A quick response to Terry
1. Terry puts far too much emphasis on so-called "design decisions"
made by software. I don't know what planet Terry resides on (somewhat
south of Australia?), but I don't see that kind of intelligence, real
or artificial, in the computer programs used by most practicing
designers.
2. Terry says we ought to train people to design the programs. Um, we
already do. Where has Terry been living? In my world, which is Silicon
Valley, design programs are designed with the aid of User Experience
(UX) folks, who do study how stuff is used and do contribute to the
development of the programs. Now, the fact that UX people are mostly
educated in departments of computer science and in HCI (Human-Computer
interaction) classes rather than design schools does not change the
fact that there is training and experience on how to do good
human-centered design.
The fact that design schools play only a small role in the training of
U professionals says a lot about design schools, but not about the
perceived inadequacies of the computer programs. I see no evidence
that design-school trained designers would do a better job than the
existing UX people.
Don
For those who missed Terry's post, he said, among other things:
In much of design practice, a large proportion of detailed design decisions
are made in the technology that is used by designers (think Adobe, Avid,
Solidworks, Revit....).
....
Significantly, design education programs in design schools do not train
designers to contribute to the design of this technology that is in effect
creating much or most of design outputs.
Instead, the design experts that design the design technology that in
effect dictates design outcomes are trained in other fields because of the
lack of suitable programs in design schools.
This lack of attention by design schools to training the designers that
design the technology that makes most of the design decisions seems to me
to be a significant omission in the discourse and practices of design
education.
|