The Importance of Recognizing the Important Parts

In his Sketching User Experiences, Bill Buxton attempts to change how we view the process of creating good design. He does this by focusing on valuing the process itself. This move in user experience and design (studies?) is interesting to anyone familiar with the history of rhetoric and composition. For not long ago (relatively speaking) there was a large move in composition studies to focus more on the process than on the finished product--or if not more than, then at least as much as. Thus, the use of portfolios in composition courses, etc. Many of the ideas Buxton promotes in his text, I think, could be said of writing studies as well.

Some passages that mark this similarity:

“[We should] view sketching as relating far more to an activity or process (the conversation), rather than a physical object or artifact (the sketch)” (1537). 

He argues that “The ability to participate in a conversation with a sketch involves competence in both reading and writing” (1561), and should be valued highly.

Switch "sketching" for "peer review and revision" (may not be a perfect parallel here) and we can see some similar problems existing in composition studies. And they have been written on to a great extent. Of course in composition courses it is incredibly difficult to convey these ideas successfully, to students and others who may evaluate the worth of the field of study. Students just want a good grade, something usually only associated (at least in their minds) with the finished product. And while we may try to emphasize participation and other elements of the writing process that focus on the process per se, I'm not sure how much it translates to the "real world." How often does a job candidate show his or her sketches to a potential employer when applying for a job? I don't actually know this. Perhaps a study of this kind would illuminate how much the process is being valued. According to Buxton it would seem to be just as big an issue:

“Here is the problem. Differences in our ability to create sketches are recognized and appreciated, largely because they are reinforced by a physical artifact—the sketch. However, in terms of our differing ability to read or extract new insights from sketches, there is no tangible reminder. Hence, this aspect of a designer’s skill is seldom recognized, and almost never engenders the same respect and status as the ability to draw” (1577).

Lastly, even though Tharon is trying to get us to come up with a new vocabulary, a new rhetoric, for digital rhetorics and design, there are so many similarities to many of these different genres of "composition," that creating this new rhetoric is no easy task, nor would we ever be able to argue with integrity for an authenticity or originality that the capitalist concepts of intellectual property demand of us. I applaud Buxton for trying to get us away from that mentality (the notion that one person designs something, and therefore holds claim to its existence, for example) and hope that more people read texts like this and begin to find value in the collaborative process that really is good design--that really is good anything (writing, etc.). My fear is that the capitalist paradigm still dominates our value systems. Unless, perhaps, we can begin to value the element of the sketch and other important parts of the process of design in terms of attributing to them (as well as the skills required for being a good sketcher--reading and writing, etc.) a prominent form of cultural capital, we will continue to only praise (or decry) the finished product, and only give credit to the face next to (rather than behind) the product. We all know Steve Jobs (as Buxton points out) but little credit is given (or at least acknowledged by the media, by the consumer, etc.) regarding the "little people," who Buxton posits, aren't really that little. Texts like Buxton's are obviously moves in the right direction.

The Successful Community, The Successful Individual

Caveat: This post may relate to thoughts I had here. Hopefully this doesn't read as repetitive, but continues to problematize the discussion, keep it open, etc. 

While no doubt Tharon Howard had a particular audience in mind when writing Design to Thrive, and no doubt that audience holds many of the presupposed values necessary to understand what he means when positing something as a "successful community," reading his book still left me wanting to question the notion of a successful community itself, since so much of Howard's argument rides on his audience already knowing what this means. Whether in terms of origins or resonances, the criteria upon the conception of a definition of a successful community might be as complex and diverse as understanding the desires of the individual in relation to what a community is. Perhaps some questions to consider: Is a community successful if it sufficiently produces the desires or meets the intended ends of the individual(s) creating that community? Must the actual needs of the other members of the community (its constituents) be met, or is all that is required is the belief that those needs are being met? Is the successful community determined by the success of an individual in that system, or is there a larger circumference that takes into account fairness and equity by which such success is defined? Interpellation, anyone? Conspicuous consumption, anyone? Of course I am thinking of these questions in terms of RIBS: Renumeration, Influence, Belonging, and Significance. 

It is important to clarify that I am not asserting Howard didn't consider these types of questions in his book, but that he already knew what his audience would consider a successful community to be. He exploits this knowledge effectively. (If he attempted to define what a successful community is in more political, or even academic, terms he may have lost large portions of his audience.) Even with his use of Pierre Bourdieu, Mark Poster, and other scholars of Post-Marxist, postmodern, and social constructivist thought--scholarship often quite critical of capitalist modes of production/information--his audience would seem to actually hold many of the values that this scholarship continually critiques in favor of models less labor exploitative, or at least more equitable in construct. In other words, even though the terms renumeration, influence, belonging, and significance convey a sense of the free communities of equal participation that the term "community" itself has historically conjured for us (i.e. community is always good), it is difficult not to see (in Howard's book) very individualistic motives governing the creation of these communities. Because of this, in some ways it seems that he is using the critics' thoughts to inform the objects of critique how to better perpetuate hegemonic practices, and how to satisfy their capitalist desires by fulfilling the consumptive desires of their constituents. In other ways (particularly Chapter 8), he is doing the opposite: he is writing a handbook for counter-hegemonic practice. I hope that at this point it is clear that I am giving Howard a lot of credit for how he constructed this book. For (if we are to consider the politics of the book) he seems to ride skillfully a fine line between teaching "the Man" how to remain "the Man," and teaching the marginalized how to organize and rebel against "the Man" if need be.

Perhaps I am taking this to extremes never intended by Howard, and if so, then let it be said that this is less a critique of Howard's book and more a critique of our notion of community in general. Or perhaps I am just attempting to practice some dissoi logoi. Nevertheless, below are a couple passages related to each of his core principles from Design to Thrive that show how well he walks this line I mentioned above, and taken in a different context could portray extremely different meanings (from hegemonic to counter-hegemonic). Try to read them through both perspectives.

Remuneration: "individuals remain members of a social network when there is a clear benefit for doing so. People need to believe that they will obtain some positive return on the investment of their time and energy in order to be attracted to participation in an e-community" (lines 1304-11, my emphasis).

"When somebody comes into a community and tries to redirect a conversation to their blog site or to another community, leaders of the community need to intervene and make clear that the discussion needs to stay in the community where it began and shouldn't be redirected elsewhere" (2017-18).  A metaphorical Berlin Wall or a community organizer concerned only with her constituents' needs?

These two passages are probably extreme enough (at least in how I framed them) for the questions I put forth at the top of this post. I'd like to close with saying how much I admire Howard's ability to make an argument that, I think, I appeals to an array of different politics, perhaps only excluding anti-technology groups. Might this type of rhetoric be more of what we see in the future? Where constituents are aware of how their identity is interpellated by and through the differential relationship they have with their communities. Might terms like "manipulation" and "interpellation" take on less pejorative weight, or even be accepted as commonplace in communication studies? Should they? I think we know Howard's answer. 

Measuring the Beauty of Design, Measuring Immediacy

With no pun intended, I admit that when I began reading Bolter and Grusin for this week I immediately felt "resonances" of the work of Bruno Latour and Jean-Francois Lyotard. Their separate theories, respectively, have argued for some time now that we have never been in an all-consuming "modern" period but only that we are at times historically situated into moments where we (as a culture or a particular group or as individuals) might view a particular technological medium (as well as its accompanying narratives) as transparently and naturally providing immediacy and presentation rather than representation, to use B & G's terminology. So, of course, when B & G referenced Latour's work by the end of Chapter Two it seemed only too appropriate. 

For this post, I admit that I am not feeling a specific argument resonating from my being, so to speak, so I will just discuss some of the interesting points of this week's readings. I will present a quote or idea from the reading and riff off of it.

From B & G: 

The double logic of remediation (or "the representation of one medium in another" (45)): "Our culture wants both to multiply its media and to erase all traces of mediation: ideally, it wants to erase its media in the very act of multiplying them" (5). 

This quote is partly B & G's thesis and partly their premise. It is perhaps the most fascinating claim they make because they actually argue against it to some degree. This does not take away from their work, but makes it smarter. I will explain: The double logic of remediation is, of course, comprised of two things, one, the logic of immediacy, "that the medium itself should disappear and leave us in the presence of the thing represented" (5-6); and two, the logic of hypermediacy, the awareness of the "new medium as a medium" (19). I would argue that this double logic is actually just a rhetoric that resonates from notions of modernity (Remember, modernity never occurred, at least not as a distinct time period or era. Perhaps it is more of a genre.) In other words, I'm not sure the desire to erase all traces of the mediation is really there. We just think it must always be addressed because of cultural traditions and societal assumptions. The actual logic is, in fact, the logic of hypermediacy. It sublates immediacy, though it is also comprised of it. It is not alone or self-sustaining, as it depends on the logic of immediacy for its existence ("the new is still justified in terms of the old" (46)), but it is actually privileged over the logic of immediacy. B & G provide plenty of evidence for this. Think of their examples of CNN or music production:

"Whenever one medium seems to have convinced viewers of its immediacy, other media try to appropriate that conviction . . . televised newscasts are coming to resemble web pages in their hypermediacy" (9). Have you watched CNN lately? If you haven't, try watching AC360 or something just once and count how many times they reference Twitter. Also, notice how they use touch screens, physically clicking on things as if they are the viewer's mouse.

"What designers often say they want is an 'interfaceless' interface, in which there will be no recognizable electronic tools--no buttons, windows, scroll bars, or even icons as such" (23 my emphasis). Again, that the logic of immediacy is just a verbal rhetoric. We keep saying that we want interfaceless interfaces, but isn't the very act of saying this an act of hypermediacy? And even in the conversations of this 'interfaceless' interface it seems that we find great joy in talking about these mediums. Which leads to the next quote.

A quote from Erkki Huhtamo in B & G: "Technology is gradually becoming second nature, a territory both external and internalized, and an object of desire. There is no need to make it transparent any longer, simply because it is not felt to be a contradiction to the 'authenticity' of the experience" (qtd. in B & G 42). So ironically, the naturalization of the technological medium isn't its immediacy or authentic origin, but the desire to experience its externality and be able to talk about it. It is in this particular section that B & G seem to take off from where Mark Poster took us in The Mode of Information. At that particular time Poster was still concerned (or at least interested in) notions of authenticity (representations of immediacy) being questioned in the production of music and other modes of information. He used the persona of the audiophile as an example of someone who yearns to "recreate" or "re-present" a particular authentic origin. B & G also talk about music, but are aware that instead of a crisis of authenticity taking place with the implementation of the digital into music, instead "the evolution of recording techniques [have] changed the nature of live performance. (see one of my past posts for my comments on this)

Now to make a jump. B & G's other thesis: "new media are doing exactly what their predecessors have done: presenting themselves as refashioned and improved versions of other media . . . no medium today, and certainly no single media even, seems to do its cultural work in isolation from other media, any more than it works in isolation from other social and economic forces" (14-15).  

There is a lot to unpack in this passage, and I won't do it here. But I want to draw attention to the concept of a "cultural work" and perhaps depart with a question for further discussion. Might we consider the construction of beauty a cultural work? I ask this because Bill Buxton, in his Sketching User Experiences, where he effectively incorporates many of Denning's storytelling techniques, btw, demonstrates B & G's above thesis with narratives about the production of Apple's IMac and IPod. In doing so he pays particular attention to one aspect of the products' improvements and refashionings, so to speak: aesthetic design. Though he is interested in all aspects of design and the success of the products (user experience, luck and timing involved, etc.) Buxton really makes a strong argument that the beauty of the products was a dominant factor to their success. 

Without getting stuck on philosophical questions of beauty, which are fascinating, my questions for Buxton and for the class are the following: Must we measure great design only through the accumulation of capital? Might something be a great design (art for art's sake, anyone?) and not appeal to the masses? Or is that beyond the realm of 'design'? In other words, is the reason we believe Apple's products to be beautiful based upon their sales, or is it the other way around? Perhaps both? Thoughts?