March Northern User Experience meetup

Recently, I attended the Northern User Experience meeting in Leeds that was organised by Keith Doyle from NUX and hosted by Simple Usability in Round Foundry Media Centre in Leeds. The turn-up was good and I was lucky enough to talk to a few really interesting people from the usability / UX industry about how they got into the field and about their methods and workflow. The main talk on the history of User-Centered Design was given by Ian Franklin. Ian presented the development of the UX since the first half of the 20th century to the present days, mentioning different milestones and approaches throughout last 70 years.

I found particularly interesting the early stages of UCD and usability affected mainly by psychology and research of human error in military systems and flight traffic control. Ian’s talk was followed by open “Tricks and Tools of the Trade” discussion on prototyping tools, particular usability issues and evangelising the UX. If you’ll be around Leeds next time then come, it’s definitely worth the time! Next event is planned on 23rd March! Northern User Experience on Twitter