NM4210 Thoughts

NM4210 Review

User Experience Design does not online confine to good web design and usability. It also encapsulates business idea generation, marketing, good services and a whole lot of areas where there is interaction between human.

Prior to taking this module, I thought that User Experience Design is about good web design or interface design that gives the best usability experience. But its underlying principle, such as knowing the customer, branding, usability testing, laddering interviews, can be used in other areas such as business, depending on what view you look at it.

In this new era where business competition is high and emphasis is on service and quality products amongst the thousands of similar imitations, knowing the right customer and building a product or service that is tailored just for him is the way to go. Thus, taking this module gave me better insight in how to approach a problem when involving human interaction. Giving the best and making a end-user happy is what I really love, which is how this module has taught me too.

But it does not end here. Further readings has to be done and experience matters. I will need to apply these methods in order to horn my skill in obtaining the true problem so I can give the best solution.

You can download the PDF version, which is formatted and easier to read.

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Smoke & Mirrors Review

Chuang Xuejin, U065250L

User Experience Design, NM4210


(Web) Design itself is subjective, not objective.

That is what I feel summarises the 5 articles in one line and strongly support as well.

Many web design companies rely on scientific tools based on scientific researches to use a measure when designing a “good” web site. I do agree with the author, however, that using solely on scientific tools and quantitative results to obtain a so called good design is purely not going to ENSURE a good web site design. There are many factors that affect a so called “good” design; and because it is a design, it is subjective as a result. When different people view the same web site, the experience each feel will definitely be different across. Some reasons would be because of the different backgrounds, culture, education, and current state of mind.

Example

David who is in a rush to obtain certain data over a web site on cars will want information quick when, compared to William who is casually viewing the web site at his own pace. David will scan the web page quickly for the information he really needs, thus heavily filtering information or skipping information no matter how or where information is placed. William, as the casual surfer will, rather, read through information slowly and slowly filtering out the information.

“There is a limit, I think, to what a so-called “empirical” user interface test can tell you. At some point, the results must be interpreted in order to be useful as a design tool — and interpretations can easily go wrong. They can overlook a critical objective or even reach the wrong conclusions, especially when interpreted by people without the appropriate design skills.” – Smoke & Mirrors

I do agree with the author on the statement above. People with different knowledge background can interpret the data gathered by scientific tools differently. Because data itself doesn’t tell the problem but rather needs interpretation, this often causes design conflicts or just wrong design by misinterpretation. The author’s example on Eyetools is a good example of the “usefulness” of such scientific tools. The hot spots, or red areas, on the Eyetools graph just tell us that the eye has been looking at that area more often. It does not explain why the eyes were fixated there more often.

And it is also true that a good web designer would have known the reasons for the color spots on Eyetools. In Seth’s Blog: What I learned from eye tracking, the author mentioned that eye looks for anomaly in the web page. If the web designer controls his design by adding good anomaly around his web page, he can control the eye flow of the user. That is design.

“Hell, you should probably hire a better UI designer anyway, because only a good UI designer is really qualified to interpret the results of an eyetracking study in the first place.” - Smoke & Mirrors

A web designer can produce the web design he has made based on the user testing he has made. BUT, because design is subjective, the client (hiring the designer for the web site), may have a different opinion and business agenda about the web design. This is where the author of Smoke & Mirror addresses the need for scientific tools. These scientific tools can help to prove scientifically or empirically to convince these clients that this is the PROBLEM and thus why you used this design to solve it. Clients, who run businesses such as the web site, do not want to take such risks that may lose more of their current customers unless the design is PROVEN that it is BAD for their business.

“So how does a designer or a design manager convince their boss that a good design decision is in fact a good design decision if the boss has no design instincts? What if the site won’t get redesigned at all unless the boss can be convinced that the current design stinks?” – Smoke & Mirrors

Some scientific measurements on web site design can be quite useless, as mentioned in article 4 “Research as Bullshit”. Forrester’s Brand Image Reviews Of Agency Reference Site chart is totally useless, for any web designer. Every web site has a differential business proposition that attracts its customer to their site. Thus, they will want to portray their branding differently. As such, it becomes a subjective issue. Organic’s Persona Room as a usability tool it also another of a expensive tool which can be addressed with a cheaper option. Unless the designers can completely change their characteristics and personality to the targeted persona, staying in a “persona room” does not help to achieve better knowledge of the targeted audience.

In conclusion, I strongly agree with the author that design instincts are better than scientific tools when it comes to web design. We should use scientific tools to help strengthen our background knowledge of the targeted user that shapes the foundation of our design. Cardsorting, information architecture, and performing all kinds of information gathering about all stakeholders will ensure that there is well-enough information during the design process. Performing this will be one step closer in achieve a good web site well-received and liked by the customers.

Smoke & Mirrors is very good set of article that strengthens my beliefs after taking User Experience Design module.

Beauty is the eye of the beholder

- interpreting: it is subjective -

Final Assignment Review - Naptop

You can download the PDF version, with better formatting and easier to read, hosted on NUS server.
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The last project aims to come up with a problem and its solution. This is much like creating a product for a business. This makes it very fun.

I found it particularly difficult to come up with the problem. There are just too many possible problems and I did not know where to start from. My group deduced that many of the problems that we encounter in real life are usually worked around, thus blinding us from realizing there is a problem. We, or myself, only see a problem when I cannot solve it and the problem still persist right in front of me!

Luckily, one of our members mentioned about napping in school.

Before the problem of napping in school, we proposed a problem of carrying heavy things, especially for ladies. However, after laddering interviews and probing the ladies, we found that the root of the problem & its suggested solution was not attractive enough for the project. Hence we switched ideas to napping in school. This showed us that laddering interviews can be a very good way to obtain rich details of the problem & its rough solution.

During the laddering interviews, it was quite encouraging raise solutions to the problem of napping. We know the problem, but not the root problem that entails the solution to it. It was during one of my interviews that I had a spark and asked these questions:

1. Do you like to hug your bolster when you sleep?
2. Do you like to keep yourself warm during your sleep?
3. What makes a good sleep for you?

Raising the right questions, questions that asks how to make them happier or feel better regarding the problem, will help to give light to the solution. This I feel is one of the most important things I have learnt in this project. We cannot just keep shooting questions and accepting any answer that we think it might be the solution. In addition, we did not prepare ourselves the factors affecting the problem, as we did earlier for assignment 3, thus it was difficult to find the actual “root” solution.

Our end product is a physical product rather than an informational web site. Many of the principles taught in lecture can be applied to product design. I found that during interview sessions and testing of our prototype are the times that revealed more questions for our designs. They were questions which were not previously thought of, such as hygiene issue (laying the head on the cushion), the use of different materials such as zip (hair might be caught in the zip). The reasons why these questions weren’t raised earlier is because of the lack of prototype and some conceptualization of the final product. We really appreciated these comments and took them into consideration for our final design.

Many people loved the idea of our product, Naptop. They thought it was cool and why no one thought of it before. This comments made me very happy, and it showed me that this can be used in marketing and entrepreneurial context!

A simple problem can be solved with the simplest solution: Naptop.

Below are pictures of our High-fidelity Prototype.

An inflated Naptop. The top part is the pillow.

The "Clean" or underside of the pillow. This is where our heads rest on.


Where we can put our laptops in

Assignment 4 Review - Learning Experience in LT

It has been quite a long time since this assignment when I'm reviewing it now. I'll try my best to recall what I thought of during the assignment.

You can download the PDF version which might be easier to read.

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We were tasked to determining and propose solutions for improving the learning experience in Lecture Theatres (LTs).

Before any study was made, our group discussed what are the different factors contributing to the learning experience. They are:

1. Subject being taught
2. Motivation of students
3. Teaching style of the lecturer
4. Cultural background of students and lecturer
5. Lecture Theatre Environment
6. Teaching cultures of University

This helped us to internalise our thoughts and highlight what are the key points to take note when performing our study (ethnography & laddering interviews).

We decided to use an ethnography approach and laddering interview to experience what it is like in a Lecture Theatre (LT). We ourselves are students and thus we would have the necessary knowledge to determine problems. However, we used laddering interviews to gather more different opinions about the learning experience in LTs.

Ethnographical study was a straight forward. We took down notes while experiencing the learning conditions. However, we were only taking down notes pertaining to environmental factors (temperature) or problems that were at the tip of the surface of the learning experience (such as interactivity between lecturer and students). This is because we were not students of the Lecture itself, we were just seating inside experiencing. We could not obtain information if whether students were actually learning or absorbing information by the lecturer during our ethnography study. Different student have got different learning abilities. Thus, a person who is talking constantly during lecture might be actually learning better than someone who is totally quiet and focused in listening to the lecture.

This is where laddering interviews came in. Laddering interviews helped to expose more problems about the learning experience based on individuals. It also helped to expose some underlying problems when some solutions were proposed. These problems were such as culture or shyness hindered interaction with lecturer in front of a big LT.

I learnt during laddering interviews that it is very hard to expose problems in greater detail as the conversation will sometimes drift out of topic. Also, the interviewees might sometimes not understand the underlying meaning of our question, which I purposely made it “abstract” or “general” to get a interpreted answer. I thought that if I asked questions that were too specific to a problem, the answer in returned is specific to that question. That was why I asked questions as general as possible.

Later, I found that it is easier to ask from general then to specific if a problem area surfaced. Then after I have asked enough questions regarding the problem area, I would go back to the general questions and probe in deeper once again. This was my technique used in later laddering interviews for the final assignment. Laddering interviews require experience and good communication skills to really probe out the deepest information to find the root of the problem.

I find laddering interviews and ethnography are a very interesting topic or way to obtain information. As a computer science student, I have learnt to gather information in a empirical or quantitative way. But I particularly like such qualitative information gathering methods as it really reveals important details which is difficult to obtain in the formerly mentioned way. I have always knew that interviewing is a way to obtain answers, but never have know that probing as detailed as possible can lead to find the root problem!

These methods also particularly applies well in marketing or product conceptualization where the end product or service is made for the customer, so we need to know how to design for the customer. Which i feel companies should invest money into these areas.

Assignment 3: 4 Pleasure Analysis

Name: Luo Jia Ying Judy, 22
Zodiac: Aquarius



Personal information:

Judy works in a media company orientated around film advertising and promotions. Just graduated from NUS School of Business majoring in marketing, she is now working as a marketing assistant in the company. Although the pay is not fantastic for a graduate, she loves her job and looks forward every day for new challenges and experience.

Since majoring in marketing in the university, Judy has realized the value of dressing well and projecting the right image. Marketing requires her to impress clients; and also for her to show confidence to herself and her clients. While in Junior College, she has been studying hard and not caring about her own image. Thus, realizing the importance of being well-dressed, Judy has improved her fashion sense and style and expanded her wardrobe.

Though Judy has the average looks of a woman, her self-confidence and sense of style gives out an aura of charm and attractiveness that rivals even her pretty peers. She is street-smart and loves to socialize with people, as it is also part of her current job. Judy is straight-forward/frank lady and says what she really wants to. This “straight-to-your-face” attitude always makes her peers envy her, as she dares to speak up and challenge while they do not there to.

Judy spends her time with her girl friends when she is not with her boyfriend. A regular at flea markets, she and her girl friends are always at a constant look out for unique items that do no cost much. She loves to doll herself up with unique items that makes her just shine. After a day of shopping at flea markets, the gang of friends would chill out at a nearby Starbucks to chill out. Judy has just met her boyfriend not long ago. Though she is not seriously into her relationship, she looks at it as a form of comfort after long days of work. She would like the care and protection of a guy.

Work Environment:
Working in a media company as a marketing assistant requires Judy to meet clients at other design studios or fashion shows. Thus, being constantly in contact with highly fashionable people also requires her to dress well so as not to be disgraced at. Using her own money, she buys clothes at flea market and Mango, a design brand she favors. This is one of the reasons why she loves her job. It allows her to socialize with these people while making use of her creativity to come up with marketing plans to attract these people. After a hard day’s work, Judy would look at the pictures she had taken with the people she met in the day at fashion events and upload it to her blog or facebook account where she can share with her friends and also add the people in her photos to her pool of friends, a marketing gimmick.

IT literacy:
Born in Singapore where she had been using the computer for blogging, friendstser/facebook, Judy is quite IT literate with her computer stuff. She often brings around her small compact Sony digital camera. It has a big LCD screen and 3x zoom-lens which are the wow factors for her. Always self-photo-taking with her friends and colleagues, she never fails to amaze her fashion peers with her camera skills. Though Judy does not know the detailed workings of her digital camera, she knows how to make use of the functions to get the best out of her photos.

Attitudes:
Judy loves to try out new things. Even though it might turn out bad, she would try it nonetheless. This is inline with her frankness and openness character. As such, her fashion might seem at times too revealing considering her chinese background and culture, but to Judy it is just a matter of perspective.

Motivation for high-tech stuff
Her motivation of high-tech products can never exceed her motivation for fashionable materials. As long as the gadget works to her needs, Judy is contented. Being able to play with new technology does not excite Judy, nor does solving how to use the complicated technology satisfy her ego. Give her a Vogue magazine and she will discuss with you about fashion all day long.

Personal and professional goals
Judy is focused in her job. She looks forward to gaining a better position (hopefully a promotion from within) so she can fully utilize her creativity and skills. She is still young, so Judy can still try out more roles and gaining the much needed experience she requires to climb the ladder.

Physio-pleasure

• Loves to walk at flea markets for one whole day and she won’t feel tired. (Appreciation)
• Enjoys wearing perfume. It makes her smell good and it attracts people around her. (Need)
• Enjoys lazying/sleeping at home on her straw chair under a cloudy day. (Need)
• Once in a while goes clubbing with her friends to dance and at the same time socializing (Appreciation)
• Once a month, Judy would go to a spa/health centre to relax her body and mind. She gets facial treatments and body massages by the professional ladies there. It is also there where she makes shares her work experiences with, and refers her friends to the spa centre. (Need)

Socio-pleasure

• Loves socializing with fashion/media/entertainment industry people. Though it is part of her job, networking with these people gives her a sense of status and pride. The association she gets satisfy her very much. (Need)
• Loves taking photos of herself and together with her friends. (Appreciation)
  
• The envy she gets from her friends (her association with the fashion people) makes her feel good (Appreciation)

Psycho-pleasure

• Her straight-forwardness/frankness to people that “wows” people makes her standing out among the crowd. She loves the attention of the “wow”. (Need)
• Likes to try new things, even if it opposes her traditions. (Appreciation)
• Going to spa once a month relaxes and recharges her mind (Need)

Ideo-pleasure

• Works hard to gain the respect and promotion to the level where she can fully show her skills and expertise and creativity. (Need)
  
• Work hard, play hard. Besides working hard, Judy rewards herself with shopping, spa treatments to pamper herself. She needs to balance herself. She has one life to live. (Need)
  
• To be a fashionable, hip creative marketing head. (Need)
  

Physio-pleasure	Socio-pleasure	Psycho-pleasure	Ideo-pleasure
Loves to walk at flea markets	Loves socializing with her work-related (fashion) people	“Wow” attitude she gets from peers	Works hard to gain respect and promotion
Likes putting on perfumes	Loves taking photos of herself	Like to try new things	Balance herself, rewards herself
Enjoy lazying around or sleeping	Envy from friends	Visits spa centre to relax her mind	To be fashionable, hip creative marketing head
Once in a while clubs
Visits spa centre to relax

Product Specification

Physical Appearance:

• Slim and holdable in a woman’s hand.
• Stylish design. Design must be able to fit any kinds of fashion outfit.
• Design must not be too classy that it will associate with rich ladies or “Tai-tais”.
• Contemporary design that suit the Gen-Y
• Have a perfume scent on the phone material. It smells good when brought close to the face

Technical Specs

• No need for advance functions such as GPS
• Able to take good videos
• Able to take good pictures (quality)
• Have a movable camera or double camera so that the display screen is facing towards the person holding the camera (self-picture taking)
• Well-sized and spaced out key pads. Ladies with long finger nails require bigger keypad size as they have to use the flat surface of the fingers to press.
• A schedule appointment function that is simple and easy to use. Reminds her of up-coming events
• Entire phone interface is easy to use and requires almost no manual reading. Uses basic instinct to navigate around the phone interface.
• Large storage space for images and videos.
• Able to sync and upload images/videos to computer easily and fast.

Other Factors

• Trusted mobile phone brand that will give her sense of confidence of reliability
• Exclusive phone
• Comes with a stylish mobile phone pouch that is exclusive for this phone only
• If it is tied in with a designer label, it gives her a plus factor to buy it
• Not too expensive, she would go for the cheaper one yet almost good looking one.

Similar products:



Nokia's designer phones may appeal to Judy, stylish and nice. However, it is not that exclusive enough as compared to LG's Prada phone. It is classy, however expensive.

Thanks to my friend, pei, for the photos.

Assignment 2: Product and Emotions: Watches

Watches are a daily necessity. It tells the time for a lot of people. Keeps appointment on time, making sure people know the correct time of the day. Besides telling the time, watches have also become a fashion accessory for some people.


Behavioral watches:

A casio watch

These watches either serve the basic necessity of the wearer or offers specific functionality for the wearer. For example, boys in Singapore often use Casio digital watches while serving the army. They are cheap (around SGD$20+) and serve the basic necessity of telling the time, together with a back-lit screen for knowing the time in the dark. Army boys know that their watches will go through rain and mud with them, thus getting a cheap watch which serves the simple purpose of telling the time is suffice. Even if it spoils, the cheap price will not hurt their wallet, and their heart. The design is also very simple and common that there isn’t much to look at or drool at.

A diver's watch

Diving watches, like the one above, is another kind of behavioral watch that is targeted at divers. Though they are slightly expensive (few hundreds), divers will know their true value and often take into account the extra functionalities that cater to their diving needs. Though it doesn’t sport a fancy design, these rugged watches are still designed with slight muscularity, due to the target audience are usually males.


Visceral watches:

Top to down: DKNY, Gucci, Prada watches

Fashion nowadays isn’t complete without matching accessories. Besides wearing the latest season fashion, one would often add in details such as bangles or watches to complete the entire look. These fashion watches are usually designed by big fashion labels such as DKNY, Gucci, Prada etc. Often, the aesthetic of the watch exceeds the functionality. These watches are expensive too (usually from few hundred to a thousand dollars), and they do not offer much functionality except displaying the correct time. People buying these watches are usually brand-conscious or materialistic; they buy for the sake of the brand or for the design. Although there are similar imitations of the designer watch, people often get the genuine for brand-name sake.

Fashion celebreties often advertises these watches by wearing them to galas or runways. Then magazines would also photograph these celebs and comment on their fashion. Such branding advertising is surely a way to get brand-conscious people to get their watches.


Reflection watch


Top tp down: Rolex, Franck Muller watches

The finest watches. Timeless watches. These watches exhibit class, status. Usually owned by the wealthy, celebrities or royalties, owning this separates one from the rest of the commons. They are usually hand-crafted by the finest watchmakers, resulting in a timeless masterpiece. Brands suck as Rolex, Franck Muller, or Patek Philippe & Co. fall under the fine watches category. Some watches are made with gold, or encrusted with diamonds, they exhibit an aura enough to capture one’s attention. Since they are usually associated with the rich, famous and royalties, having one on your wrist just makes you feel different. Mention it is a Rolex or Franck Mullar, people will look at you, or perhaps even treat you differently.

Of course, you must be able to afford that difference, at a cost of at least SGD$1000 to SGD$10000 or more. It is an entire different crowd from the rest, my friend.

Patek Philippe & Co. Watch. Costs a bomb.

Washing your dirty hands at a Basin

Toilet is everyone's best friend. Its probably the most frequent place we go in our entire lives...

You have just done your toilet business and you head for the basin to wash your hands, that's good hygiene. So this is what you see at the basin:




You reach for the tap's handle. Oh my gosh, you can't find it! Relax. It could probably be an automatic tap. Intuitively, you place your hand under the hose. Nothing comes out.

Don't panic yet. You move your hand around to capture the automatic sensor. Nothing comes out still! After some scratching of head with your dirty hands and playing with the tab, you trying turning this nob,





Water comes out. Salvation at last.


Tap Review:

There are a few standard design for taps:

1. Twisted Nob: The nob is very obvious which usually sticks out of the tap itself
2. Flip switch: a lever style switch that controls the amount of water coming out of the tap.
3. Automatic: placing the hand at the right place that allows the sensor to capture

For this tap design, it would be design 1. But the twisted nob is not obvious at all.



From the image above, there is no nobs sticking out of the tap to make it apparent to the tap user. It would be only after elimination of the type of design (ie from flip to automatic then finally nob), the user would then try to find out where the nob is. The protruding line on the nob MIGHT give a clue to the user that it is a twisted nob, but some people might think it is part of the tap's visual design.



I was around to witness another toilet commuter figuring out how to use the tap. He had his hand under the tap hoping water will come out (he thought it was automatic). After a bit of thinking, he tried twisting the nob.

Solution:

If the tap is using a twisted nob design, make it obvious. Visual cues on the nob, such as arrows indication, would greatly help users understand that that is a NOB for water. Making the entire nob a single color along with the entire tab will not help in guiding the user.

And toilet users won't feel like an idiot playing with the tap, figuring how to get water out.

Opening a Toothpaste

I was browsing through Bad Designs and came across on the article of "How do you open a toothpaste". I agree with author, that it isn't very obvious on how to open the toothpaste seal (using the piercing tool). However, the design suggestions made by him wasn't really feasible.

1. Using a cap that un-seals while screwing it open: If it was possible, it would have been done. But if the tube was squeezed tightly while the cap is still unsealed, I believe its contents will seep out through the small capillaries of the screw mechanism.

2. Directions on how to open: It kinda wastes printed space on the tube itself. Companies (usually) won't do this as I think they have lots of info to put on the tube. And, they would probably have a mindset that consumers KNOW how to use the piercing mechanism. A BIG probably.

Rather, I think a good solution would be color-coding the Piercing Mechanism and the surface of the seal area. The color would have to be outstanding and caught noticed by consumers. The matching colors on both the piercing mechanism & sealed surface would allow consumers to understand that these 2 parts MATCH each other. And, Something sharp + Flat surface = Pierced Surface. The last step, once noticed by the consumer, is intuitively known to him (and all).

Testing

My first Blog post. Really. Well, its the 4th rather. The first 3 was for another school project.

Enjoy my critiques on product designs. :-)