Bernhard
Rieder is Associate Professor of New Media and Digital Culture at the University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands.
While still in Paris,
he was co-responsible for an MA program in interaction and web design, concluding
his Phd research on the social and political dimension of information
processing. His background as a web developer, researcher, educator, together
with his recent, current position in teaching Media theory, in the university’s
Media studies department, (:faculty of Humanities), compose a unique line of
experience and flair. Digital communication, society, design, the information age, issues and problems: here
are some basic facts and figures, explained thoroughly, yet effectively by Bernhard
Rieder.
Picture above from:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/silvertje/7535118470/
Α4D-D4A: We were at the multimedia rush, back in the
beginning of the noughties (2000), when we heard that access to digital
(personal) data will be maximized , through a common server, running through
your (digital) TV, laptop AND mobile phone. Today cloud computing is finally
here, how this reality affects the design of new media apps?
Bernhard Rieder: Well, I’ve been a bit out of the loop
concerning the latest design practices, but one of the realities is certainly
that the necessity to work for different screen sizes and interaction paradigms
requires quite a lot of very concrete thinking about device-specific
interaction patterns and a lot of highly abstract thinking about how to coordinate
between devices, synching data, and so forth. My impression is that design is
becoming less about specific technical requirements (including graphical work)
- a lot of people can use Photoshop or write some code and outsourcing has
become commonplace - and more about what you could call "activity design”, which moves from what happens on a
specific screen to the question what people are doing, or what they could be
doing. Besides its technical dimension, the cloud is about allowing activity
patterns to move from one screen to the next. Apple’s continuity project is a
recent example, but so many programs now have a website, desktop app, mobile
app, etc. and what holds it together is not a particular interface or design
paradigm, but an activity or service. This means that designers need to be
concerned with questions that were traditionally asked in the humanities and
social sciences.
Α4D-D4A: What is the most common clashes you experience
in young peoples debates, during your sessions, regarding computer design?( For
instance, the eternal conflict between web designers and web developers always
occurs, even in an academic environment like yours?)
B.R: When I taught design or development some
years ago, I found that this opposition was beginning to slowly fade away, even
if it was slower than what I would have liked. But some of the best designers
were beginning to get pretty good at coding, which really also fed back into
their design practice.
Α4D-D4A:You once mentioned that you should need NO
more than 3 clicks to navigate through an application, in order to reach a
function-result, otherwise this app’s interface is extremely inadequate (you
used another word but that’s classified info ;-). Have you changed your mind?
Do you have any favourite apps , today, that you use regularly?
B.R: It’s of course an overstatement and the
slavish following of some usability mantras can really be detrimental to
creativity. But what I still like very much about these ideas is that users are
not there for the purpose of your app or website. They have their own lives and
ideas and struggles and neither the time nor the inclination to learn a badly
designed or complicated interface. Things have been getting better, but in
particular in Europe, we’ve had so many examples of really badly designed stuff
where usability was not of any concern that something like the three click rule
had its place. But it’s clear that interface design, in particular, has done
enormous strides since mobile appeared and when the activity orientation I
mentioned above really kicked in.
Concerning
favorite apps, I love the distraction-free writing
trend that started some years ago. Stuff like Ulysses
on the Mac is really such a boon to writers. I’m still waiting for something to
make the email avalanche more bearable, though.
Α4D-D4A: Energy, climate, supplies, science, space,
economy, design. Notions that are changing dramatically, succumbing to the
necessities of the crisis era. As a programmer, professor and digerati, can you
define the most important stakes, regarding the making of the future digital
media?
B.R: That’s a big one. My main worry is that complexity in all areas is growing, but our willingness to
adequately deal with it is not. By that I mean first of all that the
attractiveness of the quick fix, the slogan, the hip shot diagnosis, or the
fast thinking is growing rather than diminishing. Things have to go fast and
there is little time for introspection and deep deliberation. But most relevant
problems today are not only complex in the sense that they have many different
components, but also because they have complicated histories and engage
increasingly diverse people and ideas. That means that we would actually need a
lot of time to unpack the problem, to hear each other out, and to think through
a number of lines - and there’s rarely time for that. In my research area,
which basically concerns the political dimension of information processing, the
people concerned with critique or policy have rarely a robust understanding of
technology and the technologists are oblivious to the political dimension of
their work. They come together in research projects or conferences and I
constantly hear one group complaining about the other - if only the computer
scientists were more open, if only the social scientists were less vague, etc.
Understanding the other’s ideas not only takes willingness, but years of
exchange and the time to learn about sometimes fundamentally different ways of looking
at the world. But since everybody is so busy, exchange risks becoming
superficial, petty, and thus ultimately frustrating. It’s maybe a naive wish,
but I hope that we’ll be able to pause a bit more, to take a bit more time, and
maybe to become a bit more prudent.
Α4D-D4A: A kid/young person comes to you, asking your
advice; he/she wants to be a hypermedia architect, a designer of intelligent
digital systems. Which steps he/she should follow, to realise this, and to
overachieve?
B.R: Go broad. With things like codecademy, stack
overflow, etc. there’s really no excuse any more to not learn how to
code, at least a little. Maybe you won’t become a developer, but at least
you’ll be able to be part of a productive conversation about technical specs.
And if you have a more technical background, go to the museum, look at a design
magazine, read a novel, see a play. You’ll maybe never become an artist, but
you’ll hopefully develop a wider appreciation of culture and human diversity.
There is nothing more depressing than hearing from somebody in the first
sentence of a conversation what they are *not*. To both I’d say to stay up to
date on digital culture - there are so many great sites out there that do
quality reporting on stuff from gadgets to NSA spying and that’s the larger
context every designer or developer now works in.
Α4D-D4A: Thanks
so much for your time Bernhard!
Enjoy more of Bernhard Rieder’s views, ventures, articles and research on:
http://thepoliticsofsystems.net |
http://rieder.polsys.net | https://www.digitalmethods.net | @RiederB
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