Donald Norman

“You won't catch me giving clear lectures.”

“I prefer design by experts - by people who know what they are doing.”

“I think there is a tendency in science to measure what is measurable and to decide that what you cannot measure must be uninteresting.”

“In my opinion, no single design is apt to be optimal for everyone.”

“User-centered design means working with your users all throughout the project.”

“As for all those mistakes I make - they are on purpose - to teach you how to deal with them.”

“It is relatively easy to design for the perfect cases, when everything goes right, or when all the information required is available in proper format.”

“To me, error analysis is the sweet spot for improvement.”

“And to get real work experience, you need a job, and most jobs will require you to have had either real work experience or a graduate degree.”

“Our information lives will be better served when we are free to get to our information from wherever we are, with any device available.”

“So what does a good teacher do? Create tension - but just the right amount.”

“Isn't one of your first exercises in learning how to communicate to write a description of how to tie your shoelaces? The point being that it's basically impossible to use text to show that.”

“Am I an Apple bigot? No. I can critique their products and their customer service philosophy. But overall, they do better than any other player.”

“Market segmentation s a natural result of the vast differences among people.”

“The problem with emotion was that it was clearly something important, but-at least according to the old philosophy-it was something to overcome.”

“Knowing how people will use something is essential.”

“Readers always seem to think that the author has some control over the design of their books.”

“Everyday people are not very good designers.”

“If you think the products don't match what you want from a product, don't buy it.”

“I believe that the Apple Shuffle is an excellent compromise among the conflicting requirements of simplicity, elegance, size, battery life, and function.”