Carma,
Thank you. That's the word I was trying to think of. I think it may be the article where I'd previously seen the word but I know it's the subject matter and designer that had been the source.
This gets back to the recent "function" discussion (or at least my out-of-the-main-conversation comments.) As a Modern Boy, I find Apple's recent efforts to be creepy flashbacks to bad '70s design tendencies to put vinyl faux walnut on everything. OTOH, references to the familiar features can not only make learning a new system easier but can be a source of appealing form.
This is where a lot of interesting things ranging from Don's writing (and revised thoughts) about affordances and the struggles of minimalists like Loos over "decorative" features of structure to the problems of looking at "high tech" from a mid tech perspective. (If Apple had display technology that was 25 years ahead of where it was in the early '80s, would their interface design been as schlocky as some of the stuff they're doing now?)
Gunnar
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Gunnar Swanson
East Carolina University
graphic design program
http://www.ecu.edu/cs-cfac/soad/graphic/index.cfm
Gunnar Swanson Design Office
1901 East 6th Street
Greenville NC 27858
USA
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+1 252 258 7006
http://www.gunnarswanson.com
On Sep 24, 2012, at 9:15 PM, Carma Gorman wrote:
> Hi, Gunnar.
>
> Is skeuomorphism the word you referred to earlier but couldn't think
> of? This article
> (http://www.fastcodesign.com/1670796/a-former-iphone-ui-designer-defends-apples-fake-leather-design-philosophy)
> defines it as "the idea that new designs retain ornamental elements of
> past iterations no longer necessary to the current objects’ functions"
> (which sounds like the vestigial features you mentioned earlier). The
> writer continues, "You see this [kind of skeuomorphism] often in
> Apple’s software: The Notes app is presented as a yellow legal pad,
> while Game Center is modeled after a Las Vegas-style casino table,
> with lacquered wood and green-felt cloth."
>
> Carma R. Gorman, Ph.D.
> Associate Professor, School of Art and Design
> Southern Illinois University Carbondale
> Associate Editor/Lead Reviews Editor, Design and Culture
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