To do some more pushups on the internet There may be a lot of things that have to be studied, but there is also what I call "occupational therapy for the opposition" that says, send them off to do some more pushups on the internet. You need to be mindful that it is possible to use information, and the need for information, as a delay for the call for action. Ursula M. Franklin, Every Tool Shapes the Task informationethicswwwjustice
Good design is practical design In the context of web design, Dieter Rams’ principle is not only a resounding criticism against mindless trends and meaningless decorations. It is a humanist reminder to put material honesty and social responsibility above the pursuit of the “pixel perfect” design. Chuánqí Sun, A case against "pixel perfect" design Dieter Rams: As Little Design as Possible fashionethics
An ethics of mutual care Foregrounding maintenance and repair as an aspect of technological work invites not only new functional but also moral relations to the world of technology. It references what is in fact a very old but routinely forgotten relationship of humans to things in the world: namely, an ethics of mutual care and responsibility. Steven J. Jackson, Rethinking Repair ethicshumanitymoralitytechnology
The mirror test In the early years of this century, the most highly respected diplomat of all the great powers was the german ambassador in London. He was clearly destined for great things...yet in 1906 he abruptly resigned rather than preside over a dinner given by the diplomatic corps for Edward VII. The king was a notorious womanizer and made it clear what kind of dinner he wanted. The ambassador is reported to have said, "I refuse to see a pimp in the mirror in the morning when I shave." This is the mirror test. Ethics requires that you ask yourself, What kind of person do I want to see in the mirror in the morning? Peter F. Drucker, Managing Oneself ethicsvalues
An equivalence In both early Christianity and Islam, theologians made a claim about architecture likely to sound so peculiar to modern ears as to be worth of sustained examination: they proposed that beautiful buildings had the power to improve us morally and spiritually. They believed that, rather than corrupting us, rather than being an idle indulgence for the decadent, exquisite surroundings could edge us towards perfection. A beautiful building could reinforce our resolve to be good. Behind this distinctive claim lay another astonishing belief: that of an equivalence between the visual and ethical realms. Alain de Botton, The Architecture of Happiness ethicsaestheticsgoodness
An objective matter We have been taught that there is no objective difference between good buildings and bad, good towns and bad. The fact is that the difference between a good building and a bad building, between a good town and a bad town, is an objective matter. It is the difference between health and sickness, wholeness and divided ness, self-maintenance and self-destruction. In a world which is healthy, whole, alive, and self-maintaining, people themselves can be alive and self-creating. In a world which is unwholesome and self-destroying, people cannot be alive: they will inevitably themselves be self-destroying, and miserable. Christopher Alexander, The Timeless Way of Building ethics
If you run a website If you run a website and you put official share buttons on your website, use intrusive analytics platforms, serve ads through a third-party ad network or use pervasive cookies to share and sell data on your users, you're contributing to a user-hostile web. You're using free and open-source tools created by thousands of collaborators around the world, over an open web and in the spirit of sharing, to subvert users. Parimal Satyal, Against an Increasingly User-Hostile Web wwwethics
What to refuse to do, even for the money. Michael Sorkin, Two Hundred Fifty Things an Architect Should Know ethicsdesign
Undoing the Toxic Dogmatism of Digital Design An Essay by Lisa Angela lisa-angela-fftv.medium.com Design educators and industry leaders have never reached a consensus about what comprises a “good enough” foundational education for digital design. We do not properly retire methods (or ways of conducting them) that have been shown to be ineffective. Design team seniority levels are meaningless. We’ve collectively lost the safety (and subsequently the desire) to explore and fail. We afford well-known design leaders too much power to dictate how design is discussed and conducted. We have no ethical standards. Inclusive design and accessibility are afterthoughts — both in design education and in practice. Design Discourse is in a State of Arrested DevelopmentWaking up from the dream of UXSermon for WIAD Bristol 2021On Design Thinking ethicsuxsoftware
Learning About Work Ethic From My High School Driving Instructor An Essay by James Somers www.theatlantic.com Should we really demand that the guy who checks ticket stubs at the movie theater hones his craft? Well, yes. No job is too low to not warrant care, because no job exists in isolation. Carelessness ripples. It adds friction to the working of the world. To phone it in or run out the clock, regardless of how alone and impotent you might feel in your work, is to commit an especially tragic—for being so preventable—brand of public sin. Bob [the driving instructor] oozes concern; he wants to infect the state of New Jersey with good driving habits. He respects his public role, the fact that the minute he's done with these kids they head straight for their parents' car keys and out onto the roads we share. When I asked him what he likes to do outside of work, he laughed: "This is my life." His reward is the pleasure of depth itself. craftworkethics
The Questions Concerning Technology An Essay by L.M. Sarcasas theconvivialsociety.substack.com What sort of person will the use of this technology make of me? What will the use of this technology encourage me to notice? Does the use of this technology bring me joy? What limits does the use of this technology impose upon me? Upon what systems, technical or human, does my use of this technology depend? Are these systems just? technologyethicscollections
A Mindful Mobile OS An Article by Clo S. thistooshallgrow.com I read and loved Potential's "iOS 15, Humane" proposition. Published earlier in June by co-founders Welf and Oliver, it tackles how iOS could help us better protect our attention. As a designer who cares about and writes about digital wellness, I'm profoundly aligned with their suggestions. Persuasive design Disclosure requirement From infinite feeds to pages Was this time well spent? Regret tax Conditions of use moralityethicsuxsoftwaredesign
Weighing up UX An Article by Jeremy Keith adactio.com Metrics come up when we’re talking about A/B testing, growth design, and all of the practices that help designers get their seat at the table (to use the well-worn cliché). But while metrics are very useful for measuring design’s benefit to the business, they’re not really cut out for measuring user experience. Two levels of vetoOur obedience to the king metricsuxbusinessresearchethics
The Image of the City A Book by Kevin Lynch mitpress.mit.edu To become completely lostApparencyOn the edge of something elseNothing there, after allPaths, edges, districts, nodes, landmarks+6 More 125 Best Architecture BooksScenes of thoroughgoing samenessClues for software design in how we sketch maps of cities urbanismplacecities
To become completely lost To become completely lost is perhaps a rather rare experience for most people in the modern city. We are supported by the presence of others and by special way-finding devices: maps, street numbers, route signs, bus placards. But let the mishap of disorientation once occur, and the sense of anxiety and even terror that accompanies it reveals to us how closely it is linked to our sense of balance and well-being. The very word "lost" in our language means much more than simple geographical uncertainty; it carries overtones of utter disaster. Disorientation citiesplacegeographywayfinding
Apparency Half a century ago, Stern discussed this attribute of an artistic object and called it apparency. While art is not limited to this single end, he felt that one of its two basic functions was "to create images which by clarity and harmony of form fulfill the need for vividly comprehensible appearance." In his mind, this was an essential first step toward the expression of inner meaning. artmeaningimagesharmonyform
On the edge of something else The most common response to the question of symbolism was nothing in the city at all, but rather the sight of the New York City skyline across the river. Much of the characteristic feeling for Jersey City seemed to be that it was a place on the edge of something else. placeidentity
Nothing there, after all When asked to describe or symbolize the city as a whole, the subjects used certain standard words: "spread out", "spacious", "formless", "without centers". Los Angeles seemed to be hard to envision or conceptualize as a whole. Said one subject: It's as if you were going somewhere for a long time, and when you got there you discovered there was nothing there, after all.
Paths, edges, districts, nodes, landmarks The contents of the city's images which are referable to physical forms can conveniently be classified into five types of elements: paths, edges, districts, nodes, and landmarks. Paths are the channels along which the observer customarily, occasionally, or potentially moved. Edges are the linear elements not used or considered as paths by the observer. They are the boundaries. Districts are the medium-to-large sections of the city, conceived of as having two-dimensional extent. Nodes are points, the strategic spots in a city into which an observer can enter, and which are the intensive foci to and from which they are traveling. Landmarks are another type of point-reference, but in this case the observer does not enter within them, they are external. They are usually a rather simply defined physical object: building, sign, store, or mountain. City districtsAs a kind of gateway cities
A directional quality Paths may not only be identifiable and continuous, but have directional quality as well: one direction along the line can easily be distinguished from the reverse. This can be done by a gradient, a regular change in some quality which is cumulative in one direction. changewayfinding
Introverts and extroverts Some regions are introvert, turned in upon themselves with little reference to the city outside them, such as Boston's North End or Chinatown. Others may be extrovert, turned outward and connected to surrounding elements. The common visibly touches neighboring regions, despite its inner path confusions. place
Junctions The junction, or place of a break in transportation, has compelling importance for the city observer. Because decisions must be made at junctions, people heighten their attention at such place and perceive elements with more than normal clarity. This tendency was confirmed so repeatedly that elements located at junctions may automatically be assumed to derive special prominence from their location. citieswayfindingchoice
What we are accustomed to call beautiful Most objects which we are accustomed to call beautiful, such as a painting or a tree, are single-purpose things, in which, through long development or the impress of one will, there is an intimate, visible linkage from fine detail to total structure. beautyobjectsstructure
A certain plasticity There are dangers in a highly specialized visible form; there is a need for a certain plasticity in the perceptual environment. If there is only one dominant path to a destination, a few sacred focal points, or an ironclad set of rigidly separated regions, then there is only one way to image the city without considerable strain. This one may suit neither the needs of all people, nor even the needs of one person as they vary from time to time. An unusual trip becomes awkward or dangerous; interpersonal relations may tend to compartmentalize themselves; the scene becomes monotonous or restrictive. citiesform
As plain as day The personal experience of most of us will testify to this persistence of an illusory image long after its inadequacy is conceptually realized. We stare into the jungle and see only the sunlight on the green leaves, but a warning noise tells us that an animal is hidden there. The observer then learns to interpret the scene by singling out "give-away" clues and by reweighting previous signals. The camouflaged animal may now be picked up by the reflection of its eyes. Finally by repeated experience the entire pattern of perception is changed, and the observer need no longer consciously search for give-aways, or add new data to an old framework. They have achieved an image which will operate successfully in the new situation, seeming natural and right. Quite suddenly the hidden animal appears among the leaves, "as plain as day." natureperceptionimages