Don based his talk on the content of his “design of everyday things” book, ie. It is not enough to consider the usability of a system, but the key is the user experience.  This means for instance that you can me permissive about an object /software that is slightly unusable in some occasion, because you like it, and because your overall user experience is positive.

So the key points of his presenttaion were:

1 – It is all about the system (= not product, but the whole system)

2 – Design the system  (a good example of a system is  ITunes, that, by the way run SAP in the background, so here is the proof you can have a nice customer experience even with a poor back-end)

3 – Everything is a service

4 – Everything is a product. This seems contradictory with the previous point, but the idea is to eliminate the boundary between product and service, so that everything is both in the end)

5 – Don’t be too logical

6 – Memory is more important than actuality – this actually means that the perception of the users is more important than its real experience. Ie, if your user feels a task is running smoothly, it is more important than the actual time it takes to run (this is were progress bar were a genius invention). Moreover, if you finish by a good experience, you might forget that the beginning was a bit painful. (that is why we have good feedback on ESA, even if the install is a bit tricky). Of course we prefer have good experience all the way, but if there are bad things you cannot avoid, then organise it is a wway you can have a good thing at the end of it!

(this point is backed up with physical experimentation involving dipping your fingers in very cold water… I can talk you through if required) 

7 – Complexity is OK, Complicated is bad

8 – Design for the real world (take your ideas outside)

9 – Design for people

10 – It is all about Experience (again – it is so important that this statement needs to be repeated)