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I have a confession: I'm not a man of simplicity. I spent my entire early career making complex stuff. Lots of complex stuff.

John Maeda

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John Maeda
Age: 58
Born: 1966
Born: January 1
Computer Scientist
Designer
Graphic Designer
University Teacher
Seattle
Washington
Careers
Complexes
Making
Complex
Stuff
Lots
Men
Simplicity
Spent
Entire
Early
Career
Confession

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Teaching is the rare profession where the customer isn't always right and needs to be told so appropriately.
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Creativity's about ownership.
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Design provides solutions, art asks questions.
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Organization makes a system of many appear fewer.
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There is a construct in computer programming called 'the infinite loop' which enables a computer to do what no other physical machine can do - to operate in perpetuity without tiring. In the same way it doesn't know exhaustion, it doesn't know when it's wrong and it can keep doing the wrong thing over and over without tiring.
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Communication in every which way is everything for the leader.
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As a genre, videogames take our minds on journeys, and we can control and experience them much more interactively than passively - especially when they are well-designed.
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If you have no fear, no one has power over you.
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In the '70s and '80s there was an attempt in K-12 to teach science through art or art through science. The challenge today is how do you build the ethos of art and design into the academy of science.
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Too little confidence, and you're unable to act too much confidence, and you're unable to hear.
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The artist needs to understand the truth that lies at the bottom of an enigma.
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Videogames are indeed design: They're sophisticated virtual machines that echo the mechanical systems inside cars.
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Art is a conduit toward human needs and perception.
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Simplicity is about subtracting the obvious and adding the meaningful.
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Design is a solution to a problem. Art is a question to a problem.
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Things that I can do myself, I either do by myself, or teach a willing undergraduate who doesn't know how to do those things by doing it for me. Things that I can't do myself, my graduate students should be doing.
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People who can focus, get things done. People who can prioritize, get the right things done.
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I don't like creating software anymore. It's too exact. It's like karate there's no room for error.
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My role is to find strategic insights as to where design can have the most business impact. A designer can bring a viewpoint of not just aesthetics, but economics and usage.
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I like stuff designed by dead people. The old designers. They always got it right because they didn't have to grow up with computers. All of the people that made the spoon and the dishes and the vacuum cleaner didn't have microprocessors and stuff. You could do a good design back then.
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