Books & People

Nathan Shedroff: Design is the Problem – The Future of Design Must be Sustainable (Jul 23, 2010)

In the blog on the companion Website for his new book Design is the Problem, author Nathan Shedroff asks: "Are you as sick of sustainability as I am?" and continues: "It seems that everywhere you turn these days, sustainability is the hot topic. While this is a good thing – and a needed one – people are already getting 'green fatigue'." One might be tempted to ask: "So, why another book about sustainability?" Shedroff argues, and would probably counter, that "over the last 40 years, little has changed in spite of all the discussions, while the issues have increased dramatically. [...] What needs to change is that we all need to decide, now, that sustainability is a given." Shedroff's book intends to push everyone in this direction: While it deals with the negative as well as positive impact of his own profession, design, on sustainability, it considers the impact from a broader perspective – one which might help reach such an agreement.

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Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi & Rick E. Robinson: The Art of Seeing – An Interpretation of the Aesthetic Encounter (Jun 29, 2010)

The Art of Seeing by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi and Rick E. Robinson is based on a psychological study to discover what constitutes an aesthetic experience. This work is a result of interpretations from interviews conducted with several museum professionals who are primarily 'consumers' of art (as opposed to 'creators' of art) – such as curators, educators, and directors of major art collections. This approach to defining an aesthetic experience from the consumer's point of view makes the subject particularly interesting to HCI professionals, because they can draw parallels with what constitutes an aesthetic experience for "consumers" of the software they build. Not surprisingly, many of the criteria for an aesthetic experience explained in this book bear a striking similarity to the fundamental design principles and methods that lead to good user experience.

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Janine Benyus: Biomimicry – Innovation Inspired by Nature (Apr 20, 2010)

Biomimicry is a revolutionary new science that analyzes nature's best ideas and adapts them for human use. Janine Benyus is a natural sciences writer, innovation consultant, and author of six books. In Biomimicry, she names an emerging discipline that seeks sustainable solutions by emulating nature's designs and processes (e.g., solar cells that mimic leaves, agriculture that models a prairie, businesses that run like redwood forests).

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Book Reviews In Preparation

• Garr Reynolds (2009). Presentation Zen Design: Simple Design Principles and Techniques to Enhance Your Presentations. New Riders Press • ISBN: 0321668790 • Preliminary review page

• Derek Hansen, Ben Shneiderman & Marc Smith (2010). Analyzing Social Media Networks with Node XL. Morgan Kaufmann • ISBN 13: 978-0123822291 • Preliminary review page
• Jeff Johnson (2010). Designing with the Mind in Mind: A Simple Guide to Understanding User Interface Design Rules. Morgan Kaufmann • ISBN-10: 1-012375030X, ISBN-13: 978-0123750303 • Preliminary review page

Thomas Erickson & David W. McDonald: HCI Remixed – Reflections on Works That Have Influenced the HCI Community (Aug 26, 2010)

Over almost three decades, the field of human-computer interaction (HCI) has produced a rich and varied literature. Although the focus of attention today is naturally on new work, older contributions that played a role in shaping the trajectory and character of the field have much to tell us. The contributors to HCI Remixed were asked to reflect on a single work at least ten years old that influenced their approach to HCI. The result is this collection of fifty-one short, engaging, and idiosyncratic essays, reflections on a range of works in a variety of forms that chart the emergence of a new field. Taken together, the essays offer an accessible, lively, and engaging introduction to HCI research that reflects the diversity of the field's beginnings.
(From book presentation, adapted)

Thomas Erickson & David W. McDonald (2008). HCI Remixed – Reflections on Works That Have Influenced the HCI Community. The MIT Press • ISBN-10: 0262050889, ISBN-13: 978-0262050883

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Derek Hansen, Ben Shneiderman & Marc Smith: Analyzing Social Media Networks with NodeXL (Aug 11, 2010)

Businesses, entrepreneurs, individuals, and government agencies alike are looking to social network analysis (SNA) tools for insight into trends, connections, and fluctuations in social media. Microsoft's NodeXL is a free, open-source SNA plug-in for use with Excel. It provides instant graphical representation of relationships of complex networked data. NodeXL was developed by a multidisciplinary team of experts that bring together information studies, computer science, sociology, human-computer interaction, and over 20 years of visual analytic theory and information visualization into a simple tool anyone can use. This makes it of interest not only to end-users but also to researchers and students studying visual and network analytics and their application in the real world. In Analyzing Social Media Networks with NodeXL, members of the NodeXL development team up provide readers with a thorough and practical guide for using the tool.
(From book presentation, adapted)

Derek Hansen, Ben Shneiderman & Marc Smith (2010). Analyzing Social Media Networks with Node XL. Morgan Kaufmann • ISBN 13: 978-0-12-382229-1

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Whitney Quesenbery & Kevin Brooks: Storytelling for User Experience (Jul 22, 2010)

Telling stories is one of the most natural ways to share information, as old as the human race. This book is not about a new technique, but how to use something we already know in a new way. Stories help us gather and communicate user research, put a human face on analytic data, communicate design ideas, encourage collaboration and innovation, and create a sense of shared history and purpose. This book looks across the full spectrum of user experience design to discover when and how to use stories to improve our products. Whether you are a researcher, designer, analyst or manager, you will find ideas and techniques you can put to use in your practice. If you need to share research and design insights in a compelling and effective way, struggle to communicate the meaning of a large body of data in a way that everyone just "gets," or want to explore a new, innovative idea, and imagine its future, this book can help you, by showing you how and when to choose, create and use stories.
(From book presentation, adapted)

Whitney Quesenbery & Kevin Brooks (2010). Storytelling for User Experience. Rosenfeld Media • ISBN: 1-933820-47-0 (Paperback + PDF), ISBN: 1-933820-03-9 (2 PDF editions)

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Jennifer Preece (Aug 13, 2010)

Jennifer Preece is an online community researcher and professor and dean at the College of Information Studies (iSchool) at the University of Maryland. Her current research is concerned with the design and management of online communities, that is, what makes such a community successful, and how usability factors interact with socialibility in online communities. She works with communities of practice, health, education, non-profit and knowledge communities. Preece focusses on three main research areas: (i) knowledge exchange, cross-cultural communication, empathy, trust, and etiquette online; (ii) why and how people participate, or do not participate; and (iii) heuristics and methods for developing, maintaining and evaluating online communities.

Preece is author, coauthor, or editor of several books including Interaction Design: Beyond Human-Computer Interaction (soon coming in 3 rd edition) and Online Communities: Designing Usability, Supporting Sociability. She is also author of over one hundred and fifty book chapters and publications.
(From wikimania, adapted)

Homepage (iSchool): http://ischool.umd.edu/people/preece/
CV: ischool.umd.edu/people/preece/CV2009.pdf
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Allison Druin (Aug 13, 2010)

Allison Druin is Director of the Human-Computer Interaction Lab (HCIL) and an associate professor in the University of Maryland's College of Information Studies (iSchool). For over two decades, she has led interdisciplinary research teams of computer scientists, educational researchers, librarians, artists, classroom teachers, and children (ages 4-11) to create new educational technologies for elementary school students.

Her work has included: developing digital libraries for children; designing mobile and tangible technologies for storytelling; and developing/understanding the impact that online communities can have on children's cultural awareness.

She is the author/editor of three books on the design of children's technology.
(From interactions, adapted)

Homepage (UMD) : www.umiacs.umd.edu/~allisond • Homepage (iSchool): http://ischool.umd.edu/people/druin/
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