Sometimes I look around and I hate what the web has become.

Years and years ago when I first came to the web, back in the mid nineties, my favorite website was called “Wisteria”. It was a whimsical, beautiful, personal website that explored mythology, fairytales, kitchen magic (homemade cosmetics and organic cleaning supplies, etc.) gardening, and […]

I recognize that the relationship between objects and culture is reflexive: culture determines how we make and use things, and the things in turn change our culture. Even so, its seems remarkable to me that anyone place the craftsmen beneath the rulers—the policymakers, the kings, the legislators—since the “people of brass and iron” are the people that take our internal dreams and project them into external space.

But interaction design alone isn’t enough. In order to bring intimacy to the web, those of us in charge of designing web experiences have to think very carefully about the emotions people feel when engaged with things they love.

At the heart of user experience lies a word I rarely hear bandied about in professional circles: love. It’s an unfortunate omission since, as Mick Malisic of frog design fame points out, “Design really is about loving something.”

Although White people are thought of as standard or neutral in visual design, there really is no such things as a neutral person. Visual designers need to thoughtfully consider their use of ethnicity in design.

A blinking OPEN sign is just as bad as an article written in “stop motion” writing. Design should make my life easier. I should be able to get my donuts and read an article thanks to design, not despite it.