7

REVIEW FIELD TEST

Hippo: The Human-Focused Digital Book

Digital design and human-centred design are

adaptive methods for producing an output; Hippo

contrasts ‘human-focused digital’ as a signature, one

that does not change as long as what being human

is does not change. Think about questions, not

functions, and design for how you want people to feel

• not for what you want them to do.
  He takes a reductionist approach – ‘nature
  operates in the shortest way possible,’ he quotes
  from Aristotle – in an industry noted for ‘complicated
  approaches to simple challenges.’ The underlying aim
  is always to better enable computers to deal with our
  mundane chores, so that we can move up Maslow’s
  Hierarchy of Needs towards self-actualisation, and
  finally make that film or write that book – however
  terrifying the prospect!
  First we must leave Plato’s Cave, which, in an
  update to the analogy for incomplete knowledge
  of the way things are, is mediated by phones
  and tablets. What marks out human beings is
  conversation – chatbots engage, and if they have
  transparently bot-like personalities, can succeed in
  fostering dynamic and multidimensional relationships
  with apps and products.
  Along the way, Hippo takes in Taoism, considers
  ‘if Socrates had Siri?’, and looks at the chemicals
  produced in our quest for happiness through our
  screens. Moving past reservations about (a lack of)
  editing, and a few rather strained metaphors, this
  is a thought-provoking work which will get anyone
  involved in designing interactions with computers to
  step back and ask a few important questions, such as
  “is this universal or merely novel?”
  At heart, this is a plea for companies to do better
  things, rather than simply do things better, and
  Hippo’s contrarian voice is a necessary antidote to the
  current direction of development.

ippo here is the hippocampus, the

part of the brain that – amongst

other things – forms contextual

associations. In a world where

designs can now potentially adapt to

each person using them, this book

puts in a heartfelt plea for a design based on what

it is to be human, not for a ‘lost target within the

bamboozling and bombarding world of sneakers

with shiny lights on.’

Hippo: The Human-Focused

Digital Book

This will help

your design

succeed, by

making you look

at the ‘why’ of

your ideas and

interfaces

VERDICT

Pete Trainor £8.99 nexus.cx

7 / 10

By Richard Smedley RichardSmedley

H