design for common people

One blog to rule them all…

ELBeavers — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 21:48:19 +0000

I recognized that my blog posts fell into several big categories—funny, productivity, family, writing & creativity, and design—and experimented with spinning them off into their own spaces. During that time I moved from posting infrequently on one blog I was posting infrequently on five blogs.

The end result of the experiment is that I am consolidating everything into one site—Southern Athenaeum—as your one-stop shop for infrequent blog posts by yours truly. Just forget about those other blogs. Thanks.

However, you may want to keep a bookmark for Stuff I read over on Tumblr. It’s a quick drop box for me to share some of the small things I find online.

Independent Lens . OBJECTIFIED | Independent Lens | PBS

ELBeavers — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 22:02:26 +0000

Objectified, a documentary about design:

“We designers have been working to stimulate people’s souls and minds.” —Naoto Fukasawa, designer

Look around you. Within five feet of you are dozens—if not hundreds—of manufactured products that you interact with every day. If you are at work, perhaps there is a laptop, a stapler, a No. 2 pencil, a paperclip, a mobile phone, a coffee mug, a pushpin or an ergonomic chair. At home there may be a flat-screen TV, a pair of boots, a razor or a kitchen utensil. All told, we each touch or otherwise interact with an average of 600 manufactured objects every day.

via Independent Lens . OBJECTIFIED | Independent Lens | PBS.

Rethinking the power plug

ELBeavers — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 21:42:46 +0000

Why not rethink the lowly electrical plug. Here are two great ideas I’ve seen today, which is a little weird:

It’s so plausible and so obvious a product that it should produce a few red faces; how many more years were we going to attach our palm sized mobiles and wafer thin laptops to an object that's barely been touched since its first design in 1946? Choi picked an everyday product that most other designers find too mundane to dabble with and drastically improved it – exactly the kind of thinking that we should be celebrating right now.

www.minkyu.co.uk

via RCA student radically improves the UK plug | ICON MAGAZINE ONLINE.

And another one courtesy of Nevn Mrgan:

Dustin Curtis: On very basic site design needs

ELBeavers — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 01:33:18 +0000

If the first thing I see on your site doesn’t directly answer the question “What is this?” then you have failed.

via Twitter / Dustin Curtis

Why am I blogging about design?

ericbeavers — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 23:26:37 +0000

Every time I buy gas at the station down the street—the one that has the lowest prices in the area—I mutter under my breath about the pumps. If you use a credit or debit card at the pump, there is no tactile feedback to the buttons you’re required to press to move gas from the pump to the tank. No aural feedback either. Can’t we at least get a beep? I’m pushing buttons and I can’t tell I’m pushing them! Sometimes it works. Sometimes it doesn’t.

This is bad design.

I realized that I have begun recognizing the significance of design in everything. Design isn’t just the furniture in your living room or the layout of that magazine you enjoy reading. Design isn’t just about looks, but about functionality.

I spend a fair amount of time grumbling about bad design, but I appreciate good design for what it is, too. When something functions great, and without any thought, then that is good design. When you can use a tool to complete a task without thinking, then that is a tool worth having.

But why do I want to start a blog about design? I have several reasons, but one is my epiphany that design really matters to me. It’s something I am passionate about. Sometimes, when I’m talking about design, I can see the eyes of my audience either glazing over or darting around searching for an exit.

I was listening to a podcast recorded at South by Southwest 09. In that recording [Merlin Mann](http://www.merlinmann.com) and [John Gruber](http://www.daringfireball.net) titled [HOWTO: 149 Surprising Ways To Supercharge Your Blog With Credibility](http://www.43folders.com/2009/03/25/blogs-turbocharged). In that blog, Merlin Mann reached through my earbuds and grabbed me by the lapels. Mann said:

How do you know you if you need to start a blog? People keep telling you to shut up.

Find your passion, learn everything you can about it, and find a venue to share your passion. Design is one of mine. I hope you enjoy the blog.