30. April 2009 by justdanika.

While reading Infotopia (Sunstein) I came across an area talking about brainstorming and discussing what types of groups can come up with good ideas. He mentioned a quote that directly contradicts what the design community believes.

“For such problems [brainstorming], deliberating groups have been found to do far less well than statisticl groups. The apparent reason is that deliberating groups discourage novelty.” He then goes on to say that you are better off to brainstorm individually and then to collaborate on decision making and judging ideas.

Deliberating groups are designed under the assumption that through deliberation they will improve judgements and predictions.

During a brainstorm there are set rules that need to be followed to encourage a good brainstorm. The first 3 are directly related to group dynamics.
1) Defer Judgement
2) Encourage wild ideas
3) Build on the ideas of others

Trust truly is the most important aspect of a group brainstorm. To feel that you are not being judged on your ideas and that you are contributing.

Sunstein goes into these during his social influences of “deliberative failures” due to the fact that people silence themselves. He says people fear their statements will be disliked or ridiculed (see Rule 1 and 2).
The problem with individual brainstorm (as Sunstein suggests as a solution) is that you can not utilize rules 3 without a group. Rule 3 states that your ideas can be enhanced and become more innovative as you hear others experiences and ideas and build off of them. A brainstorm is only as powerful as the collection of the experiences the people bring to the table. An unspoke idea or experience is useless and can not help others grow their ideas.

There are proven ways to make deliberation groups better group brainstormers and remove the lack of trust from the equation:

1) Do improv to let people relax and feel energized by the group. Work environments especially, usually encourage “normal behavior” and you need to break people out of it to get a good brainstorm.
2) Team building exercises to encourage acceptance.
3) Brainstorm on a topic not related that is suppose to be funny.
4) Talk about the opposites.Brainstorm a bug list to get people talking about the topic on a personal level.

These types of activities can break Sunstein’s suggestion that deliberation groups can not be good brainstormers. They can be but they need a some prepatory work before hand.

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27. April 2009 by justdanika.

Different technologies dot history and craft the behaviors of groups. In the past it was automobiles that allowed people to move farther from their neighbors and their place of employment. This behavior change, not the car, have changed how people live their lives now and the future of how people interact. In the future you can’t say solar power is going to save the earth from global warning because it is not about a technology. As long as people are reckless with their energy use a technology will never actually help.

Shirky states this on the cover of his book. “Revolution doesn’t happen when society adopts new technology, it happens when society adopts new behaviors.” This statement is driving engineers, designers, politics and other influential groups to think about how to change how people behave. A technological solution is simply a pill fix for the culture that is unsustainable.

Sustainability lies within people changing how they behave and though technology can help that or encourage it, it can not be the sole effort. Understanding groups and how they have changed is important for understanding how to create infectious action. Shirky discusses lowering transaction costs and then getting the promise-tool-bargain ratio correct to effectively form a group.

Here lies Shirky’s disconnect. There is no behavior change in this, it is just different. People have been forming groups since the beginning of time for every rhyme and reason under the sun. As he puts it, “faster is different.” Yes it is different, but it isn’t a change in behavior. All of these social tools that have been created across the world have given people new tools to achieve goals that they have always had but just have not been able to achieve due to lack of communication. I don’t see how helping people to achieve their existing goals is changing behavior.

I believe Shirky’s book title would have been accurate by saying something such as

“You can’t change behavior with just technology, but you can utilize the ease of group formation to encourage that behavior change.”

or

“Empowering groups is a 21st century phenomenon. By lowering the transaction cost of action, behavior change is no longer reliant on technology as a driving factor.”

Shirky never addresses behavior change, he just addresses the possibilities that the change in how people are organizing can lead to greater, faster impact. Not that I disagree with the statement of the cover, it is just not what Shirky’s book is about.

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20. April 2009 by justdanika.

There is something to be asked about people who are “odd” in the same way you are and if you are going to make an effort to be friends with them. There are 2 reasons these people could potentially be better friends.

1) Since they have a link that is “odd” they are more likely to have other interests that also over lap.

2) Since they share an intimate, very personal moment discussing a unique aspect of themselves, they are more likely to be friends because they have already broken down a barrier.

In my personal experiences, I would assume the second is a more likely answer. If you are at an event and you meet someone who shares a distinctive like, dislike or rarity with you, you feel compelled to share more about that experience. Perhaps this conversation is one of the few times you have ever felt truly comfortable that what you are sharing is not odd and that the listener truly understands your emotions. This exchange is something so deep, even if it is for the like of something trivial, it is still a very close connection that you perhaps have a strong personal value with. This is not a normal social interaction, it is rare and it usually invokes a feeling of excitement and passion.

“The net effect is that it’s easier to like people who are odd in the same ways you are odd, but it’s harder to find them.” Shirky, pg200

Shirky is talking about people sharing “odd” aspects of themselves as a way of forming new social groups. Truthfully, having an oddity in common is just a way of breaking down a social barrier. People don’t want to find other Xena lovers or Witches, they are just using these unique aspects of themselves to skip awkward introductions and know that they won’t be judged for what they like. They can then talk to someone openly, honestly as if they had been friends for years and years. They can be real and share personal stories all because they were able to be themselves during their first encounter discussing something that makes them “odd”.

It is a question to whether you could simulate this experience to allow people to interact with other people who they may not know more openly and remove the need to share something odd just to get past that barrier. Is there a situation or tool or product that could provide people this ice breaker?

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15. April 2009 by justdanika.

Maybe Celine Dion was a visionary…

First and fore most, the social tools that exist today have turned love from a sappy emotion into an acceptable expression. The internet has now actually reduced the effort needed to show love but it can also now have a greater impact.

The community that can now be created using the Web is vast, elastic and limitless. People are getting together and collaborating to fight for change in the Catholic Church (one of the most deeply routed organizations on the planet) and they are also getting together to create encyclopedias.

People can show their passions and love with greater impact that lasts a lot longer by being able to join up with people everywhere who share those deep emotions.The community that develops is appreciative of this love and support and enhance it. A showing of love, like entering an article on wikipedia about something you care very much about sharing, will be around for very many years to come. This is a lot longer than that pair of earrings you bought or the cupcakes you made.It will also continue to be seen by millions of people globally.

Now that is how I want to show love.

Let me break it down mathematically to you in terms of value:

1 hand written card * mom = 10,000 love pts

1 hand written card * mom * shows it to dad = 20,000 love pts

1 text * mom = 100 love pts

1 wikipedia entry = 100 love pts

1 wikipedia entry * 1000 views =  10,000 love pts.

Now imagine if that wikipedia entry reaches 10,000 views by next year or better, 1 million views. Suddenly your love has been shared and surpassed the value of anything you could have created and tried to show to 1 person.

Love can suddenly accomplish GREAT things beyond any perception humans had 10 years ago. So go on, if you have a love and need to move a mountain for it, I bet you can find other people who have the same love and combined…you can truly move that mountain.

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8. April 2009 by justdanika.

“Mass amateurization is a result of the radical spread of expressive capabilities, and the most obvious precedent is the one that gave birth to the modern world: the spread of the printing press five centuries ago” Clay Shirky - Here Comes Everybody

Mass amateurization is the hit fad right now caused by providing people with the tools to “dable” in almost anything.  It is no longer unusual to be a jack-of-all-trades. Everyone can learn, study and become conversational in almost anything.

This varies from things (wine, food, technology) to professions (travel agency-expedia, CPA-turbotax, blogging-journalism). The society we live in today provides mountains of information that can keep you busy for days endlessly wielding through websites, reading information, conversing with total strangers and developing a stong opinion on a topic.

The longer you talk about a subject (a product, service or experience) the more substance that subject now has to its name. The stronger “it’s” sense of importance becomes. People provide objects with meaning by spending time further developing their relationship with it even when they are not engaged with it.

Mass amateurization has become an every day occurrence. It is important to realize that when designing, to understand that people will want to fully understand their products. They don’t put web page addresses on objects just to take up space. Designers of those objects know that by allowing further engagement with those objects on an intimate level will further develop the “relationship” with the product.

The more people connect to an object, the more they will promote it and create a “story”, a narrative for the object, bringing it closer and closer to the life of a person. Giving the object power beyond that of the physical object.

Designers must understand this power, research it and design for it from day 1.

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6. April 2009 by justdanika.

Here is the DL

Beijing is amazing.

I got to spend 8 days in Beijing with 11 others students from Stanford and 12 Peking University Students for my Cross-Cultural Design class I am taking this Spring.

My team is working with Adobe learning about self-expression in China, how they use digital media and how they differ from American’s in how they present themselves online versus how they are in person.

You want to learn about the Chinese culture, this is how to do it.

As a culture they differ from us in where they place their priorities, and what makes them an individual. The majority of young adults also have no idea what it is like to have a brother or sister as the majority are products of the 1-child law. They also think its rude to be loud on a train(rush hour and it was nearly silent).

My stereo-types were destroyed. I didn’t see haglers and thousands of bikers or anything old either. Debatable if this is a good thing, but everything was very modern. Their public transit worked like a dream, it rivaled my Europe experiences in clenliness, ease and reliability.I felt safe, everyone was friendly and inquisitive and happy to help us with food, traveling and directions.

I am thankful very much to my new 12 PKU friends as well as my new Stanford X-Cultural friends.
It is going to be a great quarter really diving into the culture and needfinding and designing for this awesome culture!

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3. February 2009 by justdanika.

Assignment: Design 3 pens in the style of 3 different designers.

We had to research designers, archtiects,  artists and whoever we were interested in in order to really get into their style. Then we designed pens in their “style” as if they were going to create a pen.

My three designers & renderings below. I am building them now.

Richard Rogers - Architect, Lloyds Building (London), Pompidou (Paris)

Hella Jongerius - Dutch Industrial Designer

Ralph Lauren - Rugby

Next I need to actually manufacture 2 of the 3. Stay Tuned.

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14. January 2009 by justdanika.

Assignment Art160-Design a Cake

Really you are going to give me a masters in engineering to design and make a cake?

Works for me…

Chocolate Stout Cake…made with Guinness. Covered in a chocolate Guinness glaze topped with a cream cheese frosting. Served upright in a pint glass (or shot glass) and eaten to your hearts content.

Happy St Patty’s Day…just a little early.

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12. January 2009 by justdanika.

Classes are up and running…and its going to be an amazing semester.

Not only have all 3 of my professors let me know that their class is the most important, but they all are passionate for the students to succeed.

This semester I am going to:

1) Learn how to turn a wooden bowl on the wood lathe

2) Perfect the Art of Needfinding

3) Build a Lamp

4) Make a Cake

5) Build a Personal Statement

6) Find My Voice

7) Go to Beijing

Wish me Luck!

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23. December 2008 by justdanika.

Hot!

I’m reading the Art of Innovation…

Teams…literally, I couldn’t sleep the other night because I was so enthused by what I had read. Thinking about the work I had done at Pratt & Whitney and how our team worked I was inspired to pick it apart.

What was wrong with how we did work? Was it the fact that no one was passionate? There were negaholics? We were really spread out? We all worked as individuals? Lack of challenge?

Yes there were issues but one thing the Measurement Center had right was the right mix. We had young engineers who were all really good at their jobs and were actually really smart. If you weren’t great, everyone knew it from day 1 that you were never going to cut it designing instrumentation.

The Right Mix is a hard concept to hit on the target. People interviewing sell themselves with words/writing, not action. I think a temporary job to feel out an new employee works great…but then you end up like some of our BEST employees, contractors, that get kicked to the curb regardless of the fact that they really did hit the mix just right.

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