the literal search for information is concluding. the race to shape the mass of explorations, readings and connections into some semblance of a coherence artifact begins. read and response to
traversing the edge and center: a spatial approach to design research by katie salen define how will you proceed from today… 44-54 page book (you best get going)
can’t get started? try one of these.make quick notes from books you find useful. see what explorations, readings, and writings fits under the topics.
Example: my notes from John Maeda’s book Simplicity
Simplicity= sanity (like using initials to protect privacy)
We have become uncomfortably full. Everything makes perfect sense until it doesn't.
The laws- reduce, organize, time, learn, differences, content, emotion, trust, failure, the one, away, open, power, life.
Thoughtful reduction uses less to gain more
Organize to make many appear fewer
Shrinking time feels like simplicity however fast doesn’t come cheap.
Seeing and knowing- knowledge makes things simple and creates bodies of evidence. Evidence shows confidence in what you are doing.
Simplicity and complexity need each other
The periphery of simplicity is not peripheral to communication
More emotions are better than less, openness simplifies complexity
Is trust in simplicity worth the gain? Don't pretend it is just convenience
Some things are never simple and can never be
Subtract the oblivious and add the meaningful
You need mentors to give you courage
Adding up all the little things really matters
There is no kitsch there is only kitsch
Omit the important to find “important”
Another organizational method: table of contents as metaphor
find various books from different professional areas. you could use salen’s metaphors of travel, dwelling, interaction, or find your own metaphors (but do it now!).
collect a large amount of chapter or section titles. pick and compile.
see what explorations, readings, and writings fits under the topics. expand on the selection of topics/ explorations that fit, or make new ones. re-sequence to organize the structure or to make expansions.
Example: ( I sort of used salen’s)
One brain or two
More experience = bigger brain
Public domain
I am a natural, I think…
Suicide spot
Beyond the bypass
Primitives that we are
Unromancing the dream
Faking it
Starving audience
For export
In exile
Service like the old days
Are you hypnotized?
In Jekyll’s foot steps
Its not just about salivating dogs
Knock wood
Through a broken lens
Public enemy
Public image
Dining out
Last chance
Delusions of grandeur
Annexation area
Border zones
Rest of the continent
for the memories, thanks
Crowding into the bath
Growth control
Floodway
Flight path
Struggle to lose control
Prisons by any other name
Audiences as co- designer (you think you control me but I control you).
collect a large number of taglines from magazines or advertising. covers work well but you need variety. compile them mix them up in lists. then see where what you have made fits the under the taglines. then organize the taglines based on your response to the assignments.
