I recently was handed a special business card.  The woman actually spread out a deck of cards with about half a dozen different styles.  (Imagine she said “Pick a card, any card!” like a magician).  They had all different images on the back, all original illustrations.  She had them in 2 card stocks.  One was matte and the other with a satin finish.  See below:

The first is the glossy style and the second the matte finish.  The matte was also heavier than the first one.  I held both in my hands and really soaked in the UX.  I immediately thought these were the best cards I have seen in a long time.

Matte or Satin
Interestingly, I did a little test.  I put the cards in people’s hands and asked them which they liked more.  People looked at them both, but the matte finish had an interesting side-effect.  People kept rubbing it with their thumb.  They couldn’t stop touching it.  The Satin was sharper, more resistant to degrading and cheaper to produce.  However, the Matte got all of the hand attention.  People didn’t even realize it was happening until I pointed it out.

Look at the image above.  You can see how much more touching the Matte received.  I’ll use the analogy  The matte is like a vinyl record and the satin finish is like a CD.  The CD is better in every measurable way.  However, the vinyl created a stronger experience.  It was more fun to collect.  It was a lasting experience, BECAUSE of the flaws, not in spite of them.

Making things perfect is never the goal.  Creating a strong experience is the goal.  When people realize that, they will make much better products.

Great Business Cards
The first and most important aspect of a business card: It should leave an impression.  People get cards all the time and most of them end up in the trash.  You need your card to grab a hold of someone and tell them, “Hey, this is special!”.  This is especially true for creative types, but even for something like an accountant, you want your business card to stand out.

The second most important thing is to: Not suck.  Here is a quick list of business card don’ts.

1. Don’t make tiny/enormous business cards.  In fact, don’t stray from the basic dimensions for your country.  In the US it’s 3.5 x 2 inches.  They are a pain in the ass to carry and don’t improve the UX.  It stands out, but in a way you want to throw away immediately.  Wrong impression.
2. Don’t show perforations or other signs of cheapness.  There is nothing lamer than knowing the business card was printed at your house on perforated cheap paper.  If it’s worth giving out, spend the money to get a decent card.
3. No QR Codes or other advertisements.  It’s tacky.  It takes up room and detracts from the experience.  Your card has one purpose, to communicate who you are.  Don’t try to make it interactive.  Don’t try to sell other ideas.  It’s not a billboard.
4. Don’t put in too much information.  Do people REALLY need your fax number?  REALLY?  Do they need your physical address?  Less is more.  Stick to the basics.  They need to contact you, give them the best way.
5. Don’t make the card all dark colors.  People often want to write something on the card.  Give them space and light backgrounds to do so.  Make it easy to write on.

One great place to get great custom business cards is Moo.  They have great paper and the web app works very nicely.  Browse their designs and you will see many creative ideas.

Having a great business card doesn’t cost much, but you have to think about the details and the experience.

I think my reading comprehension must be pretty bad.  It would explain why I always

1. Use PowerPoint with few words in presentations
2. Write with fewer words on websites.
3. Ignore long emails

OK, I have to explain that last one.  I don’t ignore it completely.  When I see a long email, I immediately get up and walk to the desk of the person who wrote it.  I say, “Hey, I just saw a long email from you.  What did it say?”

Now some of you might consider this obnoxious.  To me, it is a huge time saver and usually results in much greater understanding of the issues involved.  Written text usually has problems with nuance and information density.

Nuance
Spoken words have the additional benefit of facial and body language accompanying the specific text.  I can see if they are confident or unhappy or vexed by certain information.  I can “read between the lines” by watching the person speak.  I can also ask questions.  Getting the nuance of the issues is usually where the keys to success lie. A solution to a problem that doesn’t understand nuance is doomed to failure.

Information Density
By this, I mean “too much” or “too little” information.  The Curse of Knowledge makes this particularly hard.  The writer knows all of the details.  The question is: How much of the detail should he/she put in an email.  I find most people do both.  They add in tons of useless facts, and then leave out the most crucial bit of information.

It’s an incredibly difficult skill to master:  Typing just the crucial information.  Yet, it is so valuable. I wish there were classes on this in K-12 education and college.  I believe our society would reap massive benefits.

So I go over to the person’s desk and get the information verbally.  This usually saves a ton of time and gets a better understanding of the message.  My thought is: Is everyone’s reading comprehension poor or am I just especially bad?

Although I can only experience the world through my own eyes, I believe we should design and write as if people’s reading comprehension is as bad as mine.

I have been an avid user of Google Reader for years.  I was stunned by Google’s announcement that they would shut the service down.  Literally, I check it and read 10-20 times a day.  I don’t like my news getting stale.  But they are discontinuing it, so I needed to find a replacement.

First, I tried The Old Reader.  I wanted my old reader back, so this seemed like a good fit.  I imported my Google Reader definitions file and it told me it would process my request…just as soon as it finished 35,635 other users first.

WTF?  No seriously.  WTF!

Surprisingly, this took weeks to accomplish.  My WTF meter was off the charts for quite some time.  This is the difference between good programming and bad programming.  However, it did finish eventually.

My first test had Google Reader open at the same time as The Old Reader.  I would watch them both to make sure it was picking up the news.  Turns out the The Old Reader was extremely slow in picking up new articles.  I couldn’t tell what was going on, but it was clear that this option would not work for me.

I explored a few other options and tried Feedly.  It connected to Google Reader easily enough.  Speed seemed decent and it had android and iPad versions.  All good.  Then I started using it.  I found many of their UX enhancements to be annoying.

• Keyboard shortcuts [n]ext and [p]revious didn’t work.  Instead they use [j] and [k].  The preferences make it look like [n] and [p] work, but they don’t on my computer.
• Mark as as read.  I don’t understand this gesture at all.  Google would mark anything I looked at as “read” unless I marked it otherwise.  It seems like Feedly needs me to click “Mark category as read” at the end.  I checked the preferences, but it’s confusing.
• Too many options.  All of the “news” layouts are just hard to read.  Give me the articles in a simple layout and stop trying to confuse me.  I understand “some people” will like those other layouts, but Google got it right.  Keep it simple.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t hate it.  I am just sad about Google scrapping it. I don’t understand their reasoning.  Goodbye old friend.  Until I find a better option, Feedly will fill your place in my daily routine.

I used to LOVE April fools day.  It was a chance to make gullible people believe the craziest things.  Pranks and humor is a time-honored part of the start-up world.  Creative people love this “no holds barred” day of fun.

My favorite prank was on my father after my third child was born.  I told him, “We have news…Katie is pregnant again.”  He yelled, “My god, don’t you people have birth control?!”  It’s all in good fun.

Then Google started their tradition a few years ago.  At first it was cute.  Now the whole thing has jumped the shark.

Definition of Jump the Shark
a term to describe a moment when something that was once great has reached a point where it will now decline in quality and popularity.

Origin of this phrase comes from a Happy Days episode where the Fonz jumped a shark on water skis. Thus was labeled the lowest point of the show.

Not only is everyone jumping on the April 1 bandwagon, Google has lost their collective minds.

Look at Techcrunch’s April 1 Roundup.  I can’t even copy it in bullet form.  It’s retarded.  I can’t take it.  It’s lost all sense of fun.  Now, it’s a perfunctory corporate game that has no soul.

User Experience is about baking love into the cookies.  It’s knowing when you put too many chocolate chips in the batter.  It’s know that you should always leave them wanting more.  It’s about getting people to love you without smothering them.

I don’t love Google (or any of those other guys) for this inundation of fun.  I feel like they ruined one of my favorite days of the year.

This year, the pranksters are the fools and we all have to live with it.

Today, I counted 9 unmatched socks.  That’s 9 worthless socks.  The problem is a UX one.  They all look different.  Because they all look different, if I lose one of the pair, I can’t match it up with another “same” sock.  I appreciate socks that are colorful and let me express myself, but I also want socks to match.  I feel like a spaz wearing unmatched socks.  Just sell me the damn 3-pack and they are all exactly the same.

Go into any store and look at the men’s causal socks.  Look at this example of a 3-pair of socks.  Notice the picture.

Two are the same and one is different.  Why do I need socks that look different from each other?  It only makes it so I can’t match them together when one (inevitably) disappears.  I hate this. I don’t know why it does, but it does.