Ok, not one to normally chime in on things that can get semi-controversial, but...
Whether we get down to the "correctness" of using nouns as verbs, etc., I really don't think that matters as much as the point of what Seth is saying. I think this is actually a great approach to understanding this discipline, at least what I do. Every time I tell someone I'm a designer the first thing they think of is the visual design. Sure, I may do a little visual design, but really what I do is architect more efficient and friendly systems, products, sites. It doesn't get much simpler than this. Just my $.02. David On Thu, Aug 7, 2008 at 6:17 AM, Will Evans <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > So Seth Godin has a new blog post <http://tinyurl.com/6rqluo> concerning > the > semantics of designing. vs. architecting which is rather interesting. > > Here is what he says -- > Is architect a verb? > "I confess. I like using it that way. > > I think architecting something is different from designing it. I hope you > can forgive me but I think it's a more precise way to express this idea. > > Design carries a lot of baggage related to aesthetics. We say something is > well-designed if it looks good. There are great designs that don't look > good, certainly, but it's really easy to get caught up in a bauhaus, white > space, font-driven, Ideo-envy way of thinking about design. > > So I reserve "architect" to describe the intentional arrangement of design > elements to get a certain result. > > You can architect a computer server set up to make it more efficient. You > can architect a train station to get more people per minute through the > turnstiles. > > More interesting, you can architect a business model or a pricing structure > to make it far more effective at generating the behavior you're looking > for. > Most broken websites aren't broken because they violate common laws of good > design. They're broken because their architecture is all wrong. There's no > strategy in place. > > Stew Leonard's, which used to be my favorite supermarket example, is > architected to extract large amounts of money from customers. One example: > there's only one route through the store. You start at the beginning and > work your way to the end. No one goes there to buy a half-gallon of milk. > And he's not going to win any design competitions either... > > Or consider the architecture of the pricing at > 37signals<http://www.37signals.com/>or the architecture of Hotmail's > viral marketing campaign years ago. > > Architecture, for me anyway, involves intention, game theory, systems > thinking and relentless testing and improvement. Fine with me if you want > to > call it design, just don't forget to do it." > > > -- > ~ will > > "Where you innovate, how you innovate, > and what you innovate are design problems" > > > --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- > Will Evans | User Experience Architect > tel +1.617.281.1281 | [EMAIL PROTECTED] > twitter: https://twitter.com/semanticwill > > --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- > ________________________________________________________________ > 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 > -- "Art provokes thinking, design solves problems" w: http://www.davidshaw.info ________________________________________________________________ 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
