The human behind the computer

Isn't it strange that we live in a world where being able to think about humans is a specific skill or talent? Picture by Averie Woodard Again and again I come in contact (and sometimes conflict) with intelligent, educated and experienced people running companies who have no clue that there is a human being sitting …

Design for Positive Emotion

"The broader one’s understanding of the human experience, the better design we will have." - Steve Jobs Thinking about Positive Emotion From the last few weeks, I have been thinking over how to create better emotional experiences for people who use digital products. It turned out that I lacked a good vocabulary of emotions. We …

Jobs to be done, emotions to be experienced

We need to get sh*t done. The rallying motto of many founders. But people don't just get things done, they experience deep emotions while using products. And if you ignore the emotional dimensions, you will build a sub-optimal product. I want to focus on one such emotional drive today - the need to express your …

Psychology isn’t enough

“In individuals, insanity is rare; but in groups, parties, nations and epochs, it is the rule.” - Friedrich Nietzsche I have been intrigued by subtleties of human nature for a long time, and thus devoured a quite a few books on psychology. But I now realize that psychology does not give us a complete understanding of …

Better than apes

We tend to vilify imitation. Our culture encourages us to 'be original' and 'be yourself', and 'don't follow the crowd.' Laws punish copying in serious cases, and society in general looks down on it. We consider apes as inferior, hence if someone copies others, we call the act 'aping'. So I am intrigued by the …