Embracing Asymmetrical Design An Article by Ben Nadel www.bennadel.com Humans love symmetry. We find symmetry to be very attractive. Our brains may even be hard-wired through evolution to process symmetrical data more efficiently. So, it's no surprise that, as designers, we try to build symmetry into our product interfaces and layouts. It makes them feel very pleasant to look at. Unfortunately, data is not symmetrical…Once you release a product into "the real world", and users start to enter "real world data" into it, you immediately see that asymmetrical data, shoe-horned into a symmetrical design, can start to look terrible. To fix this, we need to lean into an asymmetric reality. We need to embrace the fact that data is asymmetric and we need to design user interfaces that can expand and contract to work with the asymmetry, not against it. To borrow from Bruce Lee, we need to build user interfaces that act more like water: “You must be shapeless, formless, like water. When you pour water in a cup, it becomes the cup. When you pour water in a bottle, it becomes the bottle. When you pour water in a teapot, it becomes the teapot. Water can drip and it can crash. Become like water my friend.” — Bruce Lee The pernicious issue with pangramsChanging Our Development Mindset datainterfaces
The Sound Of Silence A Song by Paul Simon & Art Garfunkel www.simonandgarfunkel.com Hello darkness, my old friendThe flash of a neon lightAnd no one daredSilence like a cancer growsThe neon god they made Silence
Hello darkness, my old friend Hello darkness, my old friend I’ve come to talk with you again darknessmelancholy
The flash of a neon light In restless dreams I walked alone Narrow streets of cobblestone Beneath the halo of a streetlamp I turned my collar to the cold and damp When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light That split the night And touched the sound of silence streetsurbanismweather
And no one dared And in the naked light I saw Ten thousand people, maybe more People talking without speaking People hearing without listening People writing songs that voices never shared And no one dared Disturb the sound of silence communicationlistening
Silence like a cancer grows “Fools,” said I, “You do not know Silence like a cancer grows Hear my words that I might teach you Take my arms that I might reach you” But my words like silent raindrops fell And echoed in the wells of silence silencediseaserain