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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.

Donald A. Norman

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Donald A. Norman
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More quotes by Donald A. Norman

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I believe that the Apple Shuffle is an excellent compromise among the conflicting requirements of simplicity, elegance, size, battery life, and function
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Attractive things work better.
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Forget the complaints against complexity instead, complain about confusion.
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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.
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Having the best product means nothing if the people won't buy it.
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Go to the bookstore and look at how many bookshelves are filled with books trying to explain how to work the devices. We don't see shelves of books on how to use television sets, telephones, refrigerators or washing machines. Why should we for computer-based applications?
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So what does a good teacher do? Create tension - but just the right amount.
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We are victims of our own success. We have let technology lead the way, pushing ever faster to newer, faster, and more powerful systems, with nary a moment to rest, contemplate, and to reflect upon why, how, and for whom all this energy has been expended.
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Academics get paid for being clever, not for being right.
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Hypertext makes a virtue out of lack of organization, allowing ideas and thoughts to be juxtaposed at will. [...] The advent of hypertext is apt to make writing much more difficult, not easier. Good writing, that is.
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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.
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The current paradigm is so thoroughly established that the only way to change is to start over again.
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If you're more susceptible to interruption, you do more out of the box thinking.
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If people keep buying poorly designed products, manufacturers and designers will think they are doing the right thing and continue as usual.
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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.
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I believe that robots should only have faces if they truly need them
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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.
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Beauty and brains, pleasure and usability - they should go hand in hand.
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