THE UX OF FINAL MAJOR PROJECT | BLOG 12

FMP Review

14/07/21 – 25/11/21 (about 3 months - excluding summer holidays)

Design Brief: Materialise the obscurity and complexity of the Blockchain System.

Project Member: Yiwei(David) Han, Sue Heeyeon An.

Design Phase Review

Final Major Project Review

Firstly, I have to acknowledge some of the mistakes I have made during this project. One of the reasons why this was a very long and difficult project was that we did not have a particularly specific target user for our design concept, which led to hesitation in the idea generation phase and an inability to make informed judgements. Another reason was that we used too many background research methods (literature research, interviews,) but not the appropriate methods to facilitate concept and idea generation, which resulted in us taking in a lot, but not having the space to present or distil much of it.

In terms of collaboration, we collaborated and communicated relatively easily and happily in the early and middle stages of the project, but as time went on, the pressure became more intense and the collision of different ideas between project members became more frequent. As my emotional management wasn't working very well at the time, it led to some verbal jousting, for which I feel very sorry. It also made me realise how immature I was in managing stress and my emotions. It also made me realise that in teamwork, it is vital to express your views sincerely, respect others' views politely and maintain a good state of communication. I hope I can always bear this in mind in my future work. Keep a humble and inclusive mindset.

Self-assessment of this project practice is based on John's table: Red dots represent aspects of the project that were not covered or were missing. Yellow stars represent aspects of the project that were attempted and explored. The red dots plus yellow stars represent areas that were explored but could be improved. (Courtesy of David).

This has been a very convoluted and challenging story. Looking back over the course of the project, our design brief has undergone several major changes and several minor ones. From the confident start of de-tokenising and de-monetising the blockchain; to revealing the negative impact of the blockchain; then the idea was challenged and adjusted to blockchain storytelling; to finally materialising the complexity of the internal structure of the blockchain. Our perspectives and design practices have wavered from micro to macro. We explored the topic of human values and incentives design, meta-narratives, trust, socio-technical systems, and of course blockchain system. We experienced many failures and lack of understanding, many idea substitutions, model iterations and constant trial and error. But overall, we managed to complete the project, we made it real and weird.

Our work with me (Courtesy of David).

Visitors looking at our exhibition (Courtesy of David).

Our work (Courtesy of David).

A big thank you to my tutors (John, Alaistair, Eva, Greg, Won, Tiffany) for their help and advice during this project, and to my classmates for their assistance and discussions, as well as my project partner Sue, without your help this project would not have been completed. This is the end of the project, but for me it is just a small milestone, my design career has just begun. See you later, promising students and esteemed tutors : )...

Student card with notes and sketches throughout the course (Courtesy of David).

In conclusion, I have a few words to say to myself.
I want you to be a real and honest designer rather than a 'trickster' designer who decides problems on your own and directs yourself. You should include more audience participation in your design processes (whether participatory or co-design), to discover practical problems and to research and generate really radical and rigorous creative ideas.
I want you to become more collaborative, situated and flexible: We should learn from the perspectives of other professionals, other users, and even other species (tentacular thinking); We should be specific to the current situation and context; We should acknowledge our own limitations and finiteness, which includes our knowledge, our experience, but also our values, our paradigms and keep open to other different paradigms or opinions.

Then, keep the level, move forward.