Episode Summary
In this episode of The Digital Life, we critique CNN's sad information visualization, dig into design for behavior change as a new frontier for UX, and celebrate the 10th anniversary of the Business Innovation Factory Conference. Oh, and Dirk explains his thinking regarding the eventuality of humans turning into cyborgs.
If you're interested in conversation at the intersection of technology, UX, design, and human behavior, you've come to the right place. You can view the full show transcript as well as previous episodes on The Digital Life Web site.
Here are a few quotes from this week's discussion.
Dirk on cyborgs:
Oscar Pistorius, who was ... when he came to international prominence with an inspiring story, that's story changed of course. He is cyborg. Cyborgs are already here first of all, but second of all, the ethical questions have already been asked and answered.
I mean, Pistorius in the Olympics was celebrated. There were very few people who were saying, "This is not fair. This is not right." Even though, and I was inspired by the story. I was certainly was in outrage that he was racing, but I was scratching my head. I was like, "A thousand scientists could tell me that this dude gets no advantage from those legs." He was born without legs. He couldn't be running in the Olympics if massive expensive technology wasn't ... I don't know what the ... I'm sure it wasn't grafted, but it was grafted onto his body.
The world was A okay with it. It's like, "Yeah, rock on. Go for it." Really, it was Pistorius' rise that got me thinking about cyborgs in a practical way, and the notion that, "Geez, this isn't Hollywood anymore. It's not Sci-Fi books anymore." Cyborgs are here and real and accelerating.
A lot of us at Invo wear different devices to track health data. It's only a matter of time before that becomes subdermal. That again is a cyborg aspect.
Jon on BIF10:
The very exciting Business Innovation Factory conference is celebrating their 10th anniversary, BIF10. Saul Kaplan runs that. He is a really generous person. He attracts a lot of terrific speakers, gets a lot of geniuses on stage talking about everything from neuroscience to building playgrounds for kids, charity playgrounds for kids. He just gets these incredible people from all walks of life, who are innovators and who find ways to solve problems that are unexpected and new and are effective. That in the nutshell is what Business Innovation Factory and the BIF conference is about.
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