器具的进化《Scott Bower：All about the context》

All about the context August 6 2006

By Scott Bower - See all my reviews

I found this book to be very illuminating in light of what I do (interaction design) and the books I have read recently on the latest in computational neuroeconomics maninstream pattern recognotion theory interaction design visual design industrial design computer engineering new marketing theory and information design around complex systems. In fact this book is almost a stake in the ground on how the manufacturing process invention and branding created the artifacts in our environment. Better than the Industrial Desig books I read 10 years ago. I think we would call these "case studies" and "use cases" in modern terminology. I mention all the fields above because every single one of them have an exact doppelganger in the past.

This book is a brilliant look at process and can be used as a research tool when looking at why something like the iPod caught on and why almost everything that has been developed at MIT in recent history (except eInk) has never gained a foothold in popular American culture. In the face of the rise of "everyware" computing it's adoption in places like Korea and Japan and only limited use by the rich for personal security in the US I would say this is a must read for contemporary designers no matter what depth of complexity their task at hand. This book predates the web making it very enlightening in light of user-centered design in recent years.

This book looks at the relationship of genius design corporate R+D pop culture the feedback loop for product innovation and the adoption of standards around SIMPLE things. This means these case studies can be used to ***yse the failures (and how failure breeds innovation not "form follows function") of our complex information economy and embedded systems. Society has gone through it all before. And as projects become increasingly team based and open sourced (like Stanford's new d.school) just about anyone can find value in this book based within this context.

http://www.amazon.com/Evolution-Useful-Things-Artifacts-Zippers-Came/product-reviews/0679740392/ref=cm_cr_pr_link_1?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=0&sortBy=bySubmissionDateDescending