Mar 8, 2024No One, No Where BotsOriginally published at https://acuity.design on March 8, 2024. I have just started a new project with a German museum. They have sent me their strategic and visitor engagement plans in a couple of PowerPoint slidedecks. I have used Google Translate to try and understand what is being communicated in my…4 min read4 min read
Feb 26, 2024Text is not a good interface for detailOn Threads, Rotomonkey, a professional Environmental Technical Artist, has critiqued this new Sora generative AI video clip. Not so much on the realism of it, but on the usability of the AI system within a production process of image imagination, option creating and editing of possibilities. …Content Design4 min readContent Design4 min read
Feb 14, 2024Being human, being socialThis is a post about sharing images and text as something humans have done for centuries for personal wellbeing. The current period has led to greater capacity to make and share but the underlying intent is deeply embedded into humans and their societies. This is a sketch diagram I wrote…3 min read3 min read
Feb 8, 2024Schema and enabling capacitiesStarting with Marshmallows The Marshmallow Test is most often used to deride children and their current, and possibly future, self control. However, there is also something else in the research. …2 min read2 min read
Jan 28, 2024Faking our way to social failureI am reading a book about the Habsburgs at the moment. There’s a chapter which starts with a discussion of the Mechanical Turk (as pictured above). A table-sized robot that successfully played chess. It was demonstrated at the court of Theresa Maria in Vienna and then across Europe. This automata…AI4 min readAI4 min read
Jan 19, 2024Music, memory and protestI am reading The Revolutionary Temper by Robert Darnton. It is a history book about the popular experience of the pre-French Revolution period. It is an odd book in a sense that it is about tracing and tracking how sentiment shifted in Paris as events occured. …2 min read2 min read
Jan 18, 2024The God View trapWorking on a transit hub wayfinding map at the moment and they have fallen for an old information architecture mistake in physical space and human centred design terms. When you only work with top-down 2d maps and whiteboards, it is easy for the system-view (the God view) to become the…2 min read2 min read
Jan 17, 2024Somewhere to put your dreams and fearsThis is a post about making and offering accessible maps but, more fundamentally, it is about creating a space for people to put their dreams and fears. Humans create cognitive maps within themselves. They imagine, learn and perceive so much and need some way of creating patterns to find meaning…2 min read2 min read
Jan 13, 2024FAQ knowsThis is quick post about wayfinding and FAQ (Frequently Asked Question) webpages. There is a lot wrong in the above diagram I drew during a BlueSky chat but, as with most of the artefacts I make, it’s an attempt to clarify to myself a few questions and to try and…3 min read3 min read
Jan 7, 2024Engineering Design in Climate CrisisThis is a short post about a model for talking about design in the climate crisis. The complete diagram is complicated so I will work thru the elements and build up the meanings I am trying to communicate. Hope and Energy are critical themes. The underlying mechanism is Permaculture and…Design8 min readDesign8 min read