Creating Local UPA Chapters

Martin Rantzer, Janice James, Asa Granlund, Lucy Mae Suits, Steve Macko
Ericsson Radio, Systems Simply Usable through Design, Ericsson Radio Systems, Plural, Cognos

The effort of creating Local UPA Chapters has been very successful, with chapters in Minnesota, Linkoping Sweden) and Ottawa. Local Chapters provide you with a platform for networking and skill development in the comfort of your own neighborhood. Please join us to find out how you can start a Local Chapter.

How to Have Killer Ideas, and Neutralize Idea Killers -- Unless You Have People In The Right Places, Nothing Will Happen

Allen Fahden,
Innovation Network

What good are creative ideas if most of them just fall through the cracks? Have you ever sat in a team meeting with great design solutions to communicate but had trouble getting them on the 'short list' for the next release? Before you spend more time and resources trying to inspire others to action with your ideas, learn why they could be dead by the end of the week. Unknowingly working against each other, team member's opposing work styles make most companies anti-innovation minefields. Allen's work style profiling system looks at ways to make team interaction and collaboration more effective and creative by characterizing people as Creators, Advancers, Refiners, or Executors and describing the personal work processes associated with each type. With humor and wit, Allen will give you the answers on how to have your killer ideas become design reality.

Newest Web Site Research

Jared M. Spool
User Interface Engineering

Jared will present latest research on a variety of web topics, including: 1) New task design techniques specifically for web site testing, including interview-based tasks and compelled-shopping tasks.  2) Latest findings about the number of users needed to find critical problems on e-commerce sites.  3) Why making sites faster probably has no effect on user perception of the site. 4) UIE's never-before-released research on obstacles to purchasing on e-commerce sites.

Learning from Comics

Scott McCloud
Comic Book Writer and Artist

Film, Radio, Television and the Written Word are on the verge of startling transformations as they converge on the digital stage. But convergence is a two-way street and as the technological distinctions between media are stripped away, the ideas which make them unique will send each in wildly different directions. The author of Understanding Comics has been plotting the trajectory of comics' own transformation for years and now offers a unique and exhilarating glimpse into digital media's next Big Bang.

Digital Effects: Conception to Execution

Marc Cooper
Industrial Light and Magic

Digital effects in films and commercials today are now so common that they are regarded as simply another tool available to the filmmaker to realize his or her vision. But as with anything in the realm of moving pictures, there's a whole hidden process and a small army of artists and technicians that work for weeks and months before the spaceships launch or the dinosaurs take a step.

Usability Testing at PC Magazine and Intel Labs

Bill Howard, PC Magazine Senior Executive Editor
Paul Sorenson, Manager of Intel User Centered Design Group

As performance differences decline among similarly configured PC or notebook brands, usability and ease of use become more important buying criteria for business, mobile, small business, SOHO, and home users. Scripted lab and checklist based testing by PC Magazine, Intel labs, and others provides repeatable results that can predict which systems and features benefit the various user classes. Focusing attention on ease of use and usability acts as a driver for system vendors to create better computers.

A Broader View of Usability: Forget Branding... Customers Want A Good Experience!

Mark Hurst, Founder and President
Creative Good, Inc.

Using real-world case studies, Mark Hurst will show how top e-commerce sites have become more successful by improving their customer experience, where ease of use is only one of several significant factors contributing to the user experience and perceptions of value. Loyalty, "conversion rate," and branding all are dependent on a good customer experience.

Design it the Whole Brain Way!

Pat Herrmann
Herrmann International

In this highly interactive session you will learn about how the brain impacts usability and design. Activities and Exercises will allow you to discover your own preference and learn about how you can design products that will appeal to different thinking styles.

Solved and Unsolved Problems of Usability

Jakob Nielsen
Nielsen Norman Group

Many fundamental usability questions have been answered; often with answers that have stayed the same for ten years or so. At the same time, there are problems we have known about for more than ten years that have still not been resolved despite many attempts. Six years ago the scope of usability expanded to encompass the Web, leading to new problems, many of which are unsolved. This talk will take the long view of the usability field, assess what we know and don't know, and set priorities for future work.