On Jan 19, 2008, at 7:56 AM, Jeff Howard wrote: > Graphic design more properly encompasses a world of symbols and > images. Industrial design? Form and mass. Interaction design? Actions > and behaviors. Graphic designers can ply their trade on a letterpress > just as validly as they can with pixels--or with skywriting for that > matter. Subdisciplines can develop. Logo designers and typographers > and poster designers can co-exist without threatening each other > because they're united by a common understanding of the foundation > of graphic design. The medium doesn't define the discipline.
I largely agree with this, and you make a lot of good points. However, given your example the final creation still defines the practice, if not the medium. In other words, graphic designers and industrial designers create things at the end of the day regardless of medium as you rightly point out. Those creations largely share common components in some way or another. If interaction design is only about actions and behaviors, then what is it that you are making that is tangible at the end of the day? Diagrams or workflow analysis? If so, that seems to put the interaction designer at an extremely weak point as those are only definition documents, which are then often taken out of the hands of the designer when it comes to execution. That's probably the biggest point of confusion. Because if what you make are deliverables that are used only to define the final product, then what are you making really? And how can you earn the level of need and respect of the designers that do make things in other defined fields? Imagine this for second, even if it seems a little silly. (Or least forgive me for my preference in television): In the future, interaction design is a more mainstream profession, and Bravo decides to create a reality television series called Interact This! built around the same model as Project Runway. Now imagine how the interaction designers would operate on such a show for the challenges. What exactly would they do? Maybe I'm putting the cart before the horse here, but digital creates a well rounded place to start to create a definition that is well scoped. With code, there many specific things you can do that are high level enough to be used in multiple mediums, as long as there is a code component. Without digital or code, the variety of things "interaction" can be is rather broad and not very well defined. It could literally be almost anything that involves humans, which for our practical reality is everything. > To me, the biggest gulf in our understanding is this: I believe that > interface design differs from interaction design primarily in its > focus on the artifact, regardless of whether that focus is on form or > behavior. It didn't strike me until a few months ago, but when people > on this list talk about behavior, they're almost invariably talking > about the behavior of the artifact, not the human behavior it > facilitates or requires. When the MacOS login box shakes its head > "no" at me, I consider that a great example of interface design, > but not a significant example of interaction design; it's just a > clever animation. Text messaging on the other hand is a phenomenal > example of interaction design. Dead simple interface, especially > before T9 or other type-ahead conventions became common. But > completely unprecedented interactions: Two people communicating > non-verbally in nearly real-time across space and on the go. The > interaction it facilitates is the key to its popularity, not the > interaction with the artifact. I understand you point, but even in this example, what makes text messaging interaction possible in the first place is a digital component. That's why I focus on it as a term that's important. While it's true the interaction is defined by more an analog mode of input like a mini-QWERTY keyboard and the people who want to communicate with each other, behind the scenes are all sorts of pieces of code used to process the input to make the interaction possible. And then there's the mini-displays that are also driven by code to turn pixels on and off, and otherwise present information to make the interaction possible. And the presentation of those pixels is integral to driving the interaction that exists as well. I understand there's a core "interaction" between people in the example, but your text messaging interaction would simply not exist if code didn't make it possible. So if we define more examples of what "interaction" design is and discover there are more digital examples than not, shouldn't that be important? Further, shouldn't that also be used in helping to define interaction design as distinct from graphic design and industrial design? > Here's a good shibboleth for recognizing interaction design. Does it > actively change patterns of social behavior? The telephone? The > elevator? Fundamentally reorganizes business. Friendster? Twitter? > Reifies your circle of friends. The post-1972 US presidential primary > process? Crazyness. Starbucks installs WiFi? There you go. Birth > control pills? Absolutely. Recycling? Huge. Adobe invents Postscript? > Revolutionary change. Ebay? Connects and empowers people all over the > globe--regardless of the interface. You are now exemplifying the danger, imho. Once you go so broad like this, I think practically speaking it's less useful as mans to define one's career, especially so early in the development of the profession. I mean... I guess I could do it all, but who has the time? And fwiw, Paul Rand did a lot more than graphic design. He designed the IBM Stores, the IBM packaging and the entire IBM purchasing experience long before Apple did that sort of things as well. Was he an "experience" designer? Was he more than a graphic designer? Sure, you could easily call him that, but he was largely a graphic designer in his approach to craft. More importantly, it took him some thirty odd years to get to the point in his career where he was given the money by those that write the checks to do things like create the IBM purchasing experience. Even more importantly, there aren't going to be a lot of Paul Rands in the annals of design history. What are the rest of us supposed to do? So, would it have helped to call the graphic design field "experience design" back then given that one of it's main influencers did a lot more than just make logos or brochures? Obviously, I'm not convinced that would have helped at all to go "broad" during that point in time. > -- Andrei Herasimchuk Principal, Involution Studios innovating the digital world e. [EMAIL PROTECTED] c. +1 408 306 6422 ________________________________________________________________ *Come to IxDA Interaction08 | Savannah* February 8-10, 2008 in Savannah, GA, USA Register today: http://interaction08.ixda.org/ ________________________________________________________________ Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ....... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe ................ http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines ............ http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .................. http://www.ixda.org/help
