Kai
Thank you for your intelligent and constructive remarks. Below I offer
some brief comments upon some of them. Even these brief remark took time to
write and seem long when viewed below. The dialog is useful despite (or
because of) some disagreements. For many of these issues there are no
"correct" answers.
On Thu, Aug 29, 2013 at 3:40 AM, Kai Reinhardt <[log in to unmask]>wrote:
> 1) We are talking about different things and the word "design" can't cover
> all of these things.
> ...
>
> Would a definition of design not include every form of design?
>
Don: I have defined design as the deliberate modification of the
environment to accomplish a desired goal.
Don: This covers all activities, and as such, it is not particularly
useful. I subscribe to the view that we must always talk about X Design,
where X is an ever-growing list of activities: Engineering, nanoparticle,
interaction, communication, environmental, fashion, interior, furniture,
organizational, ...
> A separation of the several design disciplines would cause a fracture and
> would render the word "design" meaningless. It would be hardly bearable for
> me.
>
Don: To me, the word design without specification is meaningless. To me,
the separation is essential, providing focus and direction to each
different form of design.
...
>
>
> Designer are working in the system of this basic process, they align all
> the parts and subsystems to reach the goal of this process, but they are
> also stepping outside the system to counter check the current state against
> the connectivity to other systems (other sytem should be an open variable;
> maybe UTE, maybe esthetic "value" ) and to prevent possible weaknesses at
> these connection points. When they step back in the basic process they are
> evaluating their work under the light of these aspects in a holistic manner
> to achieve a holistic result. They change what they need to change and
> produce the next step in the basic process. After that they step out and
> the loop starts again.
>
Don: That is indeed what I do, but not what all designers do. In
addition, this is what many creative people do, people who would never
consider themselves designers: writers, authors, construction workers,
craftspeople, engineers, scientists, ...
...
> 2) Everyone is a designer.
> What you have mentioned before is that we have no common definition of
> what design or who a designer is. If I include esthetics into the field of
> design a lot of people would not be designers (like Richard, the lion
> bender). If I include tinkering my father (and Richard) would be a great
> designer although he has only little sense for the esthetic things. Please
> keep in mind that I'm coming from a visual communications background. In a
> broader sense of design I would accept your statement because the purpose
> of going beyond the closest solutions is common to every human.
>
Don: Yup.
>
> ...
>
> 4) You summed up your personal development and asked why a designer should
> have a kind of licence.
>
...
> Who am I'm critizing are the people without such a rich pool of knowledge
> who are calling themselfes designers. Especially the field of graphic
> design/visual communication/communication design is often judged as the
> handsome sister of art. And because art is free everyone is allowed to do
> it. It's like imprisoning the whole family for the crime of one member. Or
> paying you less because your brother earned less. Or you uncle of second
> degree from your mothers side. Artist are meant to be poor (but happy)
> idealists by society. I see that visually talented people are coming to my
> market and eroding the prices activly without having the necessary depth to
> produce value. To be frank: I have financial interests.
>
Don: I understand and I sympathize, but this is where we disagree. There
are incompetent people in all areas of work (including people who have
licenses). S
o
me people get jobs in corporations, which takes away some freedom but
yields some degree of job security (less and less true, alas). Others brave
it out in the competitive market of independent or small business providers
and consultancies. Nothing is certain.
Don: I agree that there is much unfairness in the world. I especially
dislike the western financial institutions (especially Americans) who put
monetary profits above human values and who care nothing for the actual
company or products: they add no value -- they destroy value.
Don: But i do not believe that the solution is artificial job security. I
do not like university tenure systems. And i do not like the guaranteed
employment systems of many nations and labor unions.
Don: But these are personal opinions. I agree these are complex, difficult
(wicked?) problems. I have no answers.
Don: (As the American journalist H. K. Mencken said: "Every complex problem
has a simple answer. And it is wrong.")
>
> 5) Get over it.
> No. Markets are discussions among people. Discussions can be influenced.
> But now it is getting political.
>
Don: But that is precisely where it should be: These are indeed political
issues. There is nothing wrong with politics. It is how we resolve
competing interests and allocate scarce resources. Politics is good and
necessary. (Politicians however can be brilliant and principled or ignorant
and evil. Distinguish the process from the people.)
>
> 6) Sketching
> I would not tye the word sketching the craft of drawing. I would define it
> as the ability to estimate the outcome of the process defined in 1) by
> using whathever you like. If dancing or a handstand does the job for you...
> why not?
>
> Don: Buxton convinced me that "sketching" means roughing out the idea: it
can be a drawing or a construction. It can use pebbles organized spatially,
paper, wood, or foam. It is whatever spatial, physical means aids thought.
(Had a nice conversation last night with my friend (and great Japanese
psychologist, now retired) Yutaka Sayeki, about how we think with our
hands, the entire body, and by sketching. He said he is developing a paper
on "non-cognitive cognition." We talked a lot about the power of sketches
and models to use three or more dimensions to order our ideas. (More than
three dimensions if you add color, symbology, perspective renderings, time
snapshots (story boards) etc., as dimensions.)
Don: But i do not think sketching is necessary for design. It is one of the
many powerful tools we have. We use it where appropriate, but not all
designers need to. And non-designers use it also.
Don
--
Don Norman
Nielsen Norman Group, IDEO Fellow
[log in to unmask] www.jnd.org http://www.core77.com/blog/columns/
Book: "Design of Everyday Things: Revised and Expanded<http://amzn.to/ZOMyys>"
(DOET2). Pub date: November 2013
Course: Udacity On-Line course based on
DOET2<https://www.udacity.com/course/design101> (free).
Nov 2013.
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