this experience, I think it would be interesting to replicate this procedure, but in a much more discrete way. What made me stop going was because one day she insisted on suction cupping my forehead. Then the highschool vice principal approached me and asked if I was taking a vacuum cleaner to the forehead. So if the suction areas could be stylized, or minimized to specific parts of the body and thimble sized rather than fist sized, I think it could garner interesting conversations. It would be like a health tattoo. (In fact that is what I will call it). If it could become popular, it could be an automatic indicator of health, but without being so strict with the diagnosis that it scares people away. It would be more like a stylish health bar.

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