Register for World Usability Day events on Nov 8th

Join Michigan UXPA, and the rest of the world, on Thursday, November 8, for World Usability Day. This year’s global theme is “Design for Good or Evil.”

We have partnered with Michigan State University (MSU) Usability/Accessibility Research and Consulting (UARC) and AIGA Detroit for two special World Usability Day events in service of our Michigan community.

Morning: Michigan State University, East Lansing

MSU UARC has hosted a conference all 14 years of World Usability Day’s existence! They have another fantastic line up of presentations:

Planning for Usability, Peter Morville, Semantic Studios
Designing our Future(s), Erik Dahl, Erik Dahl Design Company
Understanding the User Experience Behind the New WCAG 2.1 Requirements, Shawn Henry, World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) Web Accessibility Initiative
Designing an Accessible Personal Health Record, Jason Withrow, Washtenaw Community College
How to Talk to Engineers about Usability, Dawn Opel, Michigan State University

The conference runs from 8:30am to Noon in the MSU Union, with an optional tour of MSU UARC from 1:15-3pm in the Kellogg Center.

Check out the MSU event web page as additional information becomes available.

Registration is now open. Cost is $25: a bargain for a conference that has become a pillar of our community.

Evening: College for Creative Studies, Detroit

AIGA Detroit is hosting its first World Usability Day event in the evening, at the College for Creative Studies in Detroit. Doors open at 6:30pm.

At “Ethics of UX Design”, you will learn ethical principles that apply to user experience design, hear examples from everyday practice, and get some practical tips on how to design user interfaces that follow ethical principles. The speakers will be:

Michael Beasley, UX Designer, Amazon
Jack Nank, Digital Producer, Threespot
Amy Michelle DeBaets, PhD, Assistant Professor, OUWB School of Medicine (Oakland University)

Learn more at AIGA Detroit’s event page.

Registration at Eventbrite is available. Tickets are $10 plus a service fee. Also a great deal for an evening of discussion about such an important topic.

We hope to see you in East Lansing or Detroit (or both) on November 8th to celebrate World Usability Day with Michigan UXPA.

Walk & Tour Recap

We had a great Detroit Month of Design event on September 6th: our sold-out Architecture Walk & Experience Design Tour!

olga-walk-Dmb19sBVAAA9bIl — Introductions in the cafe. Photo by Olga Stella, Design Core Detroit.

Fifty people started out meeting each other and having a great lunch at the Detroit Opera House’s Cadillac Cafe.

miuxpa-opera-1 — Discussion on stage about how production design and performance affect user (audience) experiences.

One group toured the opera house, learning about theater design & architecture, acting, directing, costumes, makeup, and more. A few examples of the topics covered:

How a theater building itself contributes to the user experience of a show
How the type of stage affects set design, directing, and acting
How a director anticipates and solves problems on behalf of the audience
Accessibility issues related to lighting and sound
The “best seat in the house”: it depends
How the rehearsal process parallels the UX development process

Dan Brinker, Technical Director of the DOH, and Larry Rusinsky led the discussion. Larry posted pictures and comments on Facebook.

DanStartsWalk — Dan Klyn starts the architecture walk outside the Opera House.

Dan Klyn led the architecture walk around parts of downtown Detroit. Discussion examples:

Boundaries, contributing to certainty or ambiguity
Pace layers, the uneven application of governance
Spatial primitives, geometric shapes and light
Good fit, emerging form in response to new forces
Channels, connectivity between touchpoints

Dan has shared pictures of the key stops on the walk and his discussion guides.

Thanks to many individuals and organizations who helped make this happen! Dan Klyn & Larry Rusinsky, Michigan Opera Theater, Dexterity UX & The Understanding Group, and Design Core Detroit.

Register for July 9 event

Enjoy an evening of industry case studies about innovation using human-centered design! The program will feature 3 case studies about local applications in healthcare, military, and automotive.

Augmented Reality Design in Healthcare by Christina York, CEO and Founder, SpellBound
Human-Centered Design of Tactical Vehicles by Dave Hullinger, Human Factors Engineer, United States Army Research Laboratory
Data Analytics Design for the Transportation System of Tomorrow by Nisreen Salka, Lead Product Designer, Emerging Analytics, Ford Motor Company

WHAT: User Experience Innovation in Healthcare, Military, and Automotive Applications
WHEN: July 9, 2018, 6-8pm
WHERE: The Velocity Collaboration Center at the Macomb-Oakland University Incubator, 6633 Eighteen Mile Road, Sterling Heights, MI 48314
HOW MUCH: $5 to attend. Free for UXPA International members and Oakland University faculty, staff & students.

Register at Eventbrite

Schedule

6:00pm Doors open, check in, socialize, have pizza, salad, and soft drinks provided by our hosts, Mac-OU Inc
6:30pm: Welcoming, introductions, and other announcements
6:45pm: Case study presentations, Q&A
7:45pm: Closing and community announcements
8:00pm: End of event

Augmented Reality Design in Healthcare

Christina York, CEO and Founder, SpellBound

Christina will share the story of SpellBound, a therapeutic tool that helps children cope and engage with medical treatment using immersive augmented reality technology. She will also share parts of her journey from a UX manager to a (female) CEO of a tech startup.

Christina York is an entrepreneur, experimenter, team builder, and technology visionary. She was the UX Manager at ITHAKA for 10 years before starting SpellBound. She creates magical 3D experiences that are used by child life specialists and therapists to distract, engage, and entertain pediatric patients. She is a Midwest Female Founder for Change.

Register at Eventbrite

Human-Centered Design of Tactical Vehicles

Dave Hullinger, Human Factors Engineer, United States Army Research Laboratory

We worked with users to evaluate a concept for a new model of tank. We will share some of our challenges that were unique to military applications, but also some that will be familair to UX professionals in other contexts. Examples: following established standards, getting access to end users, and consulting on specifications managed by a vendor.

Dave Hullinger got his start as a mechanical engineer in the automotive industry. He joined the Army Research Laboratory in 2010.

Register at Eventbrite

Data Analytics Design for the Transportation System of Tomorrow

Nisreen Salka, Lead Product Designer, Emerging Analytics, Ford Motor Company

As autonomous and connected vehicles join the streets, Ford Motor Company leverages the data they generate to help city officials prepare for this new world of transportation. In collaboration with the City of Tomorrow Challenge, we built a product team that paired data scientists and software developers. We reinvented the agile process and revitalized our approach to user experience research and design for our unique context.

Nisreen Salka recently completed her Masters in human-computer interaction from the University of Michigan School of Information. As the lead product designer for the Emerging Analytics department at Ford Motor Company, she collaborates with end users to design applications that leverage mobility data. Earlier this year, she presented at Ann Arbor World Information Architecture Day 2018 on dark patterns.

Register at Eventbrite

About our hosts, Mac-OU Inc

The Macomb-Oakland University Incubator (Mac-OU Inc) was constructed to support economic development in SE Michigan by accelerating high-tech business, cultivating academic innovation and encouraging R&D in the region. Mac-OU Inc is directly affiliated with and supported by Oakland University, which provides collaborative access to its faculty, students and physical assets to assist entrepreneurs in many facets of their business formation and development. Mac-OU Inc is also a state of Michigan-designated SmartZone, which allows it to leverage a wide range of state resources to further attract, build, fund and deploy new businesses in and around Macomb County.

Register at Eventbrite

Digital Experience Architecture: An Evening with Practitioners

Thursday, February 19, 2015
6:00 PM to 8:00 PM

Join Detroit User Experience for Digital Experience Architecture: An Evening with Practitioners, an exciting warm-up to World Information Architecture Day to be celebrated in cities around the world (including Ann Arbor) on Feb. 21!

They will feature four fabulous experience/information architecture practitioners from the local area delivering three presentations total. Each presentation will be approximately 20 min. long and chock-full of great insights and tips that you can use in your own work. Food and beverages will also be available.

WHO IS THIS EVENT FOR?
Their event is for anyone involved in the creation of digital experiences: user experience professionals, information architects, designers, developers, programmers, content strategists, digital marketers, project managers, social media experts and more!

For more information, go to the Detroit User Experience Meetup page.

Holiday Mixer

Michigan CHI, Southeastern Michigan STC, and Michigan UPA invite you a casual Holiday Mixer.

When: Tuesday, December 2, anytime between 5–8pm

Where: Conor O’Neill’s Irish Pub
318 South Main St.
Ann Arbor, MI 48104
Map

To make this fun and interesting, consider:

Wearing a UX or Tec-Doc or conference shirt
Bringing a Great Success and a Horrible Failure story that happened to you this year…relevant to your profession

We will not have a reserved room or purchased food.
We will just meet in the bar, take over tables as needed, and buy our own (and if you like) each other’s food and drink.

Spread the word, bring your colleagues, and let’s fill this joint!