Donald A. Norman Quotes

I've been looking at the iPod- the Apple iPod. One of the interesting things about the iPod, one of the things that people love most about it is not the technology; it's the box it comes in

I'm not a fan of technology . I'm a fan of pedagogy, of understanding how people learn and the most effective learning methods. But technology enables some exciting changes.

And to get real work experience, you need a job, and most jobs will require you to have had either real work experience or a graduate degree.

Knowing how people will use something is essential

User experience is really the whole totality. Opening the package good example. It's the total experience that matters. And that starts from when you first hear about a product experience is more based upon memory than reality. If your memory of the product is wonderful, you will excuse all sorts of incidental things.

If you think of the product as a service, then the separate parts make no sense - the point of a product is to offer great experiences to its owner, which means that it offers a service. And that experience, that service, comprises the totality of its parts: The whole is indeed made up of all of the parts. The real value of a product consists of far more than the product's components.

The designer shouldn't think of a simple dichotomy between errors and correct behavior; rather, the entire interaction should be treated as a cooperative endeavor between person and machine, one in which misconceptions can arise on either side.

Everything has a personality: everything sends an emotional signal. Even where this was not the intention of the designer, the people who view the website infer personalities and experience emotions. Bad websites have horrible personalities and instill horrid emotional states in their users, usually unwittingly. We need to design things-products, websites, services-to convey whatever personality and emotions are desired.

The design of everyday things is in great danger of becoming the design of superfluous, overloaded, unnecessary things.

A good designer will actually design the company.

Forget the complaints against complexity; instead, complain about confusion.

Will robot teachers replace human teachers? No, but they can complement them. Moreover, the could be sufficient in situations where there is no alternative––to enable learning while traveling, or while in remote locations, or when one wishes to study a topic for which there is not easy access to teachers. Robot teachers will help make lifelong learning a practicality. They can make it possible to learn no matter where one is in the world, no matter the time of day. Learning should take place when it is needed, when the learner is interested, not according to some arbitrary, fixed schedule

Technology may change rapidly, but people change slowly. The principals [of design] come from understanding of people. They remain true forever.

I believe that robots should only have faces if they truly need them

Any time you see signs or labels added to a device, it is an indication of bad design: a simple lock should not require instructions.

Everyday people are not very good designers.

Simplicity design axiom: The complexity of the information appliance is that of the task, not the tool. The technology is invisible.

Complexity is acceptable as long as it is intelligible and necessary. We want to avoid needless complications.

I think a successful company is one where everybody owns the same mission. Out of necessity, we divide ourselves up into discipline groups. But the goal when you are actually doing the work is to somehow forget what discipline group you are in and come together. So in that sense, nobody should own user experience; everybody should own it.

What makes something simple or complex? It's not the number of dials or controls or how many features it has: It is whether the person using the device has a good conceptual model of how it operates.

Rule of thumb: if you think something is clever and sophisticated beware-it is probably self-indulgence.

The argument is not between adding features and simplicity, between adding capability and usability. The real issue is about design: designing things that have the power required for the job while maintaining understandabili ty, the feeling of control, and the pleasure of accomplishment.

Attractive things work better When you wash and wax a car, it drives better, doesn’t it? Or at least feels like it does.

The best kind of design isn't necessarily an object, a space, or a structure: it's a process- dynamic and adaptable.

If people keep buying poorly designed products, manufacturers and designers will think they are doing the right thing and continue as usual.

It is relatively easy to design for the perfect cases, when everything goes right, or when all the information required is available in proper format

Products were once designed for the functions they performed. But when all companies can make products that perform their functions equally well, the distinctive advantage goes to those who provide pleasure and enjoyment while maintaining the power. If functions are equated with cognition, pleasure is equated with emotion; today we want products that appeal to both cognition and emotion.

I prefer design by experts - by people who know what they are doing

To me, error analysis is the sweet spot for improvement.

The current paradigm is so thoroughly established that the only way to change is to start over again.

When a device as simple as a door has to come with an instruction manual—even a one-word manual—then it is a failure, poorly designed.

It is not enough that we build products that function, that are understandable and usable, we also need to build products that bring joy and excitement, pleasure and fun, and, yes, beauty to people's lives.

The world is complex, and so too must be the activities that we perform. But that doesn't mean that we must live in continual frustration. No. The whole point of human-centered design is to tame complexity, to turn what would appear to be a complicated tool into one that fits the task, that is understandable, usable, enjoyable.

A big ethical question is what happens after people stop using the device. Does it degrade the environment? Could it have been designed so it would actually be good for the environment?

Simplification is as much in the mind as it is in the device.

Am I an Apple bigot? No. I can critique their products and their customer service philosophy. But overall, they do better than any other player.

In my opinion, no single design is apt to be optimal for everyone.

Too many companies believe that all they must do is provide a 'neat' technology or some 'cool' product or, sometimes, just good, solid engineering. Nope. All of those are desirable (and solid engineering is a must), but there is much more to a successful product than that: understanding how the product is to be used, design, engineering, positioning, marketing, branding-all matter. It requires designing the Total User Experience.

I think there is a tendency in science to measure what is measurable and to decide that what you cannot measure must be uninteresting.

How do you discover a need that nobody yet knows about? This is where the product breakthroughs come through.

If you're more susceptible to interruption, you do more out of the box thinking.

Isn't one of your first exercises in learning how to communicate to write a description of how to tie your shoelaces? The point being that it's basically impossible to use text to show that

AS for all those mistakes I make - they are on purpose - to teach you how to deal with them

User-centered design means working with your users all throughout the project.

The problem with emotion was that it was clearly something important, but-at least according to the old philosophy-it was something to overcome.

Behavioral design is all about feeling in control. Includes: usability, understanding, but also the feel.

Also note that invariably when we design something that can be used by those with disabilities, we often make it better for everyone

Readers always seem to think that the author has some control over the design of their books.