Hi Jared, As an amateur magician, I can say the process of designing a product has many similarities to the act of performing magic. Among other things, both of them take in account the audience, the context, and the goal to create different types of experience. I've already faced similar reactions from people after kinetically scrolling a list on Iphone and after seeing a torn card begin restored in front of theirs eyes: wow.
-- Miguel Peres On Sun, Sep 27, 2009 at 7:08 PM, Jared Spool <[email protected]> wrote: > Hi David, > > I'm intrigued with your comment: > > But what Designers do IS magic! That act of synthesis towards craft >> towards implementation is a wondrous magical thing once turned into a >> Palm Pre or HP NetBook Mini that brings new areas of delight that were >> never there before. >> >> What's wrong with magic? What's wrong with the unexplained? Or the >> secretly explained (LIKE MAGIC!). >> > > Magic is an awesome metaphor. You're right about it's wondrous qualities. > > What's interesting to me about the choice of magic is the point of view > that sees it as magical. > > There are three approaches to the point-of-view thing: > > 1) We look at magic from the Harry Potter or Terry Pratchett view where > there are things happening on a level that mortals aren't meant to > understand. > > 2) We look at magic from a more phantasmal viewpoint, where there are > forces in the universe that just defy explanation (ala Shroud of Turin or > the creation of the solar system, but on a more productive level) > > 3) We look at magic from the viewpoint of a professional magician (ala > David Copperfield or Penn & Teller), where the magicians view the process as > explainable, but design an experience for their audience that is mystical. > > I think, if we're going to assert that there are magical qualities to > design, we should pick which one we want to go with. > > Personally, I'd go with the professional magician viewpoint, because that > means that we have control over it (and don't require special powers). It > also, in my mind, is the closest thing to experience design as we think of > it today. > > One of the things I like about the comparison to professional magic is that > magicians, when they get together to talk/teach/share their craft, don't > ever talk about the "magical elements", except from the perspective of the > audience. > > For example, there's a saying amongst magicians: "That's when the magic > happens" It describes the "magical moment", a point in the audience's > experience when they are to think that the core element of the trick (such > as the chosen card moving from the deck into the magician's coat pocket) is > happening. Of course, the mechanics of the trick happened at another point > in time. The magical moment is part of the experience design, focusing the > magician on the audience p.o.v. > > Is that what you were thinking? Or were you thinking it might be a > different perspective on magic? > > Jared > > ________________________________________________________________ > 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 > ________________________________________________________________ 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
