Monthly Archives: October 2008

As someone who is a supporter of touchscreen technology and its uses (and voting machines would fall into the excellent use category, if done properly), the problems with touchscreen voting machines are cringeworthy. Basic, basic errors that could have, should have been detected months and months ago. Errors both from a technical and a usability standpoint.

Filed in Interaction Design, Technology, Touchscreens | Comments (0)

It’s too bad Father’s Day is eight months away. And that I don’t have a lawn anymore, because I would definitely want one of these: the Automower Solar Hybrid.

Filed in Products We Like | Comments (0)

Most books about industrial design fall into two camps. On one side are the books that are pure eye candy: coffee-table like tomes with beautifully-lit product shots. On the other side are books like Making It: Manufacturing Techniques for Product Design which, while valuable, are also technical and not for the casual reader. In the middle is the book Process: 50 Product Designs from Concept to Manufacture.

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Robin Chase, founder of Zipcar, spoke last night at one of the David H. Liu Lectures put on by Stanford’s Product Design Program. Here’s a few things I took away from it.

Filed in Green Design, Product Design 2.0, Speaking Summaries | Comments (0)

The Discovery Channel has a new show called Prototype This in which a team of engineers put together a wacky project every week. It’s a fun show, and one that shows off the playful spirit and deadline mania that creative people can have when working under pressure on something new.

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How many times have you turned on your car radio and there’s a song playing that is halfway through? And you wish you could rewind the song (or the discussion) back to the beginning? I’d love to have a type of TiVo for the car radio.

Filed in Product Concepts | Comments (0)

Instead of only being able to either Tap to Select/Activate or Slide to Move, now you can combine them. With these touchscreens you can Click and Move, effectively adding (at least) one new interaction design paradigm to work with.

Filed in Interaction Design, Technology, Touchscreens | Comments (0)

The next web is all about the machines: hooking up our until-now “dumb” devices to the network and to each other. The next web will be one of placing humans in context with their objects and visa versa.

Filed in Product Design 2.0, Technology | Comments (0)

Start–ups can get by with very little. The saw horse desk. Garage as office. Stealing your neighbor’s wireless. There’s a lot of ways to be scrappy. But I know very few start-ups who are able to get by without a whiteboard.

Filed in Kicker, Tinkering | Comments (9)

I just discovered my old professor Golan Levin had a new project this year, nicknamed Snout.

Filed in Industrial Design, Interaction Design, Interactive Environments, Products We Like | Comments (0)