DUX 2007 – The devil’s in the details

DUX 2007 is a wrap. We came, we saw, we laughed, we loved, and we even learned. I thought I would spend a few characters writing up some observations. I think first, it’s always important to understand the massive amount of work that goes into putting together one of these events and I know the team that gave us DUX ’07 was spared no amount of grief. They did a truly admirable job and I would like to thank them.

Thank you!

DUX is not TED, nor is it HCI International, but instead fits nicely in-between them where Living Surfaces used to flourish. A day doesn’t pass when I don’t reminisce about the buzzing energy and enthusiasm for all things interactive that used to eek out of every corner of the Living Surfaces conferences but that’s a story for another time. DUX ’07 had a nice mixture of creative sensitivity (design) and scientific reason. There were discussions about robots designed to dance with humans, the definition of simplicity, and a ton of thinking done on social networking; fun stuff. Presentations were an interesting mix (about half and half) of representatives of corporate giants and student masters theses. There was a smattering of cool independents, but I couldn’t help cringing when yet another Google or Yahoo! employee got up and started speaking. To further emphasize the vortexes they represent Google even put job postings on the give-away jump drives presented to each attendee. Yikes!

I’d have to say my only complaint about the proceedings was the same one I have at all of the UX / HCI / Ergonomics / etc. conferences; a lack of attention to a few key details. We are experience designers, we care about all of the aspects of interaction and communication and yet repeatedly show a lack of concern for the experience of our conference attendees. For some reason, they decided to pass out printed cards after each speaker’s presentation that were gathered for the purposes of a Q & A session afterwards. This didn’t work out once, questions were poorly worded, lacked relevance, and were often too lengthy to merit responses. The fall-back became, “We’ll post your questions and the answers on the blog.” Why didn’t someone use a live blog to capture questions from cell phones? They could’ve even designed a cool concept to facilitate live conversations the moment the topic was hot in our minds. Real conversations are good things, right?

The other thing that kills me is when the logistics folks provide a really cool looking slide advance gizmo that none of the presenters could use. Yes, I’ve seen this before. The best part is that no one noticed (except for the audience who had to wait for each presenter to regain their momentum after a pooched slide) that there was an issue with the control and made an attempt to correct it. Some presenters in later sessions were even refusing to use the little UFO shaped thing-a-ma-jig.

I realize this is really silly, petty stuff but for me user experience is all about the little stuff. It’s the little stuff that dents brands. Catching the little stuff means you are passionate and engaged and excited about your craft and the industry. This was never a problem at Living Surfaces.

Spill