If you look at the book "The Design of Everyday Things," it mentions that even on the basis of imprecise knowledge, accurate action can be taken, and speaks of external knowledge and internal knowledge. And it splits the types of such action into three and explains them: memorization of arbitrary things, memorization of meaningful relationships, and memorization through explanation.. But in the end, these were all memorizations based on consciousness.. Do people, consumers, users really buy and use products and feel satisfaction or dissatisfaction based on consciousness? I have doubts about that. Also, by making products based on the theories in the book above, can we really build products for users, or an optimized(?) business model?
What I feel as I run mini-projects is a doubt about interviews and service-design methodologies. Is building a business model based on user needs really the right direction? Of course, I am not devaluing user research or the consideration of needs itself. The fundamental problem I see is that they are just tools.
A business model basically has to have the owner's values, direction, and insight as a premise. Then, as a way to gain empathy for that, one communicates with the consumer through various methodologies. In common terms these days, drawing out the UX. But running mini-projects, what I felt is that because everything is based on user needs rather than on the values of the one who is making the product.. I feel a problem in direction.
To give an example from daily life: I think it is like this.. for example, when choosing a university, or choosing a department, or choosing a future career, or choosing a company, or at a 100-day or first-birthday "doljabi" — picking something based on what is trending lately rather than on one's own unconscious, values, or some conscious factor..
Users are far too many. Each of them goes through different needs and emotions in each situation.
Personally, I think the very act of wanting to build something based on their needs is arrogance. Yes.. maybe one could take a step further from simple user research.. using something like big data to derive something and build a service fit for it. But for how long can that be valid? You cannot chase after human behavior and judgments that change constantly. Grasping some phenomenon.. meaning you can see patterns and causes of the phenomenon, but you cannot judge that this itself is the alternative or the outcome for the future. For example, a clear analysis based on past data that the world may fall into chaos when oil runs out is not enough to conclude that the future will actually be engulfed in chaos. Because people come up with various alternatives to avoid it and try to improve things. In short, time and environment never stand still.
The various methodologies used in service design are like that. "The analysis result on user types shows that oil will run out in a few years. We have to find an alternative. What alternatives are there? Ah.. here are some.." That, exactly, is where the role of that tool ends.
But in reality, reliance on that tool goes beyond that. "Ah.. there are alternatives like these, but the method 'A' is being widely used and the environment is shaping around 'A,' so we should go forward with method 'A.' Then let us build a service or business model to match." That is where my concern lies.
Because the consumer's physical and mental environment, and the feedback about it, change far too often, and each judgment about it is very imprecise. Therefore, building new alternatives on the basis of their (past, current, or up-to-now) mental model hits a very clear limit. For example, "due to the user's so-far-learned negative experience with voice, doubting whether that technology is the appropriate technology," or "shutting down a business in solar or wind power based on the poor past market performance." If the feedback of users who have only experienced an unfinished service plays a decisive role in determining future alternatives, is that direction really right? I think it may just be an irresponsible way of seeking approval, or of offloading responsibility for a hard decision and getting its legitimacy endorsed.
* Charles Sherrington, a pioneer of early neuroscience, wrote this despite having considerable knowledge about nerves, muscles, and tendons: "When I pick up a piece of paper, I know nothing at all about the movement of my muscles. I just move them properly without any particular difficulty. The thing that moves my arm is a product of the mind. Human consciousness perceives the external world based on elements it has not experienced."
* It shows, paradoxically, how important attention is. To see change in a thing, you must first focus on it. (...abridged) In other words, we encode only the small amount of information that comes into our eyes. The rest is just assumption. (...abridged) The sugar bowl was always inside the clock, but because the brain did not need that information, it filled in additional details. (...abridged) Generally the brain does not need to know most of anything. It only needs to know how to bring in the data it needs. The brain moves according to the need to know something. Because such knowledge (about the entire ordinary surrounding environment) will rarely be put to useful use anyway.
* The eyes moved in completely different patterns according to the question given. Think about what this means. The brain actively extracts only the information it needs.
— from Incognito
Do not set direction as if the ever-changing situation were standing still.
Make clear what you want to do, and then — whatever you do, however you do it, whatever tool you build, I think what matters is drawing out their interest. Direction is not the result of analysis, but the visualized result of intuition emerging from the unconscious.
To visualize that invisible, even to oneself unrecognizable intuition, multi-disciplinary learning and experience across philosophy, humanities, and business are needed, and communication and feedback with many people are needed. While using the many existing methodologies. Again: methodologies are not for setting the direction of a service. They are for improving, fleshing out, and visualizing my already-set direction — in order to draw out shared empathy.
* (It can look like a face, or it can look like a vase.) The important point is that in reality nothing has changed. The change has happened in "your brain." Sight is not passive but active.
— from Incognito
It is the same with everyday services. No matter how much we analyze, no matter how rationally the results are derived, the outcome is the same. In the end, it depends on the user. No — even for the same user, the perception may shift depending on that user's mood or situation.
Such business modeling or service design, in the end, exposes us to the dangerous situation of success or failure whose cause we do not know.
