Category: Design

Design in Tech Report 2018

Today’s most beloved technology products and services balance design and engineering in a way that perfectly blends form and function. Businesses started by designers have created billions of dollars of value, are raising billions in capital, and VC firms increasingly see the importance of design. The third annual Design in Tech Report examines how design trends are revolutionizing the entrepreneurial and corporate ecosystems in tech. This report covers related M&A activity, new patterns in creativity × business, and the rise of computational design.
– John Maeda

Screen Time – design effective cross-screen experiences for tomorrow

Screen time used to mean sitting in front of a TV. Today we move between screens of various sizes, proportions, and quality all day. The abundance and diversity of devices can overwhelm teams delivering software. We need practical ways to tackle the problems that come with this diversity of screens. Luke explores a deeper understanding of screen time today and ways to design effective cross-screen experiences for tomorrow.
– Luke Wroblewski

The Shape Of Things

Computers are getting smaller, cheaper, spreading further and bringing their power and the power of the network into every space in our lives. But how will those developments change the things around us, how they communicate with us and how we interact with the world, and with information itself?
– Tom Coates

The Centrality of Design

Josh Brewer, Former Principal Designer at Twitter, explains the inherent benefits of designing your meetings, using prototyping, the value of design in leadership positions, infusing a company with design and sketching together.

Exploring the physical web

Today’s ‘smart devices’ are a product of the technology and mental models of our past. From a connected lightbulb to a robot vacuum, using most of these devices requires a native app. This in turn greatly limits their contexts of use. Can we really expect users to download an app to interact with a random ’thing’ they encounter at the mall, a space they explore for an hour at the museum, or a city they will only visit for a day? What devices could we build, what ‘smart’ environments could we enable if users could simply discover, “walk up and use”(and then if needed, abandon) these objects and environments as they do a web site?

Go through the above slide to explore some of the exciting possibilities of the Physical Web by Stephanie Rieger

Design in Tech Report 2016

Summary of the report is:
– Design isn’t just about beauty; it’s about market relevance and meaningful results.
– M&A activity continues in the design space, and it’s increased.
– Increasing the designers needed in the tech industry requires rethinking education.
– The adoption of design by public companies is only growing.
– Designers bring needed critical thinking/making in the economic case for inclusion.
– Work in the research labs from decades ago drives today’s startups. Be aware.

Nothing is original

Nothing is original, these are NOT the logos of Medium AirBNB, Flipboard, and Beats.
The above images are from Trademarks & Symbols of the World book.

This reminds me that “‘Don’t try to be original. Just try to be good.’ That sounds sort of naive but it’s true.” -Paul Rand