There were some interesting connections today between Ryan Freitas’s and Stephen P. Anderson’s back-to-back sessions at UX Week. Both spoke about how products evolve, but each had a different twist.
Ryan described a toolset for evolving the design of products over time. His ideas were based on punctuation, a concept from evolutionary biology that basically says that evolution happens through discrete, almost imperceptibly subtle changes. The assumption here is that designers drive that evolution and they do it iteratively.
Stephen, by contrast, talked about products that adapt based on usage — also subtly, imperceptibly, gradually — but the evolution doesn’t happen release-by-release. It happens uniquely for individual users every time they use the product. The product evolves on its own.
Naturally, I found myself comparing the two and wondering if one was somehow righter than the other. Then I realized that even though they use similar language, they weren’t really saying the same thing.
Ryan’s idea of punctuation got me thinking about how to compare the two models. (peterme informs me these are called cladograms, another tool from evolutionary biology.) When you compare Ryan and Peter, here’s what you get.
Actually, while we’re busy synthesizing (please imagine finger quotes), Ryan also talks about finding the essential Buddah nature of your product – working to bring it to its ideal form — so it’s actually something a bit more like this.
This fascinates me. Both guys are talking about evolving systems, but the models (as I see them) are completely reversed!
Of course there’s no reason to believe that both aren’t true and possible. Ideally, you’d achieve product Buddahood while at the same time building in features that make it possible to adapt as necessary for each person – kind of joining both pictures.
In theory, when you merge the two approaches you have the ability to build a foundation and then sit back and watch as the users evolve the system. Ryan mentioned Wordpress in his presentation, and that’s actually a good example of the two models in action at the same time.
At least that’s my take, but once they’re posted you should check out their presentations for yourself. Both are very thought provoking. (I’ll add links as they become available.)
