Sometimes I get to lecture a crowd or two about the near future of smart networked products and services. This is an image I have used to describe where product design is heading. It is originally borrowed from robot research, showing what they call the “uncanny valley“; the steep drop just before the curve reaches the upper right corner of the chart. It shows how [ Read more ]

Imagine that things could speak. What would they say? – This was one of 26 questions put to 42 persons between the ages of 18-50 years old in Tokyo (Japan), San Jose (USA) and Beijing (China) that took part in a photo-dairy/self-ethnography study conducted by the User Experience Lab.

The question has two answers: What thing? and what should it say? (The study was by the [ Read more ]