BLOG by zaiss

And then the audience said, “Thanks be to contextual inquiry.”

So the presentation wasn’t quite that awesome, but I will say it was worthy of my excitement from my post yesterday. My co-presenter and I were in our element; while we are far from experts in deliberative polling or participatory democracy, we know what we’re talking about when it comes to HCI and Design. I think it showed.

It also becomes increasingly difficult for me to sit through presentations about some “amazing (and usable!) new interface” – a frequent comment among these presenters (as I mentioned last night) is: “We put our system in front of users. They liked it. We asked if they wanted anything else. They said no.” Or, trickier, is self-proclaimed usability. One thing that the MHCI Advisor, Dr. Bonnie John, drills into our heads is our HCI mantra: “The user is not like me.”

My HCI Project professor once said that HCI people were arrogant. I don’t think that’s true. I think that HCI practitioners learn rigorous methods of interface investigation, and report the results that they find with confidence because the methods used allow that level of confidence. That’s why it was so gratifying to stand up, report results from the research methods that everyone in my program busts their butts to learn, and have everyone respond so favorably. It indicates that the theories and research in HCI can make an impact on discussions in a variety of forums and subject areas. That’s pretty cool.