This is a first of a series of regular emails I started sending out to my design team at Inviqa to help spark curiosity. I’ll keep posting them as they go out in my Medium publication Hello Team. Hello team, A few weeks ago I was watching a video from…

A few weeks ago on the train, an advert caught my eye: Sounds impressive, right? In fact the website of Smart Energy GB, the industry body tasked with coordinating the roll out of smart electricity & gas meters in the UK, has in the past made exciting claims like: On…

Based on a talk I gave at the Boring Conference VIII, 5 May 2018 at Conway Hall, London. — It all started with an accident. One day, coming back from work, I got into the lift in my block of flats, and got off at the wrong floor. How did this happen? Our building has two identical lifts. …

What do people do with Alexa in their living room? How do they speak to Siri in their car? Voice interactions are harder for researchers to observe than many other interfaces. They often happen in private spaces, at unpredictable times and might only last a few seconds. At a recent…

I want to take you for a trip to the dark side. More specifically, the evil world of “dark patterns” — things you can put in your design to trick and manipulate users. For example, trying to instil a fake sense of urgency — like this offer that seems to…

Over the last year, we’ve been living the future of home automation in our household. It all started last Christmas, when I bought one of these remote-controlled sockets so I can easily switch on and off the christmas tree lights. I quickly found out that a few people had already…

One good headline feature, lots of missed opportunities & basic design mistakes … Before we start, a full disclosure When the London Cycle Hire scheme launched in 2010, I launched one of the first 3rd party iPhone apps around cycle hire, which I’ve been developing and maintaining ever since. …

Hint: it’s not just about fitness tracking — Photo: Ed Yourdon via Flickr/Creative Commons Apple have spoken a lot about the Apple Watch fitness tracking capabilities. However, most of us who ride a bike every day aren’t fitness fanatics and couldn’t give a toss about our average cycling pace and calories burnt. Fortunately, there are a few other…

Have you ever given up answering an online survey because it frustrated you with irrelevant questions. — Here’s how to make sure your survey respondents don’t give up too. While leading UX projects, I sometimes have to plan online surveys (or persuade people not to run an online survey when I think that it won’t produce any helpful results). So when I come across a website or email that prompts me to take a survey, I’ll often click on…