Having returned from the NordiChi conference in happening Tampere where the picture above is captured (+ a bit of Photoshopping) - things are slowly coming back to me. I truly enjoyed most of the sessions (all though there where also a few powernap-inducing once as well), but getting the opportunity to meet a lot of good, fun and clever people was an exciting honor.

The workshop was a success and promises a lot for the future of aesthetics in HCI approaches. We got (at least I think/hope we did) past the discussion on aesthetics as mere beauty and simplicity, a common definition in HCI that fits so nicely into the governing paradigms of traditional HCI i.e. usability. Rather the discussions circled about what kind of values, vocabulary, methods, ideals etc. are currently used about the use of information technology, and wheter this is a fruitful environment to understand, design and evaluate technology from or if new paradigms and other displines are in a better position to do this!? My own small contribution to this, the “excitability” term was well accepted, allthough I was ensured that it needs a lot of work to become a valuable contribution…!

The discussion from the workshop tied very well into the keynote speeches by professor Krisitina H��k (SICS Sweden) and especially the peptalk by Research Chair Gilbert Cockton (UK) raised the voice on a shift of paradigms in HCI. Having now read Gilberts paper in the proceeding, I think he sums it up nicely. Just to let you in, here’s the bit of the abstract:

“HCI is misdefined. We need to redefine it. HCI is misfocused. We need to refocus it. HCI has a window of opportunity to recreate itself as a design discipline. It must focus on the intention of gifted design, which is to improve the world by delivering new sources of value (…) We need to change because we must and because we can. We must change because we have exhausted all current intelletual trajectories. Our luck is running out with guidelines. Usefullness cannot be achieved solely through quality in use..”

If I’m getting the message here, I migth take the impression from Finland a little further in the polemic direction (correct me if i’m wrong). HCI is no longer JUST about ensuring that users hit buttons right on a website or find the easy way through a menubar without mental workload (refering to the current discussion on please-make-me-think). Usability is not enough to create values, in fact it may even devalue use. More over the future of HCI lies in handling the question on how i.e. a website or any system creates a value for the people (formerly known as users) who has a stake in it, and whether it creates valuable contributions to problems/opportunities that are identified - and perhaps even goes beyond and creates or “donate” (i like that word) unexpected new values to these ideals, and even invites new stakeholders to enter. This means that HCI needs to get an attitude, and not continues to beleive itself to be a indifferent, neutral, descriptive science - It is not!

Design is about creating a life-world value for the relevant people - nothing more or nothing less - it’s about making a different in the real world, by putting subjective, value-centered ideals into practice of the design. Understanding by measurment ease of use and fit to context factors will not do it, but taking the design into the messy world does - and that’s where it matters to people. HCI is still much based on the objective error-finding-correcting-validating of the measurable factores in the quality of use, this approach tends to look purely at the measurable. This is by any definition no longer a way to fully ensure peoples expectations and experiences to a design is meet. So all the usability heuristics and guidelines in the world can gather together and give me a transparent and smooth interface, but it means nothing to me if the design doesn’t add something “gifted” new and creates a value opportunity to my everyday life - many system designs does so by pure luck - but as Gilbert emphasized, luck often has the unfortunate virtue of running out!