I completely agree with what the author is saying about AI here. The authors worry was already proven too, when people were testing out DALLE or other image generation AI's by asking it to draw a doctor. The AI would only come up with a white, male doctor for quite a while even when prompted to make a doctor of a different race. I think they have since addressed the issue, but I am positive that there are a million more scenarios similar to this that would take hundreds of years to fix. I am also sure that its not just the image generating AI's, because with text generating AI's they are only as good as the data they are trained on. Most of that data is already skewed in some way or another, which makes the AI skewed.

This part of the article brought up something that I personally have never thought about. I have always used the term unintended consequences and never knew that it was originally unanticipated consequences. While the language change doesn't have a specific impact on my life it may have an unconscious effect. It would also be interesting how this language has impacted a discipline like law where the way you say things matters a lot.

I totally agree with this statement here. I think this should always be done whenever possible. It reminds me of a scene from Silicon Valley where they are testing a app in a focus group, and all the people really hate the app. The main character talks about how they have never had a problem with other testers, and its pointed out that they previously only tested with other engineers. Through that they realized they needed to do significant overhaul of the design to make it work. It emphasizes the importance of testing of "real users" because at the end of the day those are the people who you want to make it for.

I found this part really interesting. In my personal experience talking out loud helps with sentence formulation, making sure everything is coherent. However, I have also found that when I am taking someone through my thought process by talking I end up choosing what I say carefully. This has the potential to be unhelpful for the test, because they will be acting less like a "typical user".

I found this passage interesting because it echoes a concept form our previous readings. That no design choice is ever truly neutral, and there will always be a group of people who are left out. This is a reminder of the responsibility designers have to be mindful of the impact their choices have on different groups. It’s important to remember that every decision designers make can affect people in different ways, and to consider how our designs may unintentionally exclude or disadvantage certain users. As we work on our project, we need to think about this by using typical page layouts that people are used to and a color palette that works for visually impaired people.

I found this passage especially important for our upcoming group project because we don't have a ton of time to complete it. Given the limited time, we need to be strategic in deciding which aspects of our project to prototype and test. We can’t afford to test everything, so it’s essential to prioritize what will provide the most valuable insights with the resources we have. The idea of balancing risk and resources is something we’ll have to carefully consider to ensure we’re testing the most critical components.

This reminded me of the lecture that we had about research. Most likely the thing you are trying to create is already out there, and understanding what your competition did right and wrong will be greatly helpful. It lead you to finding out that your solution is trash and needs to be worked on much more. This will be especially useful for us in this project because I have no experience creating financial apps.

This point is really interesting. It is something to keep in mind when using interviews for research purposes, because trying to replicate the way you are asking an interviewee a question is very difficult. Those changes in tone, using slightly different words, or unintentionally putting emphasis on the a different word could lead the interviewee to answer a certain way.

I found this passage interesting, because I made the switch from Environmental Studies to Informatics. Through that switch I had to completely change my way of thinking when it came to problem solving. Most of the time in my ES classes a problem had one solution ie: this plant is called has this name and no other. However when switching over to INFO most of my classes now have problems in which a wide range of answers exist and they can all be correct. It made me think about how I have heard that engineers don't like designers that much and it makes sense in the context of this situation, because they have completely different ways of thinking about solutions to problems. Of course they would butt heads about what to do, and why.

I found this paragraph very interesting because it highlights how individual experiences shape the way that people think and interact with designs. Everyone has different knowledge based on their personal experience which can affect their understanding of a product. This shows why designing something is so difficult because when designing you have to think about other people diverse backgrounds, who may have contradicting viewpoints to your own.

I totally agree with this statement here. For me personally I tend to forget things constantly if I don't explicitly write them down. This has forced me to have to carry around journals just containing to do list so that I don't forget what I have to do. I also find it interesting that the author explicitly mentions that it allows him to have those ideas critiqued. No matter how hard you try the first iteration will always need some reworking. This is something that I often forget and need to remind myself of when doing creative work. It is a process, and one that requires a lot of reworking to get right.

Really agree with this statement here. It shows the complexity that most designers are faced with because on the surface everyones problem may look the same, but the deeper you look into it you'll often find that the problem presents unique challenges for many individuals. This often not even addressed or figured out until the product is already in the market. For example with automatic soap dispensers there was a problem with the sensors only being able to sense fair skins tones. During the making I am sure they were applauding themselves for creating a more sanitary way of getting soap, little did they know that they were unintentionally discriminating against a large population.

I found this part particularly interesting because as the author eludes to memories are often unreliable. This article link talks about how just a single sentence can influence a persons memory of an event, and therefore affect their response. In the case of interviews it is just another reminder of how careful an interviewer must be in order to try and get the most unaffected responses.

This brings up a larger problem that I don't believe is talked about in design schools enough. As much as it is nice learning about all these different design paradigms, when designers go out into the workforce they are at the mercy of large for-profit companies. In which the only real goal is "profit and speed", and justice is more of an afterthought. If I had the chance I would like to ask designers at Google or another large company to see if they had to adjust their design values when they started working there. I would be interested to see how they answer.

I totally agree with this statement and have done this myself a number of times. It is incredible difficult to not fall into this trap because like the reading says it is unconscious so you wouldn't know when you are doing it. From previous projects the best way that I have found of combat this is by having a diverse group that challenges (in a good way) your ideas. This often leads to a better solution.