Disqus - Latest Comments for Sam

Re: Genesis

Sam — Tue, 15 Jan 2008 14:53:12 -0000

Well you're off to a good start with that book list. I love Buxton's book... he's an amazing speaker and he writes the way he speaks (...amazingly?). Lots of great perspective for the work that we do.

I picked up a ton of good book references while at Microsoft from some people who are thinking about the future of design communication. Let me know if you want me to pass some along.

Re: You like us, but do you know who we are?

Sam — Thu, 31 Jan 2008 15:08:11 -0000

Funny story from my time at Microsoft. An employee survey asked us to classify our role in the company, and like Cam, I found they were trying too hard to pigeon-hole the UCD function into buckets that didn't quite work.

I sent it out to my team, and I some great responses. One is worth sharing; it went something like this: "It's not even just usability disciplines. I'm technical support at the end of usability studies when a user didn't get something. I'm QA when I'm arguing for bugs on the same level as other testers to impact the product. And I'm *constantly* selling - not the product, but my own skills and abilities to help people to understand what I do."

I'm not sure the need for such a broad skill set is *unique* to our discipline, per se, but with how much its emerging (as Whit points out), we're going to need to be generalists for a long time to come.

Re: IA Summit 2008 Opening Keynote: “Journey to the Center of Design” by Jared Spool

Sam — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 18:15:44 -0000

This is so refreshing to see. Part of what wasn't clicking at my last job was that nobody was realizing the importance of having a vision to rally around. When I tried to develop that vision, the culture worked against me; but when I followed their direction and backed off, suddenly nobody knew what to do.

I think those are three valuable points, and I definitely think that is where our field is going. I'll make sure to keep them in mind.

Well written! Very informative!

Re: PayPal’s Live Chat Falls Short

Sam — Mon, 19 May 2008 18:42:25 -0000

Wow, not only is the design a bit off, but that interaction is incredibly shady. Even if the design had been well conceived and visually appealing, I think I still would have been wondering what happened.

I'd almost write to PayPal help and demand an explanation. I guess your email address isn't too much information, but if it were me, I'd have a serious trust problem with PayPal. (In fact, reading this, I do have a trust problem with PayPal!)

Re: Links from 8/8/2008 to 8/18/2008

Sam — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 08:33:00 -0000

UI-Patterns is cool. Have you seen PatternTap