These are my notes on the panel “Interface and Design” (Chris Bangle (BMW), Bruce Sterling (SciFi writer), Walt Mossberg (Wall Street Journal), Tim Brown (IDEO).

Walt Mossberg: people will say less and less “I found it on the Internet last night” or I found this online. Going online — the term is archaic. The iPhone is a good example of a new and important short term trend in user interface and design. We are moving to the triumph of a model that failed in the era of the PC wars. The PC war took place in the 1980s and 1990. There were 2 models:
- end to end model: Apple (hardware cannot be separated from software, need a holistic solution to design an entire solution)
- component model: overall design not important, we will make the operating system, Intel makes processors, and commodity assembly houses like Dell will put together the computers.

The latter model won for business reasons, but it imposes a high cost on users. A Dell user has a harder time than a Mac user.

So what is the iPhone? It is the latest example of what’s going on in 5-6 years of the resurgence of the end-to-end model. The iPod is the poster boy for it. It’s an undesirable closed system in the eyes of open source people and techies, but from the point of view of the consumer because it works very well and is appealing. It’s not totally closed. You can play mp3s on it, same with mp4 videos. But Microsoft has admitted defeat in applying the component PC model in music players. They will have to do the same with cell phones.

Apple is applying the end-to-end model to cell phones but it is overhyped. Walt Mossberg says he used it for 20 minutes in a meeting with Steve Jobs. It’s important because it takes the cell phone to another level. It’s a “wireless iPod” — more computer than cell phone. The screen is brilliant. It’s not just ported over from the iPod. Apple developed new techniques: flicking and pinching. This is one of the hallmarks of Apple’s software design. Most Apple products work with direct manipulation. The simple direct thing works.

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Chris Bangle (BMW designer): we tend to separate cars into “automobiles” (100 years old) and “car” (carros — Roman days). When it comes to physical mobility, auto mobile might be a good term (e.g. an escalator). On the other hand, cars are what you are. A personal extension like a car — automobile might go away, cars are here to stay. If you can describe design with life-like aspects, the more you enjoy it. Cars will get you to the garage, but it won’t get your bike out of the way. The more these type of life like aspects come into it, the more endearing it will be. Sustainability of personal mobility is important. But behind it is the need to see ourselves in another level — car as our avatar.

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Tim Brown, CEO of Ideo: he goes back to Walt’s end-to end principle. US automakers figured out how to make end-to-end automobiles in the 40s, before that it was component manufacturing and users had better experiences.

No one paid attention to user interfaces until the past 20 years. How to make integrated experiences is a new trend. When you think about something new, you can’t think of it as a physical product anymore, it must have a narrative association (it’s about stories), you have to think of the experience itself. It’s not enough to think of form of the device and behavior of the person with the device. But it’s interesting that no one really thinks about the consequences of a particular design. New ways of prototyping experiences have arisen (clay, plastic, drawings in the past). Today there’s computer aided design, film making. There is as much innovation in the design process itself as there is in design.

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Bruce Sterling: what is the follow up of the PC? we do not know what we’re talking about with these machines that people are trying to build at MAKE (self- fabricating).

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Walt Mossberg: In 2 years what will you see? Overhyping will still be there. There is a healthy trend toward more direct interfaces with devices. voice recognition is one of the holy grails that is not done right. Microsoft has done a lot of work with it. Vista does have a very robust voice recognition function, you can run the computer with it. The tablet PC is also a direct input device where you write directly — Microsoft did not do a good job because they did not build it holistically. The iPhone with multi-touch (Apple is not the only company doing something like this) — there’s a lot of juice and life in multi-touch (pop culture, movies have an effect on designers, e.g. Minority Report).

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Tim Brown: What is a design thinker? There is a difference between designers and design thinkers. Designers are very talented but they don’t have a monopoly on the way design gets done. Although designers like to make us think it is magical, they do simple things well. They have some empathy for the user, an understanding of the world and what people in that world might need, imagining life from other people’s perspective. Designers build to think — they make maquettes or prototypes — they don’t figure it all out in their heads first and think it has to be perfect from the beginning. Designers use stories to enact their ideas.

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Chris Bangle: How do you implement new design? Design is an approach to life. Singapore is reassessing design in the role of government, public policy. Design skills are important for everyone to get most out of people’s lives. So in cars, how do you take driving and lifestyle (multitasking) and make it all happen for the non-professionals (driving, talking on the phone, changing CDs, watching out for radar traps)? For pilots this is easy but not for regular people.

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