The Laws of Simplicity is written by John Maeda, an excellent experience designer as well as the CXO of Publicis Sapient. There are some valuable thoughts I learned from this book, I have summed up some notes and added my comments in this post. I would give this book a 3/5.
There are overall 10 laws:
1. Reduce
If you are not sure about it, remove it. After remove everything can be removed the SHE method is now to be put into use.
SHE = Shrink + Hide + Embody:
Shrinking means lessening the physical size of the product to create optical illusion.
Hiding can be spotted on Swiss army knife, chrome searching engine
Embodying is related with reflective design, branding the product with qualities and senses to make it stands out. Lessening it without affecting brand images.
2. Organize
Organising is realized through SLIP:
Firstly, sort things to their natural groupings; then label each group with a relevant name; after that integrate groups resemble each other whenever possible; finally prioritize groups by referring to the 20/80 rule and focus on the vital few.
By categorising things based on our understanding towards them is really interesting, it’s a process turning the objective world into our subjective ones. What’s more interesting is that our definition on one thing could be enhanced, adjusted, twisted as time goes by.
3. Time
Saving in time feels like simplicity. Instead of shortening waiting time, we could make it more tolerable instead.
4. Learn
Knowledge makes everything simpler by helping users acquire new knowledge with existent knowledge.
BRAIN:
Basics are the beginning;
Repeat yourself often;
Avoid creating desperation;
Inspire with examples;
Never forget to repeat yourself.
However, this behaviour guidelines seems a bit like cliché to me personally as we all know that to start from the basics and review what we learnt from time to time…
5. Differences
The simple and the complex complement each other.
6. Context
The more blank space there is, the less information is display, while the limited information would gain more attention.
7. Emotion
People don’t always think and react rationally, they need emotion and intuition. Even if it will become complicated. It also involves reflective design.
8. Trust
We believe that simplicity requires trust, both for people and technology.
9. Failure
Sometime some things cannot be simplified, sometime failure happens.
10. The One
Simplicity is to reduce the obvious and adding the meaningful.
Moving it far AWAY to make more appears like less;
OPENness simplifies complexity;
Use less POWER and gain more.
The above is three keys to rule No.10.
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