My blog’s personality

The meme going around lately (at least among IxD’ers) is analyzing the personality of your blog, via Typealyzer. Very fascinating, perhaps inaccurate for some folks. However, for me (and Ghost in the Pixel) I found it pretty darn spot on, marked as an INTJ, which I am per Myers-Briggs Type identification tests from college.

The long-range thinking and individualistic type. They are especially good at looking at almost anything and figuring out a way of improving it – often with a highly creative and imaginative touch. They are intellectually curious and daring, but might be pshysically hesitant to try new things.

Also enjoy theoretical work that allows them to use their strong minds and bold creativity. Since they tend to be so abstract and theoretical in their communication they often have a problem communicating their visions to other people and need to learn patience and use conrete examples. Since they are extremly good at concentrating they often have no trouble working alone.

Some cool visualizations of the brain segments active during the blog writing activity, correlated to the elements of the MBTI personality profile (extraverted/introverted, intuitive/thinking, sensing/feeling, etc.). Check it out!

typealyzer_brain_map.png

Updated my site with Issuu

I just updated my personal site, the Papers section, with a nifty Flash-based technology from Issuu, which enables PDF files to be viewed directly in the browser via a rich, smooth interface. No more interruptive and annoying dialog boxes asking to download, etc.

If you do want to download a PDF, just use Issuu’s nifty tools for emailing, sharing, and copying the exact file URL.

Below are a couple screenshots as a preview. Enjoy!

issuu_example.png
issuu_example_2.png

Awesomely bad interfaces

I just created a flickr set of some really horrible interfaces, flawed in every possible way: visuals, usability, functionality, information design, etc. I’ve used this set in my class at SJSU, as well as my “stump speech” I give at local UI events like the CodeCamp last month.

This will be populated continuously as I find more examples… Enjoy!

2008 accomplishments

What a crazy year with the career/job transitions and traveling and consulting gigs. So what did I end up accomplishing actually? Hmm let’s take a look…

  • Spoke at the annual Silicon Valley CodeCamp about UI Design Fundamentals.
  • Taught a semester course at San Jose State University for undergrads and graduate students on UI Design Fundamentals.
  • Published an article in ACM Interactions on the value of aesthetics in user experience
  • Reviewed a couple papers for CHI
  • Traveled to New Zealand for vacation, took amazing photos and had great food & wine!
  • Delivered executive-approved UI specs for Cisco VTG phone products
  • Started and kept up this blog, Ghost in the Pixel :-)

Whew! Quite a bit done this year, but as usual I had sought to do more. So many goals, so little time. Let’s see how it goes in 2009!

I have a (few) dream(s)…

Hope this doesn’t read like a “bucket list” (gulp!) but instead just a lifelong “to do list” as a designer, aside from the daily rigors of client projects, and so forth…

  1. Design my own font, Udanium Sans and Serif (in a family of weights, of course)
  2. Write a series of short books (a la Maeda’s Laws of Simplicity) on the profound topics of Strategy, Language, Innovation, Culture, and Experience, which would have the cute nickname SLICE :-)
  3. Author a best-selling memoir of my journey in Silicon Valley through Oracle, Adobe, Cisco, and other companies, and the lessons learned
  4. Illustrate a graphic novel or comic book issue (at least do the cover artwork)
  5. Do at least one of these photographic workshops, led by Santa Fe and/or National Geographic
  6. Have my own photography and art/illustration gallery downtown (or at least a temporary opening with nice wines and cheeses)
  7. Map out the entirety of design knowledge into a visually compelling diagram series, per Dick Buchanan’s landmark seminar at CMU
  8. Give the keynote address at a major design conference
  9. Design and grow a design curriculum/syllabus for a major university
  10. Take a class/workshop at the Culinary Institute of America (CIA)