Wk1 reading (Design Practice)
Erickson, Thomas. 1995. Notes on Design Practice: Stories and Prototypes as Catalysts for Communication. Available online at http://www.pliant.org/personal/Tom_Erickson/Stories.html.
This article puts a huge emphasis on the communicative process involved with production. We see the emergence of the roles, communication artifacts and the processes (or models) of communication. The concepts above are then within a stage model.
I initially wanted to argue against the author’s point about stories. A story is a scenario, but perhaps a scenario isn’t a story. The goal of Use Case description is to capture all possible scenarios. I get the idea of “real-world” thinking; anecdotes are useful, but I did not see the grand distinction. But it’s clear now the real strength of this story collection concept is the development of themes. By evaluating similar sentiments a system can really be improved. Also, stories are useful in the brainstorming and design communicative process.
Another important point is that the themes from above become macro-scenarios. Then we can move into the next point-- motivations and feelings. These are the main concepts of the first stage of production.
The next stage is focused on prototypes. Artifacts which represent the project and help shape it can exist at many levels. But, the most valuable discussion here is the perception of prototypes. The engineer knows what a prototype “means” in a very different way than the PR person, the financial director, etc. In this way various prototypes may serve different uses and must be clarified to be qualified. In a highly successful communication scenario a prototype would fulfill perspective accuracy for all viewers.
The distinction between vision and working prototypes seems very useful. The first teases the brain with the general concept, and the second allows more specific critique. But the notion that all members of the team should be able to alter the prototypes may be the most pivotal mistake of real-world examples.
The article was full of great concepts, but was somewhat disorganized. There was not a single topical narrative flow. The article would have benefited from a web type layout. Ha ironic! Perhaps the journal publication was presented differently.
This article puts a huge emphasis on the communicative process involved with production. We see the emergence of the roles, communication artifacts and the processes (or models) of communication. The concepts above are then within a stage model.
I initially wanted to argue against the author’s point about stories. A story is a scenario, but perhaps a scenario isn’t a story. The goal of Use Case description is to capture all possible scenarios. I get the idea of “real-world” thinking; anecdotes are useful, but I did not see the grand distinction. But it’s clear now the real strength of this story collection concept is the development of themes. By evaluating similar sentiments a system can really be improved. Also, stories are useful in the brainstorming and design communicative process.
Another important point is that the themes from above become macro-scenarios. Then we can move into the next point-- motivations and feelings. These are the main concepts of the first stage of production.
The next stage is focused on prototypes. Artifacts which represent the project and help shape it can exist at many levels. But, the most valuable discussion here is the perception of prototypes. The engineer knows what a prototype “means” in a very different way than the PR person, the financial director, etc. In this way various prototypes may serve different uses and must be clarified to be qualified. In a highly successful communication scenario a prototype would fulfill perspective accuracy for all viewers.
The distinction between vision and working prototypes seems very useful. The first teases the brain with the general concept, and the second allows more specific critique. But the notion that all members of the team should be able to alter the prototypes may be the most pivotal mistake of real-world examples.
The article was full of great concepts, but was somewhat disorganized. There was not a single topical narrative flow. The article would have benefited from a web type layout. Ha ironic! Perhaps the journal publication was presented differently.
posted by joshua at 5:30 PM
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