thirtyonethree

As it becomes easier and easier for designers to pack more features into the little boxes they want us to buy, it’s going to become more and more important to ask the questions about which features should be included and how will those features improve our lives. This is what experience design is all about…

This is part of a post by Jared Spool. I post it here mainly for myself. I found this helpful to think about for the future. I think about being part of team’s creating tools and features that will help make ministry happen on local campuses. I want to keep these two questions in mind: which features should be included and how will they improve the lives of those they are intended to help.

Kathy Sierra writes about the differences between “an architecture of participation” and “Sharing.” The first contributes content that we can benefit from. The second seems to be sharing too much information about our private lives. She pleas with those doing Web 2.0 to not let “harnessing the collective intelligence” become a place for group therapy. I think she puts forth a good argument and raises a good concern about how something beneficial can also feed something that is not so beneficial. As one of my collegues has said recently, “Just because you can, doesn’t mean you should.”

I encourage you to visit Kathy’s article on the Creating Passionate Users blog. She has an interesting chart that shows the scary similarities between group therapy and Web 2.0.

On Monday, I started reading John Piper’s book, God is the Gospel. My first impressions is that it is challenging, refreshing and I am looking forward to getting more into it. My prayer is that it will cause me to view the gospel with a fresh wonder and be refreshed by the good news.

Here is a challenging passage from the book:

“The acid test of biblical God-centeredness - and faithfulness to the gospel - is this:

• Do you feel more loved because God makes much of you, or because at the cost of his Son, he enables you to enjoy making much of him forever?
• Does your happiness hang on seeing the cross of Christ as a witness to your worth, or as a way to enjoy God’s worth forever?
• Is God’s glory in Christ the foundation of your gladness?”

From God is the Gospel by John Piper, pages 11-12

As I begin this book, my heart’s cry is that I would make much of Him, make much of Jesus. I think about the song,Much of You, from Steven Curtis Chapman’s last album. Piper’s writings inspired this song and it is the desire of my heart that I would live my life to make much of Jesus not look to be made much of myself. The challenge the book has brought forth in my mind is, in what ways do I desire to be made much of by God and how do I desire lesser things above the all-satisfying gift of God Himself?

Reading this book is one more step in the journey I have been making in considering God’s glory and what is means to live for His glory. John Piper has been a big part of that journey and another book, Revolution Within, has been very helpful in understanding on a very practical level what it means to live for God’s glory (see earlier blog entry for more about this).

One of the blogs that I follow is UIE’s BrainSparks. There were two best practices that Jared Spool posted recently that I found interesting and would like to consider integrating into my practice.

• Two simple post-test questions - these are two questions they ask users after a usability test. I could see using these questions with others to evaluate a current site or in the process of a redesign. The questions are: “what are two things about the design that you liked?” and “what are two things about the design that you did not like?”.
• The one-minute test - This is a practice they use at the end of a meeting with a design team. I could see using this at any meeting. It helps you to see if everyone is on the same page. The idea is to have everyone write down the answers to three questions and to only give them a minute to do it. Then they will have everyone share their answers. Depending on the atmosphere of the meeting, everyone might read their own answers aloud or they may be collected and read anonymously. Here are the questions:
  • What was the big idea? (What was the most important thing you heard at the meeting?)
  • What was your big surprise? (What was the thing you saw or heard that surprised you the most?)
  • What’s your big question? (What’s the biggest unanswered question you have at this time?)

I am an internal processer. I often process things from meetings and then think of things I would have liked to have said during the meeting several hours or days later. There also times that I have concerns or a sense of something that I can’t quite articulate at the moment but after processing it for a couple of hours or days, I am able to communicate and understand what that “gut feeling” I had during the meeting or interaction.

I appreciated a recent blog entry by Kathy Sierra on Creating Passionate Users. She addressed this issue and talked about how sometimes it is the fast talkers who win, those who can articulate things quickly. But the problem is they may may sound good but it may not be the best input or the best solution. She gives some tips to those of us who need time to think and process through those “gut feelings” to a point of articulating.

The most practical thing I got out of the post is this statement that she encourages people to memorize: “I have some concerns, but I need a little time before I can really articulate them. I think this could really be helpful to me in the future.