

Article 1651 of comp.cog-eng:
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>From: [email-masked] (Thom Gillespie)
Newsgroups: comp.cog-eng
Subject: aesthetics of the interface
Message-ID: <[email-masked]>
Date: 3 May 90 01:54:08 GMT
Sender: [email-masked]
Reply-To: [email-masked] (Thom Gillespie)
Organization: School of Education, UC-Berkeley
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References:

Does anyone know of anyone who has looked at interfaces as an aesthetic
experience which influences success? I ask this question after reading Mark
Chignells article in SIGCHI , April 1990. I think that aesthetics fits in
Chignell's taxonomy but I can't figure out where. I also think that aesthetics
may be a very important element but that it is overlooked by technical
designers for 2 reasons: the skill is lacking in the interface designer and it
may be impossible to 'quantify' the aesthetic experience other than to ask did
you like it or was it pretty. A lot of interface evaluation work seems to be
aimed at what it is possible to quantify rather than what should be examined --
this isn't limited to interface design and evaluation. Buildings aren't
(supposedly) built in downtown San Francisco unless they pass an an aesthetic
review. Shouldn't computer interfaces be held accountable in a like manner?
And, How?  Can a word processor be aesthetically pleasing and not be of sound
design? Can you design an unaesthetic version of PacMan? I don't mean one which
doesn't have sound, graphics, animation, just plain old ugly -- this might be
difficult given might be difficult given the state of post-modernism.

I guess part of my question is 'Are there interface designers who are artists'.
This thought was also reflected in Paul Heckel's 'Elements of Friendly Software
Design' where he pointed out that the original movies were all done by tech-
nologists because it was considered a technical field and he suggests that this
evolution will occur in interface design. As far as I can see the artist is
only called in to provided graphic design at a late date and only as a last
resort and they never have the veto power a director has in the movies.

The division between what is cognitive and affective is firmly entrenched in
society and still reflected in this discussion group by having it named
cognitive engineering as opposed to affective engineering -- no I'm not trying
for yet another discussion group. I'm just thinking outloud and in public.
Thanks.

--Thom Gillespie

--Thom Gillespie