This all reminds me of something from CMU, during our mid-year thesis
progress presentations for the master's interaction design grads.
Almost everyone spoke at length about some lofty grand service design
or interaction design or system design problem, and then Dick Buchanan
would interrupt bluntly and sternly ask, "So what are you making??" He
did that repeatedly even to me ;-) Even for a deep reflective
philosopher about interaction design as Dick, he understood that IXDs
manifest something material (a website, diagram, game, device, etc.),
that expresses in sensorial terms the nobler pursuits of the
immaterial concerns/problems and somehow shapes a person's way of life
(tasks, activities, goals) in a substantial and real way.
What makes (ha!) it perplexing for IXD of course is that there is this
wonderful (yet frustrating) spectrum of material and immaterial
problems, tools, artifacts, and solutions from the physical to the
digital and beyond (services, organizations, cultures, policies, etc.).
But at the end of the day you gotta make (or manifest) something!
There's a rich fascinating blend of conceptual and physical/digital
tools then lend to the crafting of a compelling interaction and
interface, as Malcolm elucidates in his Abstracting Craft and also
Digital Ground to some extent.
hope this helps...
Uday Gajendar
Sr. Interaction Designer
Voice Technology Group
Cisco | San Jose
On Aug 27, 2008, at 1:06 PM, David Malouf wrote:
Hmmm? I agree that those are all good things for IxD, but they are not
limited to IxD, right? I mean if I was a carpenter, the physical tasks
of manipulating and combining wood would be the makings of the craft,
right? Now you could say that a wheeler and barrel maker have to work
with wood too, but in my mind they are specialist carpenters that also
have to do blacksmithing as part of their total artisanship. but the
metaphor goes on ...
I
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