Interesting articles on design II.

Hello! This is my second weekly digest of all things from the world of design that caught my eye! If you seen something worth mentioning, please do so in comments! Thanks :)

The Pernicious Effects of
Advertising and Marketing Agencies Trying To Deliver User Experience Design
This article is bit dated (November 2010), though still very interesting. Peter Merholz from Adaptive Path generated huge buzz. He talked about Ad agencies providing ‘user experience‘ as part of their marketing services.

I have agency background and I agree with SOME of Peter’s accusations (though definitely NOT wit all of them), namely that doing pitches is devolving the quality of the work that agency can provide, because at the time of the pitch, the agency barely knows the brief and the strategy, not even mentioning that designing a product with great UX is not just 1 step in the process.
Also usual practice of fulfilling every client’s crazy wish is rather destructive in the long time run, as well as design work based purely on a brief, without any research.

I still believe there are many agencies that understand the real value of UX design and are trying to deliver the best product possible, taking on account not only business goals of the client, but also a needs and motivations of the users.

Jobs Talks About His Rise and Fall
Very interesting interview with Steve Jobs about his first 10 years at Apple and his philosophy of innovation and creating great products.