Human behavior is an interesting thing. With a little snooping, you can actually find out quite a bit about people. What objects occupy the spaces that they commonly inhabit? Why are they there? Look at your neighbor’s desk at work. What objects are there? Are they displayed so they can be easily viewed by the occupant, or are they displayed so they can be easily viewed by others? Each object tells a story about how the person wants to be perceived, either by themselves or by others. Sam Gosling wrote a fascinating book called Snoop: What Your Stuff Says About You and it’s all about the different messages that people send with the stuff they place around them.
Author Archives: Denny
I have a pair of old hiking shoes in my closet. They’re dirty, worn out, and the tread is almost all gone. I finally vowed to get a new pair after my last attempt to hike Mt. St. Hellens. The lack of traction was becoming dangerous on the snow. I bought a shiny new pair of shoes this winter that will carry me up the summit trail later this summer, but I still haven’t thrown my old shoes out. I can’t seem to get rid of them.
Information is important. Information is the basic currency of what I do. I am a User Experience designer, which means that Information Architecture is one aspect of a project that I work on. I make sure that information is findable, valuable, and usable. Sometimes it is important to hide information until it is specifically requested. This helps users stay focused. Other times it creates a better experience to display more information on a page, making it easier for users to scan.
Chickens ain’t easy. Well, actually they’re not too hard. It’s not like owning a dog that you have to take out on walks and clean up after. But when comparing getting eggs by raising your own chickens to buying eggs from the store, owning chickens is definitely the harder route.