Acclaimed icon designer Susan Kare early demo of original Apple Macintosh user interface (1984)

In rare appearance, Apple Computer in-house designer Susan Kare walks Computer Chronicle television presenters through the original Macintosh desktop below.

A few words on Susan Kare

Celebrated for a 30-year-plus career designing icons for the likes of Apple, Microsoft and Facebook, Kare is to be commended for advocating (early in the history of visual languages to represent digital information), that simplicity, consistency, affordance, metaphor and feedback are unifying principles of graphical user interface design.

Kare believes that good icons should be more like road signs than illustrations, easily comprehensible, and not cluttered with extraneous detail. She often observes that just because millions of colours are available, every one need not be used in every icon, and that when icons are meaningful and well crafted they need not be frequently redesigned.
— kare.com

This is Myspace

If the soon to be launched Myspace website platform rethink manages to ‘feel as good as it looks’ (smooth, well-organised and relevant) then I may be tempted to return.

A courageous design effort by Brisbane-based Josephmark graphic design studio.

(via UX Magazine)

Design of Firefox

Alex Faaborg, Principal UX Designer at Firefox, talks through the design evolution of Firefox — including the history of the brand, the design philosophy, the UX, and the user interface.

(via faaborg)

Google+ Ripples: How posts get shared

(via FlowingData)

NYT Labs “Magic Mirror”

The R&D division at New York Times has created this intriguing prototype for an augmented mirror.

(Via thecuriosbrain and NYTLabs. Remind me what a mirror does again?)

Flickr: no place like home

First Twitter, then Flickr — front page redesign is #trending. Facebook?

New Flickr

Old Flickr

(via Flickr Blog)

AlphaGovUK

alpha.gov.uk is now open. The website is a prototype for a single UK Government domain, and gives developers, Government and the public an opportunity to assess design objectives, web technologies, information architectures and user experiences which are currently laid out for the project.

With news of several government online projects facing imminent closure, the decision to adopt an open release cycle may come as no surprise: involve stakeholders (i.e. the British public) early to demonstrate what is both prudent and possible, before a huge amount of (public) money and time have been spent. So far, so good.

(Last year's strategy review of UK Government's online services, overseen by lastminute.com co-founder Martha Lane Fox, makes for an interesting read. The document is available to read here (2.58MB PDF) from the Cabinet Office website — via nicepaul.)

Data Art project

The BBC Learning Data Art project aims to introduce people to the power of information visualisation as a contemporary media form of increasing importance.

Check out the latest additions to the project, including the bubble-tastic New Cloud and Lotus interactive timeline visualisations.

UK Radioplayer — UX/Design Guidelines

Radioplayer is a partnership between the BBC and UK commercial radio, to provide radio audiences with easy online listening and to improve discovery of digital radio content. The result? — an excellent audio web app with an ambitious agenda.

I stumbled upon the minimal design standards for the Radioplayer console while I was doing some background reading. UX/UI designers may be familiar with the document format: brand application, user interface, typography, and common page elements are formally prescribed to bring a consistency to both visual design and user experience.

The Radioplayer guide is remarkably detailed and thorough. The great deal of design content and interaction which is packed into the relatively small console area (665 x 380 pixels), and the number of partner stations alongside — further branded content will be overlaid on to the player — no doubt required careful mediation and design consideration.

Go check the latest Style Guide here (maintained by Radioplayer project leader Michael Hill).

(Here is an early concept video showing ways in which users might search and naviagte across the web app — great idea! Via Radioplayer blog.)

Guardian News Interactive Talk Through

This Guardian interactive graphic caught my attention. Video inserts of science correspondent Ian Sample talking readers through developments at the badly damaged nuclear plant at Fukushima helped give credence to the small amount of information that was being received from Japanese authorities.

(Note: Japan's officials are still battling to prevent further spread of radioactivity in the region. Read more.)

Whitney Artport Idea Line

This Java visualization maps the artwork of one hundred and thirty two internet artists over time. Created by Martin Wattenberg, the Idea Line (2001) was the first internet artwork commissioned for the Whitney Artport. It remains to this today a wonderful example of interactive visualization on the web.

(If Java is enabled, launch visualization inside a new window … only 39Kb!)