Designing for a living system: how to create digital products that evolve

The digital world is constantly evolving, and given the rate at which our content is changing every day, minute, or second, digital products are now considered living systems. Especially with the emergence of what’s referred to as the Internet of Things where everything around us could talk to the internet. A product that moves a user through a single flow or experience may not be enough to address the vast scope of how we will interact with future environments.

In order to create a more natural and supportive interface, designers need to consider how users interact with multiple devices and how to minimize disruptions to their attention. This could involve the use of voice commands, haptic feedback, and removing unnecessary buttons or clutter. The goal is to create a seamless user experience that feels intuitive and easy to use.

Designers should also be mindful of the importance of patterns in achieving desired outcomes. Blaise Agüera y Arcas’ gives the deceivingly simple statement ‘It’s about What Are You Trying to Do?’ Hell’s ya and exactly! We’re probably in a phase right now where we don’t quite have the human/machine balance quite figured out yet.

Our fragmented attention split between people and devices is probably more disrupting than enabling our conversations. We may start to embrace a more natural and supportive interface that runs in the background and doesn’t nag so much or demand so much of our direct attention. As we grow tired of this inefficiency, we may start to appreciate things like the use of voice, removal of buttons, or even more natural human gesturing like haptics which will give us tactile feedback upon touching a screen in the form of a subtle vibration on the fingertip.

Additional commentary that sings to our future is that it’s more about the content and less about the chrome. The ‘chrome’ is what now seems to be old-fashioned visual metaphors translated onto the screen. The chrome is just the signal for the metaphor being used, the content is what’s real.

A truly innovative design would evolve directly from the native digital world instead of importing the idea of turning a glossy magazine page via a time-based animation to make it look like you’re turning a real page. The idea of translating traditional print and other analog metaphors into design is considered derivative and actually missing the point of our digital medium.

In conclusion, designing digital products requires a deep understanding of user behaviors and patterns. By creating a seamless and intuitive user experience, designers can create products that feel like a natural extension of our digital lives. By embracing the unique qualities of digital design and moving away from old-fashioned visual metaphors, designers can create products that feel truly innovative and groundbreaking.

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