There ain't one web

In a recent design class problem, students were asked to make a new browsing experience out of RSS feeds. What is interesting, is that many students chose to make the navigation and organization of feeds not only easier, but, more powerful.

So, given that I can now (conceptually) search, organize, browse, share, and 'favorite' my feeds in a plurality of ways, I ask: is a more powerful way to search, organize, and browse my feeds a way for me to create my own mini-web?

I keep thinking to this point a lot. Certainly there is the world wide web and there is no doubt about it. At the center of this web? Google. It unites the furthest reaches of the web better than anything else I've found (though I'm sure some will debate that).

But what about facebook now? Google doesn't search it (well, not really), but it is a rich environment all it's own. And I'm wondering, is facebook like another kind of web?

Meaning, the world-wide-web is composed of 'pages as objects' at discrete locations (URLs). Facebooks is web composed of 'people as objects' at discrete locations. Ning, for that matter, is a web composed of 'social networks as objects.' Lastly, to add this class assingment to the list, a large enough RSS-feed that was navigable would be 'personalized feed as objects.'

All of these objects are on 'the web' and there's no denying that the Google-web is the one in which all the others must be embedded. But as content and interaction continues to grow in these other macro-networks, do they become webs themselves? If they start with different objects, does that change how we will eventually come to navigate them? And if it does (or if it merely even more convenient to search them a different way), how can we begin to think of this plurality of overlapping webs? And, use this differentiation to a designerly advantage?

Heidi Klum's My Facebook Friend

I have a secret.

If you look at my Facebook profile, I think it’s pretty obvious that I am a straight male – not that there’s anything wrong with that. I have straight male tastes, I like straight male things, and I love Heidi Klum’s Project Runway.

I am so ashamed.

Now who cares, right? It’s Project Runway! It’s got Heidi Klum. It’s got runway models in lingerie. It’s got – heck – women looking good in tiny clothes that look good.

I so wish I watched it for that.

In truth, I watch it for the designerly minds. What’s a designerly mind? Well, that’s a later discussion. The issue at hand today? I was hanging with my neighbor and she asked if I was on facebook so we linked up our laptops and add-friended each other and, of course, immediately sat silent and stalked all over each others profiles awhile. I went for pictures, she went for “Info."

Male/female right there.

We went silent. After awhile I hear a practically disgusted, “Project Runway?”

Now, I understand I'm an unusual object. I’m accustomed to expressions of oddity. But holy cow, the way she said Project Runway I heard echoes of every straight female who’s ever laid eyes on my site. Project Runway??

As if, I was fine till that point. As if “yeah, good, sports, check, Seinfeld, check, penis, check, Project Runway??”

There was no doubt about it. I’d lost a point. I’d lost a penis point in the person’s perspective, and you know what? I like my points! I wanna keep ‘em. There are many things I can and cannot do and I am aware of what those things are. I have enough obvious negatives that I don’t need to send out a beacon to the world to take off some man-law points.

This bothers me for days.

“Should I remove it?” This was the question. It wasn't so much moral as it was a challenge. Should I take Project Runway off of my Favorite TV shows? Must I articulate all favorite shows if I am not around to articulate my liking of them.

An interesting question in interaction design is this question of on-line identity. Because, you know, in the real world, you can keep your work-friends separate from your school-friends and maybe we are a little different in the evening then we are when at the office. Which is normal in real space. We express different facets of a complex identity when we're in different contexts. It's like not painting your face for a promotion but doing so at the big game. Or being a nerd in the office and a freak in the... well, you get the idea. Many different facets.

How does one express a coherent and meaningful whole in one identity-page like facebook? Do I need to express the full complexity of me, really? Or just give the proper sound bite?

This question of a singular presentation of a complex identity is something I’d like to discuss more with you but for now let’s just assume Heidi Klum is hot.

Our (Victoria's) secret.

+ S

Steve Jobs: Audience Centered Design

Steve Jobs is the wildly successful leader of Apple. Recent product launches include innovative and pervasive technologies such as the iPhone, the iPod, and the series of MacBook laptops. How did he get such insight into what the consumer wants?

I believe it is user centered design.

I study and mentor graduate students in the Interaction Design Practicum class. The professor spoke of using personas and user tests as a way to prevent students from inevitably designing objects that are for people like themselves. He said it doesn't work well if you design for yourself. One student asked about Steve Jobs. The student said Steve Jobs considers himself the user, and designs for himself.

Well... that's not actually correct. Steve Jobs is a tech-geek billionaire. Yet Apple and Steve Jobs focus on a home computer market. IBM and Microsoft still dominate the workplace, where people *have to learn* the software their bosses bought. It doesn't matter how unpleasant the experience of use is. Employees *have* to do it. Apple focuses on the home -- where there is no "I.T. guy" to save you, no help desk, and no co-workers with the same product. There is only you.

Steve Jobs thought about *that* lone person. Or *that* lone family. What do they need? Ease of use. Positive interaction. Something that doesn't make me feel dumb but makes me feel techno-uber-savvy. I have sources and citations, but I'll talk about this often. For now it's enough to note that thinking of the user in context is what may enable them to have such success as computers step out of both our offices and our homes, and step into our pockets and cell phones. He understands the needs of the user in context.

Steve Jobs doesn't design for himself, guys. He'd be making platinum covered space shuttles. Steve Jobs designs for moms and dads in their homes. And that, is user in context.