#29502
Today Jakob Nielsen is an inspiration and, through his books and seminars, a teacher to many. But what inspired him to get where he is today?
Adlin, Tamara and Jakob Nielsen. UX Pioneers (2007). Articles>Interviews>User Experience
#29504
Did ye know that studying Medieval troubadours can actually help ye understand the communication challenges we face in our 'High Church of Technology?'
Adlin, Tamara and Judith Ramey. UX Pioneers (2007). Articles>Interviews>User Experience
#28498
STC communities have moved from trying to figure out how they will work in the new model to starting to make the kinds of fundamental changes and undertake initiatives that will build value for members. We are starting to understand how to 'play' within and succeed with our new rules. For UUX to undertake new initiatives, we need more members to volunteer.
Bachmann, Karen L. Usability Interface (2006). Articles>Usability>User Experience>Volunteering
#28950
Louis Rosenfeld on Enterprise Information Architecture
In this interview with Louis Rosenfeld, The Rockley Bulletin asks the information architecture and user experience guru to talk about enterprise information architecture, what it is, where it's heading, and how you can get started.
Abel, Scott and Louis Rosenfeld. Rockley Bulletin (2006). Articles>Information Design>User Experience
#30186
Think you're not into marketing? Think again. As UX professionals, we share much in common with our close cousins, the marketers. We all seek to understand customers--needs, preferences, behaviors, attitudes, and more. We all seek to create positive touchpoints with customers and, in turn, a positive affiliation with our product or company brand. We all know the importance of communicating effectively with customers and evaluating the performance of our work.
Jones, Colleen. UXmatters (2007). Articles>User Experience>Marketing
#28357
Metrics for Heuristics: Quantifying User Experience (Part 2 of 2)
In part one of 'Metrics for Heuristics,' Andrea Wiggins discussed how designers can use Rubinoff’s user experience audit to determine metrics for measuring brand. In part two, Wiggins examines how web analytics can quantify usability, content, and navigation.
Wiggins, Andrea. Boxes and Arrows (2006). Articles>User Centered Design>User Experience>Heuristic Evaluation
#29498
Before he co-founded Adaptive Path, Mike sold hot sauce online and built giant dancing robots. Today he thinks about things like boxes of chocolates that deliver joy and surprise long after the candy is gone.
Adlin, Tamara and Mike Kuniavsky. UX Pioneers (2007). Articles>Interviews>User Experience
#27808
Million Dollar Web Usability Tips
What has long been a struggle for UEX professionals can actually be a great tool to demonstrate the importance of your role. We have found a way, using tools that you may already have, to support the users' needs that can positively impact your company’s bottom line.
Remus, Jacqueline and Jessyca Frederick. Usability Interface (2006). Articles>Web Design>Usability>User Experience
#30026
Moving UX into a Position of Corporate Influence: Whose Advice Really Works?
Was documenting and evangelizing (i.e., explaining and advocating for) UX work considered to be a critical component of what it took to move UX into a position of corporate influence? It was in some companies, but not in others.
Anderson, Richard I. uiGarden (2007). Articles>Management>User Experience>Workplace
#10064
The Narrative Web: Beyond Usability and Design
The point is not that we should add stories to our sites to ensnare narrative-starved readers. The point is that the reader's journey through our site is a narrative experience. Our job is to make the narrative satisfying.
Bernstein, Mark. List Apart, A (2001). Articles>Usability>User Experience>Rhetoric
#31830
On a Scale of 1 to 5: Understanding Risk Improves Rating and Reputation Systems
Where would we be without rating and reputation systems these days? Take them away, and we wouldn’t know who to trust on eBay, what movies to pick on Netflix, or what books to buy on Amazon. Reputation systems (essentially a rating system for people) also help guide us through the labyrinth of individuals who make up our social web. Is he or she worthwhile to spend my time on? For pity’s sake, please don’t check out our reputation points before deciding whether to read this article.
Kirtland, Alex. Boxes and Arrows (2008). Articles>Web Design>User Experience>Social Networking
#28328
Optimizing the User Experience 
Web sites should be designed to facilitate and encourage efficient and effective human-computer interactions. Designers should make every attempt to reduce the user's workload by taking advantage of the computer's capabilities. Users will make the best use of Web sites when information is displayed in a directly usable format and content organization is highly intuitive. Users also benefit from task sequences that are consistent with how they typically do their work, that do not require them to remember information for more than a few seconds, that have terminology that is readily understandable, and that do not overload them with information.
#20595
OVID Tutorial: Mastering the Complexity of Creating Highly Satisfying User Experiences
A description and presentation materials from a tutorial given on OVID at the CHI 2002 and MITE 2002 conferences. OVID is a method to use while performing User Engineering.
#30824
The problem of the perpetual super-novice is the tendency of people to stop learning about a digital product--whether it's an operating system, desktop application, Web site, or hardware device.
Sherman, Paul J. UXmatters (2007). Articles>Usability>User Experience>User Interface
#29500
From deciding he hated math to becoming the president of Adaptive Path, Peter describes a career driven by experience design.
Adlin, Tamara and Peter Merholz. UX Pioneers (2007). Articles>Interviews>User Experience
#28587
Philadelphia: User Experience Beyond The Web
Because many of the local Usability Professionals Association (UPA) members work in internet-related fields, Philadelphia's second Annual World Usability Day looked to broaden horizons by focusing on 'User Experience Beyond the Web.' The pervasive theme of the presentations by Hal Rosenbluth, James Mitchell, and Stephen Wilcox was that we actually have a lot in common.
Madaio, Mike. Usability Interface (2007). Articles>Usability>User Experience
#26571
The purpose of the paper is to develop an improved conceptual framework for researching and discussing the public library's role as a meeting-place in a multicultural and digital society.
Audunson, Ragnar. Journal of Documentation (2005). Articles>Collaboration>User Experience
#31604
Recycle These Pixels: Sustainability and the User Experience
Whether we’re designing the user experience for a digital product or a physical one, as UX professionals, we are uniquely positioned to influence the behavior of other people, for good or ill. Our employers or clients charge us with responsibility for not only defining a design problem from multiple perspectives, but also finding solutions that are better than the ones that came before. Increased energy consumption, materials waste, and the resulting climate change are the chief difficulties our generation of designers and thinkers must address—or ignore at our own peril. But for most UX professionals, sustainability—unlike usability, technical feasibility, aesthetic appeal, and even business viability—is not yet a baseline factor that we take into account when designing a product or service.
Follett, Jonathan. UXmatters (2008). Articles>User Experience>Environmental
#28250
Rendezvous with KnowGenesis: Dr. Carol M. Barnum 
Carol M. Barnum is Professor of Technical Communication and Director of the Usability Center, at Southern Polytechnic State University in Marietta, GA. She is also a technical communication consultant specializing in custom training and usability, an award-winning author, a top presenter at the Society for Technical Communication (STC) annual conferences, a Fellow of STC, and a recipient of the STC's Jay R. Gould Award for Excellence in Teaching Technical Communication. She was a member of the STC's board of directors for seven years, three years as a Director-Sponsor and four years as Assistant to the President for Publications. Her graduate and undergraduate courses in technical communication at Southern Polytechnic include a graduate level course in usability testing. Her consulting work includes testing hardware, computer-based training, software, and websites. Her most recent book, Usability Testing and Research, reflects the focus of her work on usability since 1992. In her discussion with KnowGenesis, she shared her views on how organizations can benefit by investing more on usability research.
Kudesia, Saurabh. International Journal for Technical Communication (2006). Articles>Interviews>TC>User Experience
#25709
ROI Is Not a Silver Bullet: Five Actionable Steps for Valuing User Experience Design
How can design managers use valuation methodology to better increase their visibility and position themselves as a strategic corporate resource? Here are five steps that will help.
Hirsch, Scott. Adaptive Path (2004). Articles>Management>User Experience
#31601
Rosenfeld Media: UX Publishing Startup: An Interview with Lou Rosenfeld and Liz Danzico
After working on five books as an editor or co-author, Lou Rosenfeld became disenchanted with the traditional book publishing model. So, in late 2005, he founded Rosenfeld Media, a new publishing house that develops short, practical, useful books on user experience design. Rosenfeld Media published their first book, Mental Models: Aligning Design Strategy with Human Behavior, in early 2008. I recently had the opportunity to interview Lou—along with Liz Danzico, Senior Development Editor at Rosenfeld Media—about starting a new publishing house and “eating their own dog food.”
Kaufman, Joshua, Louis Rosenfeld and Liz Danzico. UXmatters (2008). Articles>Interviews>User Experience>Case Studies
#30444
Satisficing describes the situation where people settle with a solution to a problem that is 'good enough.'
Soegaard, Mads. Interaction-Design.org. Articles>Usability>User Experience>Cognitive Psychology
#31854
Secil Watson Tells Jesse James Garrett About Experience Design at Wells Fargo
When I joined the company, they were making the transition from being an online servicing group, where people could access their accounts and check their balances, to one where they could start a relationship with their customers, through selling anything from checking accounts to brokerage accounts to services on those accounts.
Watson, Secil and Jesse James Garrett. Adaptive Path (2008). Articles>Interviewing>User Experience>Case Studies
#28902
By working closely together in harmony, product management, UX, and engineering can achieve synergy, making the product user experience greater than the sum of their individual efforts.
Gabriel-Petit, Pabini. UXmatters (2007). Articles>User Experience>Collaboration
#31602
This article postulates that we cannot address the issue of simplification exclusively by analyzing the physical and computational parameters of technology. Instead, we must understand the goal of simplification in light of the knowledge, tasks, and processing-load demands on its users. We can approach simplicity as an engineering endeavor by controlling the impact on these three usage dimensions.
Santos, Lucinio. UXmatters (2008). Articles>User Experience>Usability>Minimalism
