Some time ago I watched a PBS Frontline documentary called the Card Game. It is an interesting program to see how creative bankers design complex credit card services that seem very attractive, but with hidden and expensive fees. I receive offers of these kind 2 or 3 times a week.

The consequences of these now popular practices are related to the recent financial outbreak in United States. This is an example of service design that instead of satisfying human needs, take advantage of them to enhance the profits. The old model of banking charged fees for use of services and interests for credit services. At the end of the 20th century the business model turned into free use of services and zero percent interest (at least in the first year of service) but with drastic penalties for overdraft and late payments.

An essential element of this model has been the creation of visual messages consisting of high hierarchy information of the free services and the low hierarchy information of the severe penalties. Then, this visual information uses the principles of human-centered design for profits instead of human needs. There are more vulnerable populations such as functional illiterates that more usually do not process low hierarchy information and make more mistakes tracking money balances. Indeed, people that do not control well their balances pay the fees that keep the system viable.

This case allows an understanding of critical challenges for visual communication designers in satisfying human needs. Human-centered design can be a fallacy in visual communication design where the client need usually is more about hiding rather than displaying clear information.

In this post I note how politics can teach designers about message content.

This is elections year in my country, Colombia, which has suffered of corruption for long time. Traditional groups of politicians have controlled significant number of the votes that give them power to define the next president. 8 years ago, current president Alvaro Uribe won the elections with an unprecedented portion of opinion votes because he delivered a strong and simple message: security. People were tired of guerrilla and voted for him. 4 years ago he won again because he showed good results in security. Uribe’s parties became the “new” traditional and, sadly, people have seen the persistence of corruption and illegality.

Today, the 2 major runners for president have an interesting contrast of message: simple and complex. Juan M Santos, former head of defense, belongs to Uribe’s party and his message is simple: “because going back isn’t an option” referring mainly to security. It is basically a contemporary political marketing strategy. The other runner, Antanas Mockus, former Bogotá major, has a more complex message that is difficult to summarize. He argues that all citizens have to be legal, from families to government administrators. He plans a large educative intervention in social and citizenship competencies. Although it is complex, it seems to be clear for opinion votes that transparency could be the way to go. Lately, the survey trends have shown a decreasing vote intention for the Santos’s simple approach and an increasing intention for the Mockus’ complex approach.

Because past Uribe’s simple message was successful and current Mockus complex message might be, there is no a best way to deliver a message. I’ve seen a trend in design and other areas of life for simplicity that not always applies. Although Mockus’ ideas are complex, they need to be complex. Besides, Mockus uses well-crafted and powerful metaphors that have entered in many people’s mind. We’ll see soon who wins between simple and complex messages.

To learn more about current elections: http://www.economist.com/world/americas/displaystory.cfm?story_id=16015299&fsrc=rss

The video below is a documentary about Bogotá that shows how Mockus uses metaphors to explain complex concepts.

I received this message some time ago from one of those anonymous email chains. Popular wisdom is nice and amusing.

La tecnología . . . te vuelve menso ?
Technology … makes you stupid?

Estar en el 2009 implica que..
Being in 2009 implies that..

1. Accidentalmente tecleas tu password en el microondas.
You accidentaly type your password in the microwave

2. Ya no has jugado solitario con cartas verdaderas en años.
You haven’t played solitaire with real cards in years

3. Tienes una lista de 15 números telefónicos para ubicar a tu familia . . . de sólo 3 miembros
You have a list of 15 phone numbers to locate your family . . . of just 3 members

4. Le envías un e-mail al que se sienta junto a ti.
You send an email to one that sits next to you

5. La razón que tienes para no estar en contacto con tu familia es por que ellos no tienen correo electrónico.
The reason you got for not contacting your family is because they do not have email account

6. Se te pierde un momento tu vieja en el super y le llamas al celular (y ella está en el siguiente pasillo).
You lose your spouse in the supermarket and you call her/him at the cellphone (and s/he is in the next hall)

7. Cada tonto comercial de televisión viene con su página de internet . . . y tú te metes !
Every stupid tv ad comes with its website … and you visit it!

9. Salir sin celular, el cual no habías tenido los primeros 20 años, te hace entrar en pánico y regresar por el..
Going out without cellphone, which you had not had in your first 20 years, makes you panic and to come back for it.

10. Te levantas en la mañana y te conectas antes de tomar tu café.
You get up in the morning and connect before a cup of coffee

11. Ya no cuentas chistes… ahora le das REENVIAR .
You know don’t tell jokes … now you FORWARD them

12. Estas volteando alrededor para que nadie te vea que estas sonriendo como estupido enfrente de tu pc.
You are looking around to make sure that nobody is looking at you smiling like a moron in your pc

13. Peor que eso, ya sabes perfectamente a quien le vas a enviar este correo.
Worst, you already know whom will you send this message

I just received an email this week about the triangle of life, wich explains what is the smartest way to locate oneself in case of an earthquake. Although the visual information was not designed by a professional designer (I guess… and hope!), it is a very effective result.

Para mostrale a louis

Click in the image to enlarge:

It’s a couple of weeks now since my wife and I have played eRepublik. It is a MMOG game, “a mirror world where players, referred to as citizens, join in local and national politics, set economic policy, start businesses and wage wars with other countries.”

This game proves that there is not need of complex visual graphics to engage players. Today, there are more than 350.000 citizens! The game has a clear goal of entertainment and the creators have clear profit goals. However, it seems to me that the game have a powerful potential of learning social competencies. Reading some articles and discussing with my wife we found core mechanics that strongly review and reinforce social competencies.

One is described by Alexis Bonte, one of the cofounders in the game, in an Spanish newspaper interview. He described that some time ago the president of France reduced taxes to zero and the companies collapsed. Then players migrated. Bonte says that players auto regulate themselves, which is a relevant social competence.

Besides, talking with my wife, she concluded that essential social values such as recognition of others’ differences and citizen identity are reinforced. She for example compared political invitations between political parties in USA and Colombia and understood cultural differences in how people invite and promote membership. We also have done metacognitive analysis of our social potentials wondering whether or not we are able to participate in certain career paths like army, politics or business. Although the game offers you an option to try with low risks, you make decisions from your capabilities and how you better can support the community.

I wonder if the game has more potential for adult learning because children and youths might not be interested in a text-based game. Anyway, the growing alternatives that non-serious game industries offer can fit serious game needs in the future. Serious games aims could be achieved more effectively with instructional/interaction design than with game design and development.

These are two good examples of information design in audiovisual format. The first above es one the Sprint ads (cellphone service), it might be difficult for us “humans” to process the statistics but the goal is persuasion and the designer wants to show us how reliable, fast, and popular is the service, not to make information understandable at all. The ad is beautiful and very dynamic, which is great and enjoyable.

The other example below is the last video clip of the Story of Stuff. I love it because with very simple graphs they explain complex concepts. In audiovisual information, audio is part of the tools available to solve information presentation and the oral explanation of the presenter helps a lot.



Both clips are rich in rhetoric tropes, one of the design tools in which I am very interested. I think that the first one for TV teaches us that short persuasion is a powerful tool. Sprint wants to sell, but how can we use this persuasion tools for social change? The second one can be the answer, but I wonder if people stay passive that long.

PS. Gui Bosiepe is from who I heard first the concept of audiovisual rhetoric and you can read it here

Photo Dario Cardona, La Patria, Colombia

The last decade in Manizales, where I live in Colombia, there has been a proliferation of call centers that offer customer services of different companies in Latin America and Spain. This make me wonder if the solution for bad information design and corporate communication has cause this call center increment. I also have felt that every year I use more call centers, to clarify services, make questions or whatever according to circumstances. Of course, I don’t have evidence about the correlation between bad information and the increment of call centers. But I do know that many information need a better design. See example below about phone company bill from Manizales (Emtelsa).

If you ask a designer which part of this visual information has the highest visual hierarchy, probably he or she would say that the number “51″ and text “Monday through Friday”. According to visual hierarchy design principle size, contrast and position define the order of visualization. However, designers always see through designers’ glasses; real world interactions are different. In a brochure with 3 tables like this above (Monday-Friday, Saturday and Sunday) I have asked people to find Saturday schedule and write down a departure time to arrive at 2pm to a destination.  Most of them focus on time tables and have written Monday-Friday time and then they realize later of the mistake correcting the answer. Some people even realize the mistake.

This means that a given goal changes the visual hierarchy principle. This issue leads me to think that visual hierarchy might be not a principle at all because people in real world interactions, that usually have a goal to achieve, definitely is not to see how the design manages contrast, size and position. I have found myself missing tittles or subtitles when I read journals, books, websites and so on. So, design research has a lot to do to study the traditional design principles that have been established for so long in the design schools.

PS A final thought: should high hierarchy information be part of details and pop up from them?