Olympic Logo 2012
Now that the 2012 London Olympics logo has been released into wild, only to spread impromptu protests and full blown epileptic seizures, I’ve come to admire the level of controversy this simple design has appreciated with such short-lived exposure. My knee-jerk reaction to it was probably very similar to the reaction of a lot of [...]
Self-Checkout at Wal-mart
Having worked as a design consultant on several point-of-sale systems for national retail, I find myself evaluating self-checkout stations as I come across them in my everyday routine–even when I don’t particularly want to. It’s a sickness I can’t escape these days. One system that I find particularly offensive–and I say that with my “user” [...]
Meet Mr. Usability
The scene opens as Mr. Usability sits and watches TV on a quiet Sunday afternoon. Enter Wife holding a red and white envelope strewn with the familiar Netflix logo. The paper appears tattered and worn, with a tear that almost splits the envelope in half. Wife: You really did a number on this envelope. That’s [...]
Jean Baudrillard and the Forward March of Customer Experience Design
Last week, Jean Baudrillard, the French thinker who will most certainly be remembered in the states as having provided a convenient prop for Neo to hide his illegal software in the Matrix series died of cancer. Throughout his academic career, he consistently maintained that the best representation of his thesis on Simulacra and Simulation was [...]
This is Artistic Brutality
It’s worth pointing out after my small semi-rant a couple of posts back that The Nation is running a special issue which features an appropriated cover from a once-famous WWII poster by Ben Shahn. Of course, his version was meant to rally the boys into fighting Hitler’s fascism. Today’s version represents an indelible stain on [...]
