Usability Views Article Details  home | timeline | recent | popular | e-reports | userati | books | about  Final Thoughts - AIGA Boston (19 Sep 2005) Watching GK VanPatter's presentation on "Who Will Lead Design in the 21st Century?" really made something clear, and something that resonated with the talk that JJG and I gave on the (arguable) death of user experience. The vast majority of designers in the AIGA audience have essentially become marginalized. Form-makers, while valuable, are being passed by those who are attempting to use design to serve more strategic ends. And these form-makers, it is clear, have no idea. A fair portion of the blame rests on traditional design "journalism" (Print, ID, Communication Arts, etc.) which does everything to laud style and form, and nothing to increase awareness in its audience that such endeavors are becoming increasingly marginalized and commodified. And so when someone would suggest that form-makers are, well, being left behind (as happened in both GK's and JJG's and my talk), inevitably an audience member would lash out. Sadly, the bulk of the AIGA conference, particularly what happened on the main stage, simply bolstered the primacy of form. I guess it's an open question around to what degree is the AIGA responsible for *leading* designers (which often means taking them where they don't want to go), versus giving designers what they want (which often means designers getting left behind.) Article URL: http://www.peterme.com/archives/000601.html Read 25 more articles from By Special Request sorted by date, popularity, or title. Next Article: Forms vs. Applications     This site is a labour of love built by Chris McEvoy