Lean of Death

     So in the Computer Science department labs, there are a bunch of these all over the floor:

The idea is that there are cords that you can run underneath the floors that will have outlets where these holes are.  Unfortunately, the design did not take into account the general area where these things would be used nor did it take into account the possibility that the caps to these holes, which are loose extra pieces would come off.  The result of this negligence is the LEAN OF DEATH

my suggestion would be to make it a solid plug that fills in the whole with little sections that slide open to unveil the outlet that is supposed to be there.

A Spot of Bad Design

I was over in downtown Greenville, actually doing some user observations for the FOMO problem, and stopped by the tea cafe Tealoha.  I looked around for my subject scoped the spot I would sit at and ordered my tea.  When it was brought to me at my table, I was already doing user observations so I didn't really notice.  I reached out for the handle of the cup and lifted it to my lips...except I felt a small stabbing pain where my fingers were touching the handle.  The culprit?  Bad design Exhibit A:

Connected both sides of the handle was a middle ridge that acted as a seem on the outside of the handle.  The two pieces of glass created a sharp edge to pickup and since the whole glass was made from glass, I couldn't just grab the cup without burning my hands.  I ended up holding the cup from the top most edges of the circular part of the cup.

Sincerely,

Ahmed Mustafa

WATCH out for the new Iphone 6

http://cdn.gottabemobile.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/iwatch2-ios-smart-watch.jpeg

The design of the iWatch was nothing short of incredible!! Not only did Apple take advantage of the dying market of watches but they also were able to intuitively integrate their iphone touch screen technology into their design as well as include the magsafe technology from their apple MacBook technology.  All things that users of their projects are familiar with but presented in a new and innovative way.

Down in the Dumps

Hello Blog,
     Today I will tell the story of how bad design annoyed me throughout my MayX course.  During MayX I lived NVA with my friend Matt and if you were't aware NVA has the smallest parking lot on all of campus (smaller than the trone zone).

Picture from Furman Parking Map

     Well throughout my time living there, the parking was always so limited that I was forced to either park in the parking lot next door or in the worst cases in front of NVC.  Seeing as parking is so scarce in this lot it straight up baffles me as to why anyone would do this:

Right beside this lovely dumpster is a wooden gate with a GIANT DUMPSTER IN IT, but apparently that wasn't enough.  The trade off here is just not worth it here.  You get a little more dumpster space for the price of two places of prime real estate parking.  Worse yet, the amazing design of the dumpsters and trucks are wasted on this design.  I've always thought it was great ingenuity to have dumpster trucks able to lift entire dumpsters and dump them in the back of the truck.  Since this dumpster is placed so closely to the narrow opening of the lot, a dumpster truck clearly would not fit and in the past I have seen the truck just pass the dumpster up or go in and empty it by hand.
     This dumpster just has no awareness of the context in which it is being placed.  The artifact is well designed but holistically its not being used to its full potential and I doubt there are any instructions for users to ensure that its used to its full potential.

deSIGNING off,

Ahmed Mustafa

Earhole Choker

Hello blog,

     Today I will tell the story of when bad design caused my little brother to go to the emergency room this summer.  Before we can get into the details we need some background.
     Growing up my little brother has always had ear problems.  In fact, he had to get a tube put into his ear because his eardrum was too close to his ear bones and getting stuck to it.  He had been in and out of emergency ear visits and custom ear plugs from a really young age.  For the last 3-4 years though he hasn't had any real issue aside from the occasional infection which is normal for those of us with non-tubular ears.  That said, we can return to the story.
     So here I am laying in bed sleeping when my little brother busts into my room at around 3am saying that he is deaf in one ear.  Unfortunately for him I was mid-REM and only the good graciousness of Allah got me to situp in bed and blearily look at his ear.  From what I saw there was nothing...so I told him to ask Mom and went to sleep.
     Two hours later I was in the car taking my increasingly more pained brother to the emergency room.  He goes in and gets checked out only to find that he had the plastic bit of an ear bud stuck in his ear!!

Instant relief...from the pain that is.  The design though...has stuck with me like a thorn in my side.

Its true that these ear buds did follow the principles of good design understanding the task and goal of the ear buds was to conveniently transit sound to a person in more readily available and compact way.  The design is sleek and accounts for constraints such as ear hole size by providing removable tips that accommodate for all different kinds of ear shapes but despite this I can't help but feel that their means of executing this holistic view fall short when trying to make informed tradeoffs.
     By adding this versatility to accommodate one ear phone for all ear types, of course this is more cost efficient but it also causes the earbud to fall out of the ear more often or causes the bud to detach from the headphone causing loss of bud or even an ear choke-down.  The trade-off wasn't worth it in my opinion.  I would have iterated back to Protoypes in the approach and try again until they had a proper headphone fit for portable and exercise use but also safe for heavy use.


     The question I leave with this blog entry is whether or not the versatility and cost efficiency of the exchangeable headphone earbud heads are a worthy tradeoff for the integrity of the earpiece if they were made as single pieces in different sizes?


Designing off,

Ahmed Mustafa