I sat in on this talk just a few months before we founded Say Yeah. For me this was a transitional time period, when I was making the change from “guy who designs websites” to “guy who cares about users”. Beginning with those first few projects at Say Yeah in the fall of 2008, our user-centerd design philosophy has been the foundation for our work over the past 6 years.

While keeping in mind that this talk was given two months prior to the initial iPhone launch, these points stick out to me as what would eventually become mobile first design process and the MVP movement.

• Remove features that aren’t being used when the benefit of simplicity is more than the benefit of the feature.
• Remove items to create visual simplicity.
• Figure out what you need to launch, the core features and watch how people use it.
• Get the site out there. Optimize later, when the site scales.

It’s impressive how adaptable this talk is to today’s emphasis on agile and lean product management. The talk is certainly as relevant now as it ever has been.

If you’re interested the event slides can be found on SlideShare, but read on now for my detailed notes.

MeshU – Notes from Presentations – 20/05/08

Iteration & You – Designing Adaptable Websites

Daniel Burka, Digg, Pownce

High Road Architecture

• Lots of planning, years to build and iterations take as much planning
• In websites, highly designed sites–flash, etc.

Low Road Architecture

• Quick, easy to build, change, adapt.
• In websites, built on frameworks, other peoples code/standards

Establish a Visual Language

• Design elements as a ‘visual vocabulary’ similar unified style for the entire site.

Desire Paths

• Builders pave walkways, people use the grass, they build their own pathways.
• Watch what people do, how they use the site, or app, and then help adapt.
• Figure out what you need to launch, the core features and watch how people use it

Adapt to Scale

• Get the site out there. Optimize later, when the site scales.

Subtraction is Iteration

• Remove features that aren’t being used when the benefit of simplicity is more than the benefit of the feature
• Remove items to create visual simplicity

Realign, Don’t Redesign

• Don’t take out the wrecking ball and restart – it’s very tempting, too much work.
• Make adjustments over time, instead of huge increment versions.
• Major redesigns can remove the pathways that users have developed over time – break user patterns.
• Use innovations of others, not your own, people understand how the things they’ve seen work. – Ie tabs, pagination, are intuitive and people know how to use them.
• Innovate only when needed, not for the sake of it.

Make Time for Iteration

• Build in time to change things to your past work.
• Research how users use the site.
• Improve on what you have, instead of just making new things.

Don’t Panic

• You’ll get feedback, wait and see before reacting.
• Take a breather then come back in a week, or month, and see what all users are thinking.
• Once you implement a feature, you have to maintain it.

Adapt to Survive

• Convince of why iteration is important, usually based on the bottom line. Set goals, try to reach them.
• Usability tests – simple as friends and a pizza – ie. These people, this background, have this problem.

Key Points

• Low road design is much easier to adapt.
• Realign, don’t redesign.
• Create a visual language and iterate it.
• You can’t predict all eventualities.
• Remove as much as you add.
• Don’t be over reactive.
• Make time for iteration.

Product strategy as a foundational skill

If you’re looking to bring fundamental product strategy methodologies and execution to your team, we’re here to help.

Get in touch

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Some of our initial assumptions were wrong. Get feedback, fix things — that’s the only strategy.

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Following Apple’s iOS 7 announcement earlier this week, there’s been a lot of discussion around the default icon set (pictured above, right). Detractors have focused on inconsistencies, concerns around a lack of cohesion between icons, and a general disdain for the colour palette and icon styles. Designer Leo Drapeau’s taken a stab at addressing some of the more moderate considerations with his iOS 7 icon refinements (pictured above, left).

He offers some nice takes on both simplifying some of the icons (Camera, Game Center, Stocks) and differentiating others (Reminders vs Notes), but I don’t agree with his decision to go back to the iOS 6 corner radius (where icons appear smaller inside their rounded corner squares).

The new, larger iOS 7 icons have a beautiful playfulness and resonance with the smaller padding. Resetting them makes them appear less touch-friendly.

Update: Neven Mrgan wonderfully illustrates an issue with the larger icons based on their varying weights:

And yes, you need to scale to ensure lighter weight icons are not overwhelmed by their fuller cousins.

Now back to Leo: I fear he’s lost the plot in the dock, with a more complex Phone icon, under-styled Mail and Safari icons, and a thin, more conservative musical note which almost disappears when compared to the other icons.

For me, there are five concerns that stand out with the iOS 7 icons.

1. Game Center’s reflective bubbles, which are incongruous with every other icon.

2. Music’s vibrant red/orange, which is outside the colour palette of the other icons (or at least appears to be because of the dark to dark gradient, rather than light to dark gradients of the other icons).

3. The Reminders icon, which has no charm, particularly in light of Leo’s wonderful reworking.

4. The overly complex Settings and Compass icons.

5. A Camera icon that shows something that isn’t anything like my iPhone. I’m sure they still aren’t using a floppy disk as a save icon, right? The previous camera icon was a lens. Perfect.

Some minor efforts in finding consistency will resolve most of these issues, but there’s no doubt these new icons better suit the expression and the experience of iOS 7’s overall redesign.

Icons aside, the most important concern stemming from this redesign is found on the lock screen, where ‘slide to unlock’ has lost its arrow, trough, and the block that slides through it from left to right (pictured below).

Certainly some visual cues need to be added so you know how the heck to unlock your phone. I bet 50% of people try to slide up, rather than from left to right:

The post Refining iOS 7’s Icons. And What To Do About A Very Confusing Lock Screen. appeared first on Say Yeah!.

Many companies get the disease of thinking that a really great idea is 90 percent of the work. And the problem with that is that there’s just a tremendous amount of craftsmanship in between a great idea and a great product. And as you evolve that great idea, it changes and grows. It never comes out like it starts because you learn a lot more as you get into the subtleties of it. And as you get into all these things, designing a product is keeping five thousand things in your brain, these concepts, and fitting them all together in new and different ways to get what you want. And every day you discover something new that is a new problem or a new opportunity to fit these things together a little differently. And it’s that process that is the magic.

The post Steve Jobs talks the relationship between a great idea and a great product appeared first on Say Yeah!.

There is no such thing as a failed experiment—only unexpected outcomes.

The post There is no such thing as a failed experiment—only unexpected outcomes appeared first on Say Yeah!.

Apple shatters expectations when it enters a market, not when it’s already entrenched in one.

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