Author: Christopher Fahey
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The View From the Other Side of the Microscope
Photo by Liz Danzico The AIGA is currently in the throes of a major web site redesign. Liz Danzico, the AIGA’s Experience Strategy Director, invited me and about 7 other design industry types to attend a card-sorting exercise to help their design team understand how the AIGA’s users think about the types of content and…
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Condescending Cultural Critique
When we evaluate movies, TV shows, and other media products that are intended to be seen by a large, mass audience, we often take two positions at the same time: What I really think of this What will Someone Else think of this? (where Someone Else is a social demographic different from your own) We…
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Microsoft Word’s Useless Buttons
It’s not bragging (in fact, it’s probably a little embarassing) for me to say that I am an expert user of Microsoft Word. I can do just about anything I want with it, and I understand most of Word’s idiosyncracies and tricks. Still, the UI has always seemed to get in my way. For example,…
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Reaching Higher Ground with Google Maps
The ever-excellent Google Maps mashup Google Pedometer has recently added an “elevation” feature, allowing you not only to see how far you walked, ran, cycled, or drove, but also to see how far up and down you went along the way. You simply click the “elevation” link and it displays a scrolling iframe with your…
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Why do Executives use Blackberrys?
Who’s the boss? The only people I ever see actually using Blackberrys tend to be high-level executives. Why is this? It’s simple: Because they can get away with it. Only the boss can sit in a conference room twiddling around with a Blackberry, their attention a thousand miles away, while everyone else is working on…
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Dell Rips off Large Businesses
On the left is a nicely-configured Dell Latitude D620 laptop as you’d see it in Dell’s Medium & Large Business store. On the right is the exact same computer if configured in the Small Business store: Not only does the Small Business store offer a significantly lower price to begin with, but they also automatically…