Design Matters

The net gen has significant influence on the world of technology and design

People have been talking about the generation gap for many years. I remember my parents telling my sister to turn down her record player like it was yesterday.  Herman’s Hermits, the Beatles, and other British bands had clearly invaded more than America, they invaded the Hill household. My sister’s love of the Beatles was mystifying to my dad. Music was Mozart, not mop tops with odd collarless suits and crazed women fainting at the sight of a guy named Ringo. Decades later, it turns out that both my dad and sister knew what was special in the world of music, but at the time, the generation gap was very real.

Portable music technology and design circa 1965

Today, the generation gap continues, but it seems to have stretched even wider due to the rapid changes in technology. I didn’t own my first personal computer until I was in my late 30’s. My children, on the other hand, were nearly born with them. The generation I am talking about  is often refered to as Generation Y, the Millennial Generation, Generation Next or the Net Gen.  This group is marked by an increased use and familiarity with communications, media, and digital technologies. They don’t fear new technology, they just think it’s too slow. They rarely use email, and probably have no idea what a stamp costs or that you used to lick them.

I just read an interesting article published by Beloit College about what they call the Annual College Mindset List. They have published this fascinating and entertaining list since 1998. Here is an excerpt from the introduction to this years class of 2014 list:

The class of 2014 has never found Korean-made cars unusual on the Interstate and five hundred cable channels, of which they will watch a handful, have always been the norm. Since “digital” has always been in the cultural DNA, they’ve never written in cursive and with cell phones to tell them the time, there is no need for a wrist watch. Dirty Harry (who’s that?) is to them a great Hollywood director.

The Beloit College list helps us to put into context the “mindset” of this latest generation. The list provides a look at the cultural touchstones that shape the lives of students entering college this fall.

I wonder what coiled phone cord manufacturers are doing now?

Here are three of my favorites from this years list:

They never twisted the coiled handset wire aimlessly around their wrists while chatting on the phone.

They’ve never recognized that pointing to their wrists was a request for the time of day.

Nirvana is on the classic oldies station.

All of this is important because it helps to put the designer in the mindset of the latest generation of customers and technology critics. Do they care about the SysRq key, or would they prefer a Skype optimized camera ? Is it about the latest colors, or authenticity of materials? How does the environmentally responsible factor play out for a generation who never bought a hamburger in a styrofoam clamshell?  Designers always need to have a view on what’s next. What better way to study where we are going, than to understand who is leading the way.

David Hill

Alluring design, or best kept in the tackle box ?

Lately there seems to be two schools of thought concerning the design of notebook computers. One is the modernist approach of simplification, proportion, quality materials, authenticity of form, and an aesthetic that supports rather than dominates your world. Dieter Rams, of Braun fame, has talked often about this minimalist approach.  In his 1985 “ten commandments” of design, this ideal of recessive aesthetics is clearly referenced.

“Good design is as little design as possible” Dieter Rams

Ten Commandments of Design:

Rams’ design work has dominated the minds of generations of designers who admired and sought to emulate the purity of expression that he achieved during his productive and successful career at Braun. I certainly was, and continue to be,  one of them. As a entry level designer fresh out of college, I often wondered how he was able to convince people to make products so devoid of ornamentation and superfluous doo dads. Where was the traditional gold trim, blinking lights, cursive “stereophonic” lettering and fake wood grain? To some, his models must have looked like the engineering  prototype that was crying out for some design help. Rams, however, changed the face of design thinking and created some of the most successful products in history. Rams has often been called the designer’s designer. It fits.Interestingly, his influence is far from over. His legacy lives on in a design ethos that has been copied by many throughout the years. Apple has often been accused of taking Rams emulation to historic levels.

Contrast this historic Braun consumer electronics design with most of the era

Genuine simulated wood grain

The other school of thought is the antithesis of these ideas. It celebrates the “more is more” design mantra with what I am calling ” fishing lure syndrome”. Just like attracting a fish into biting the hook, these designs are about creating an immediate reaction. You just can’t help but notice it. It’s about turning heads with surface embellishment, often irrational shapes, flashy colors and swirly whirly patterns that sometimes make me feel dizzy. Many times they look as though they were designed to be aerodynamic objects intended to fly through space at warp speed. Much to Rams’ chagrin, fishing lure design is about “as much design as possible”. There goes the 10th commandment. Computer store shelves are full of this type of design. Each manufacturer is desperately trying to outdo the other with new surface treatments or molding techniques, hoping to draw you closer to the hook. Don’t let the big one get away.

Remind you of anything?

The question is simple. Which school of thought is right.? Do people want minimalist designs that soothe the soul and stress subtle perfection of execution, or do they want to make a flashy statement about themselves and their newly purchased technology marvel. As with any such debate, it’s always possible the answer lies somewhere in the middle.  We should always recognize, however, that it’s very hard to create something truly special when you aim for the middle.

David Hill

Dairy farmer surveys his new IBM friends/neighbors in Rochester, Minnesota

Today was my 25th service anniversary working for IBM/Lenovo. Incredible how fast the time has flown by. It seems like only yesterday I attended the new employee orientation at IBM in Rochester, Minnesota. I’m pretty sure it was snowing. I’ve designed, or led the design of, nearly every type of computer imaginable, but it’s about much more than that.

I’ve been blessed throughout my career by being able to work with so many amazing people. They are my friends. We’ve always shared a common desire and passion to make the best designs imaginable. I am forever grateful to all of them for making my career and life so enjoyable. Cheers.

David Hill

If you are at all like me, you have more than one AC  adapter for your ThinkPad. To be honest, I think I probably have more than the total number of ThinkPad notebooks I have ever owned. That is a big number. Some people refer to these neccessities of technology as wall warts, I prefer to call them “bricks”. I have them strategically placed throughout my world. I have one in my garage, bedroom, kitchen, family room, backpack, car trunk and of course my conference room and office. There are actually three in my office alone. Whenever I get the chance I always plug in to ensure that when I go truly mobile I always have the fullest charge possible. I guess I would rather be safe than sorry. I do try to make a habit of unplugging them when I’m not using them to avoid needless power consumption. If you didn’t know, all AC adapters consume power even if they are only plugged into the wall outlet and not an electronic device.

I thought it would be interesting to poll my readers regarding how many AC adapters they currently have in use.

If you crave more power and always want to be prepared with maximum battery power, I suggest you arm yourself with more “bricks” here.

David Hill

I recently did a podcast with Information & Design founder Gerry Gaffney. Operating out of  Australia, Information & Design is an innovative usability and user experience consulting firm. Not to suprisingly, Gerry is also a big ThinkPad fan. I thought you would find the content regarding the evolution of ThinkPad interesting.

You can read the transcript, or give it a listen here.

David Hill

First Grade at Ranch Heights in Bartlesville Oklahoma

Way back in 1963 I ventured out from the security of the nest to experience first grade at Ranch Heights Elementary School. It was a big deal for certain. Who were all those new people? Why were we made to go there?  Wasn’t it more comfortable at home? Were we really expected to eat that food? There were so many unanswered questions for the newly appointed first grader. Questions aside, we were there and we weren’t turning back. Thank goodness my first grade teacher, Mrs Cramer, was a decent and caring person. She made us all feel at home. Can you imagine what it would have been like if she had delivered on the evil-schoolmarm vision that filled the minds of most new first grade students? Rumor had it that Mrs.Castleman, another teacher at Ranch Heights, ceremoniously kissed each child before they headed home at the end of the day. The mere thought of being systematically lined up and kissed by her sent shock waves through the entire student body.

In addition to the unique personalities and experiences, part of the elementary school indoctrination was the ritual of  shopping for school supplies  Armed with a blurred mimeographed list of supplies, my mom skillfully guided her tiny shopping cart through the TG&Y store looking for the prescribed supplies.  ”No David, it specifically calls for the 10 count crayon set, not the set of 64″ explained my Mom. Did this really matter? The 64 color set certainly looked better to me, it had far more interesting colors and it sported a nifty built-in sharpener. Being the thrill seeker that she is, we bought the 64 color set.  Thanks Mom.

Was $1.00 really the highest priced item at the TG&Y?

One of the oddest items on the list eventually became my first tablet. It was strangely called a “Big Chief ” tablet. What in the world was that? Growing up in North Eastern Oklahoma, we all wondered what Indians had to do with it. Turns out it was a poorly bound tablet of  very low quality paper with exceptionally wide rules. I guess they thought the rules would help guide you through the painstaking exercise of learning to write properly. In my opinion penmanship was one of the most tedius punishments ever devised by educators. The unbleached paper was nearly impossible to write on, tore frequently, and even smelled bad. It had a kind of musty odor. How could anyone think this helped the higher education cause? To make matters worse, we were expected to write on this thing with what was called a Laddie Pencil. For those of you who don’t know, these were extra large diameter pencils. I suppose someone decided that small hands required a huge pencil. They didn’t even fit into a normally sized pencil sharpener. Curiously enough, they also had no eraser. I guess we were expected to never make a mistake.

The “Big Chief” tablet was all about content creation. A brief story, penmanship practice, simple diagrams, or a crude sketch were what mattered in the first grade tablet world. We certainly didn’t read from it. Reading was done primarily from rudimentary wonders such as the popular Dick and Jane series. Who can ever forget such literary masterpiece phrases as ” See Dick run. ” Today it would be turned into an acronym like SDR.

The Big Chief Tablet was pencil based and wireless

The infamous Laddie pencil required you to bring your own eraser

Later in life I was fortunate enough to have been given a much more creative tablet than the infamous “Big Chief” version. I’m not certain of the year, it must have been in the early 1960’s, but I certainly remember the product. The tablet was the Etch A Sketch by Ohio Arts. An Etch A Sketch is a thick, flat gray screen in a bright red plastic frame. There are two white knobs on the front of the frame in the lower corners. Twisting the knobs moves a stylus that displaces aluminum powder on the back of the screen, leaving a solid black line. The knobs create lineaographic images, not so different from a crude computer plotter. The left control moves the stylus horizontally, and the right one moves it vertically. This tablet was a real breakthrough, it promoted creativity! Okay it was a bit frustrating to try to draw a diagonal line, but it was part of the whole creation experience. I remember a friend of mine set a goal to color the entire screen black  so that he could discover the inner workings of what made the magic happen. He never quite finished before someone mistakingly erased his time consuming quest. Creativity was what the Etch A Sketch was all about.

Think creativity when you think about this breakthrough tablet design

Many years later, I was exposed to what is probably the next milestone tablet in my life. It was my first IBM tablet.  Oddly enough it was called a THINK pad, although it was clearly not a computer, and it was certianly not black. I carried one for nearly 20 years while I worked at IBM. It was all so handy for jotting down a note to myself, capturing a phone number, or of course drawing a quick sketch of some design idea. I can still remember pulling it out in the hallway at IBM to sketch the design of a System/36 control panel in front of the responsible engineer. I’m not sure he had ever seen someone draw a sketch before, he was much more comfortable with circuit diagrams and numbers. I still have the pad tucked away in a drawer someplace. It contains a nice list of outdated phone number, some old passwords, and a few very old sketches. Refills for the pad were free from IBM by just dropping them a line requesting one. Somehow I think the address listed is no longer fulfilling the refill requests. The patina on the leather cover is a priceless reminder of my many career experiences at IBM. 

As the personal computer and cell phone became more and more important in my life, and career, the friendly well worn pocket sized notepad became less relevant. I found myself sticking it in my pocket more out of habit than true necessity. It was time to move on to a new generation ThinkPad and retire my old leather friend. Sometimes change is hard, but in this case it made good sense.

My first THINK pad was the ultimate in portable content creation

The first computer branded ThinkPad was in fact a pen based tablet. It was not a clamshell notebook. Called the ThinkPad T700, it was launched in 1992 for a vertical market application. Howard Dulany, a current Lenovo software marketing manager, worked on it when he lived in Boca Raton. You can watch a short video of Howard talking about the first ThinkPad here.  It seems an insurance company had a need for a portable device optimized for filling out claim forms, and IBM was prepared to deliver a solution. It contained a huge number of innovations including magnesium construction, integrated heat sink technology, solid state storage, and of course a pen based operating system.The design point, however, was not so different from my red framed Etch A Sketch. Thankfully a stylus replaced the somewhat frustrating white knobs for manipulating content on the slate user interface.  The device was a bit ahead of it’s time, but lacked the ability to drive much in the way of content creation. It was pretty much about simple forms. 

Since those early days we launched the first ThinkPad convertible tablet in early 2005. Called the ThinkPad X41 Tablet, it quickly became the tablet of choice for demanding business applications. Sure we designed and released something called the TransNote a few years earlier, but it failed to register on the radar as anything more than an off target technology driven oddity. We learn from our mistakes. With the  X41 our refined offering finally got the balance right between viewing, annotating and creating content. Practice makes perfect.

With all the recent interest in tablets, it will be interesting to see how this market continues to develop. Is the IdeaPad U1 hybrid the answer? I certainly endorse the concept of allowing choice for how people use their devices. I also support optimization of form factor to task. The U1 does both of these. I’m honestly not certain that a content consumption focused slate is the answer. It sounds far too compromising to me.

No matter what happens in the market, I still think content creation is just as important as consumption. What did you expect?  I love to design things. Where did I put my crayons anyway?

David Hill 

I was just in Japan for a week working on our future generation ThinkPad offerings. I met Richard Sapper there along with Aaron Stewart from my North Carolina based design team. The trip there was a lengthy 24 hours door to door, including a 13 hour torture test of an airline seat. When I arrived at the hotel I was pretty much worn slick. International travel of this magnitude is brutal. We ate that evening at the Trader Vic’s at the hotel. Seems a bit odd, but it was actually quite good and convenient. We got up at the crack of dawn the next morning, rode the train into Yamato, and began a week long marathon discussing, debating, and inventing the latest design details for ThinkPad. I think you will like what we are working on.

While we were in Japan we got the opportunity to visit the Imperial Palace in Tokyo and tour the East Gardens. I love Japanese gardens and found this very inspirational from a design perspective. The Japanese attention to design detail and beauty is everywhere. Not so different from the ThinkPad design approach. While at the palace we were fortunate enough to get to observe a  team of gardeners delicately prunning the black pines perched 50-75 feet in the air. Working without ropes or safety nets, they prune individual bits of the tree with small specialized scissors. At ground level, assistants scurry around picking up the clippings. It’s really impressive to watch.

How high in the air are these people?

Japanese pruning scissors are a design treasure

Can you find the Imperial Palace?

Resting on the promontory

The trip to Japan was a great success. I got to visit my friends in Yamato, re-think next generation ThinkPad, and emerse myself in another design sensitive culture. I can’t wait to go again. Maybe I can squeeze in a trip to Kyoto, the cultural hub for all Japanese gardening. I can only hope.

David Hill

Zero Fireplace is anything but a zero

Lately I’ve been twittering what I have chosen to call ”The Design of the Day”.  Yes, my interest in design is far deeper than just computers. Design is a career, a hobby, and a way of life. My intent is to tweet a new design on a daily basis. Don’t expect to see a lot of computer tweets, that’s what the primary focus of this blog is.  I still plan on occassionaly blogging about non-computer related design classics here, but those will be much more detailed that Twitter will allow. One of the first designs I tweeted about is a wonderful outdoor fire place that celebrates both fire and fuel. This would look so good in my backyard. You can search for these tweets using #designoftheday or just follow me on Twitter. Hope you enjoy them.

http://twitter.com/dwhilldesign

David Hill

AC adapters are an ever increasing part of our lives. Cell phones, digital cameras, GPS devices, MP3 players, and of course laptop computers all use them. I personally have at least a dozen in my house, most are ThinkPad adapters which are deployed in critical spots to power my T400s.  I also have  four or five in my office, and of course one in my backpack. I certainly don’t want to be stranded somewhere without one. 

Working at Lenovo exposes you to more computer users in one day than probably any job in the world. Everyone I see has a ThinkPad in hand either on the way to a meeting or is already there using one. It’s very common for Lenovians to carry an AC adapter to meetings, especially if they are long ones.  Trust me I’ve certainly been in my share of  those.

Martha would be proud

Over the  years I’ve noticed that people are not just physically, but are also emotionally connected to their AC adapters. It’s scary just how much attention is paid to them. People zip them into special pouches, carefully carry them their in laptop bags, or purses, slide them into a convenient pocket, or sling them over their shoulder like a jaunty scarf. Some people label them with their business card to avoid disappearing adapter syndrome. This happens way too often in the corporate world. I’ve had a few people even suggest we make the adapters the exact size of their business card to enable this practice more neatly. These are probably the same people who diligently arrange/label the snarl of cords and cables behind their computer desk. I think Martha Stewart did an entire show on this. 

Are you a winder, wadder, or something else?

One of the most interesting things I have noticed is that everyone seems to have a slightly different method for winding up the adapter cord when they are ready to hit the road. They have a tendency to fall into a few categories. Some people carefully stretch and straighten the cord then precisely wind it around the adapter body parallel to the longest dimension. Others quickly wrap the cord around the body in the opposite direction. This type of winder typically takes less time to neaten things up. A few just wad the cord up in a snarl and sinch it to the adapter body with the Velcro. I like to call these people wadders. I guess they must be more interested in speed than neatness. I’ve also seen some cord purists bundle the cord independent of the adapter body.

Design inspiration can come from your own backyard

We have designed many AC adapters over the life of the ThinkPad brand. Some new processor power requirement is typically the driver for a new design. Big ones, small ones, short ones, fat ones have all passed through the design studio.Of course we have tried designing the adapter shape to make winding up the cord eaiser. My favorite design earned the nick named the “dog bone”. It won several design awards back when it was first introduced. Oddly enough, the very features we built into the adapter to aid winding made some people unhappy. The distraught crowd often stated it didn’t match their own winding style. Interesting, the shape actually helped winding whether you wound the long or short way. Some whined that it looked like a dog bone. Is that such a bad thing? Perhaps they missed an opportunity to train their dog to fetch more than a pair of fuzzy slippers. Such is the life of a designer, everyone is a critic.

Subsequent ThinkPad adapters have been pretty simple in design. They usually feature form fitting black cases, heat dissipating ribs, molded logos, a zillion agency approval marks, and of course a grey Velcro strap to top things off.  We haven’t given up on making something that adds winding value. The trick it to invent something that doesn’t add size, cost, or weight.  It also can’t have design features that jam, break off, hook your clothing or make the myriad of winders and wadders mad. Something to think about while you’re unwinding over the holidays.

David Hill

Trivia question: Where is Einstein’s brain today?

Sketching and diagraming are very important tools for the designer. This hasn’t changed for centuries. Cavemen drew pictures, Einstein drew formulas, designers draw everything you can imagine. There is a clever site where you can pretend to be Einstein at the board, totally hilarious. Drawing is a tool for both communication and problem solving. One of the traps that many designers today fall into is the desire to run to a computer to solve a design problem. Not so fast. Never under estimate the power of the traditional methods.  One of my favorites is the blackboard. When I was about 8 years old my dad put a good sized blackboard in the garage for my artistic endeavors and doodling early design project details for things like Cub Scout assignments. I followed his lead by screwing an even larger blackboard to the wall in my own garage for my sons to use. I bought it a the Mayo Clinic surplus equipment store for a whopping 8 dollars.  I ended up using it as much as they did. Some things never change I guess.

When I first started working at IBM back in the 80’s I had a huge blackboard in my office that was well over four feet wide and eight feet tall. It was a floor to ceiling statement of creativity. What a wonderful way to draw a refrigerator sized design concept. You could even draw it as though it were sitting directly on the ground. It was a great tool. Chalk may leave dust behind and perhaps gets your clothing a bit messy, but it never runs out of ink. Even if you couldn’t find chalk you could still draw in the  the residue of former sessions with your finger. Much of the mid- 90’s IBM AS/400 Advanced Series design conceptual work was actually done on that very blackboard. There is just something about an old school blackboard that still gets my creative juices going.

Would Einstein have liked this?

Okay, white boards have their place too. We have several huge ones that allow us to brainstorm our thoughts and project design photos or drawings at the same time. Remember those electronic white boards that captured what you created and printed it out for you as a memento? They didn’t quite catch on in my world.  One true benefit of the basic whiteboard is the ability to draw over the projected image. Not so easy with a blackboard. This technique allows me or my team to envision design revisions as though you were working on a giant drafting table.

There is no such thing as too large of a drawing surface

As useful as white boards are, they still frustrate me. The ghostly image from the last meeting seems to hover on the board like a cloud of blue haze that refuses to die. Someone always steals the nasty smelling eraser which in turn demands that you rub the board clean with your handkerchief, finger, or hand. I hate having rainbow colored hands for the rest of the day. The markers also seem to always be the wrong color for what I want to draw.  When using ink or pencils I like to draw with black. Color has a place,  but not just color for the sake of color. For me it should have meaning in a sketch or diagram. If the markers aren’t missing they are squeaky dry, or totally empty. The empties annoyingly never seem to quite make it into the trash can. Do you throw the chalk away when it’s used up?  Think about it. The ultimate white board crime is when someone writes on it with a permanant marker. Game over.

I thought it would be interesting to poll Design Matters readers as to their own preference.