Two Books for Summer Shelves

Two books have jumped out at me so far this year as thought-provoking. Neither is about usability and both will stimulate a better appreciation of the world into which usability fits.

The first is a new classic. "The New Media Reader", edited by Noah Wardrip-Fruin and Nick Montfort, is winning fans from those who glance at its contents list. If you don't know who Theodor H. Nelson is and the significance of "A File Structure for the Complex, the Changing and the Indeterminate"; if you are not familiar with the contributions to computing of Bush, Turing, Wiener and Licklider, then this book is even more essential to you, than for the people who just want the keystones of network history all in one place. I've never seen a book so perfectly compiled to save teachers and students illegal photocopying. (Many texts here are now quite hard to find elsewhere.)

Delightfully, it also deals with the other disciplines that have fed the development of new media: Laurel, and Boal on theatre; Borges and "The Garden of Forking Paths"; Haraway, McLuhan, Turkle, and Winograd and Flores theorising about how people use media; Suchman on situated action; Bolter on writing; etc, etc... It's like a party full of your best old friends.

There is also a website with promising support features for the book, linked below.

The other book is entirely different but just as broad in its disciplinary reach. Harvey Molotch has brought a unifying vision to product design and the many elements that come to together to form stuff. "Where Stuff Comes From: How Toasters, Toilets, Cars, Computers and Many Other Things Come to Be As They Are" (which does not come accompanied by a useful website, but does have good onboard illustrations), provides an overview of factors and detailed specifics in a readable mix.

Talking of a toaster, Molotch comments that: 'It does not just sear bread, but presupposes a pricing mechanism for home amperage, government standards for electric devices, producers and shopkeepers who smell a profit, and people's various sentiments about the safety of electrical current and what a breakfast, nutritionally and socially, ought to be. Any particular toaster also contains the trends in fine and popular art that give it a particular look and texture of operation, including - in many models - a human satisfaction in the sound and sight of the pop-up moment. There are merchandise critics, trade associations, advertising media as well as the prior range of goods within which it must fit - wall outlets for its plugs, bread slicers calibrated to a certain width, and jams that need a crusty base. There is a global system that yields a toaster's raw materials, governments that protect its patents, a labor force to work at the right price, and a dump ready to absorb it in the end.' And that is just the start of an odyssey.

Launching the book last month in London, Molotch (pictured) demonstrated a modified easy-to-clean garlic crusher and described how it came to be made in metal not plastic. He also showed the new stuff - plastic but with moving parts - that had come as a prototype out of a stuff-maker, a tool that interprets a program of an item into the thing itself.

Books, then, that show the future by way of the past...

Associated Link: New Media Reader website

All change at the top for System Concepts
Source: System Concepts Ltd, 3 July 2009
 
Leslie Fountain has been promoted to joint Managing Director of leading usability consultancy System Concepts.

Life in UCD immortalised in fiction: you couldn't make it up
Source: UN, 2 July 2009
 
Sarah Herman's fictitious book on life in a user-centred design company has hit the shelves and The Guardian's book pages...

Interfaces Magazine - Issue 79: The Education Issue
Source: Interaction Group, 1 July 2009
 
The latest issue of Interfaces is now available as a free download from the Interaction Website.

Two new Behavioural research Tools from Noldus
Source: UN, 30 June 2009
 
Tool updates make on-site behavioural data collection easier.

Cell Phones that Listen and Learn
Source: MIT Technology Review, 29 June 2009
 
New software tracks a user's behavior by monitoring everyday sounds.

Top Six Don’ts for Usability Testing
Source: FutureNow Inc., 27 June 2009
 
Six tips for creating quality usability tests to ensure useful feedback from testers.

Usability: ‘Lovely software. But I can’t work it’
Source: FT.com, 26 June 2009
 
In a recent survey by Global Graphics, 77 per cent of office workers estimate they lose up to one hour a week because business software is difficult to use.

And what do you do?
Source: Dexo Design, 25 June 2009
 
How do you describe your job role? Here are the results of a recent 'Preferred UX/UI Title' Poll.

Most Doctors cite Usability as critical to Electronic Health Record Adoption
Source: TMCNet, 24 June 2009
 
It's all about 'meaningful use'.

Glossy monitors look good but can hurt
Source: QUT, 23 June 2009
 
A new advisory cites research which suggests high gloss monitors make users sit awkwardly.