I guess I'm in the minority on this and design for sustainability. I think interaction designers should design interactions that meet the goals and needs of the users for whom the interaction is designed. Somehow, there's an imperious political bent that seems to come out in some threads--"Resistance is futile," so to say.
While my personal values support environmental approaches, I don't think I have the right to impose my values on users. If I discover that my users' goals include sving the planet, then designing interaciton that supports those goals is appropriate...otherwise, it's not. I don't think I'm really expressing myself in print here as well as I should (sorry), but I'm just a little concerned by statements such as "I strongly believe that interaction design is central to solving the major issues facing our society today (this is probably no surprise coming from an Interaction Designer). Large scale challenges like the environment and healthcare can only be addressed if we can positively influence personal behavior on a large scale in a sustainable way." Quite frankly, I strongly disagree. We have no right to impose our values on our users, our clients, our customers as part of our design activities--unless these activities help users meet THEIR goals, not mine. I hope my sentiment isn't too politically incorrect (though it probably is) :( . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Posted from the new ixda.org http://www.ixda.org/discuss?post=36296 ________________________________________________________________ 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
