Usability.gov's "What is User-Centered Design" page

simple primer on user centered design

A nice web building company I ran across

dark patterns... sounds so awesome.

Portfolios!

Paul from Usabilla draws the connection between Learning and UX - Awesome!

Explaining Design Research - good podcast!

"Design Research is defense against the dark arts - SEO"

nice (long) article from a time tracker and how it's changed him. "You can't improve what you don't measure"

A pretty nice (pretty and nice) blog of 52 posts on UX topics. cool idea.

"1. Assuming you know what the customer wants First and deadliest of all is a founder's unwavering belief that he or she understands who the customers will be, what they need, and how to sell it to them. Any dispassionate observer would recognize that on Day One, a start-up has no customers, and unless the founder is a true domain expert, he or she can only guess about the customer, problem, and business model. On Day One, a start-up is a faith-based initiative built on guesses. To succeed, founders need to turn these guesses into facts as soon as possible by getting out of the building, asking customers if the hypotheses are correct, and quickly changing those that are wrong."

Start-ups are getting user-centered FIRST, before going thru all the pain of starting up. I'm pretty sure this is what the whole Lean Start - up , Lean UX is all about.

"We are a global network dedicated to the professional practice of Interaction Design. With the help of more than 20,000 members since 2004, the IxDA network provides an online forum for the discussion of interaction design issues and other opportunities and platforms for people who are passionate about interaction design to gather and advance the discipline. "

Interaction design association

A new way to do the 'website tour'. Pretty cool actually.

It would be interesting to watch the users move through this on Clicktale or Inspectlet. hmmm, interesting...

Critiques!

The US government web design and usability guidelines - HUGE book in PDF format with many guideline explained in a concise format. It's actually pretty good. I wish it was in a better format - PDF isn't the most... um, whats the word I'm looking for - USABLE format. just sayin

"247 web usability guidelines Although designing usable systems requires far more than simply applying guidelines, guidelines can still make a significant contribution to usability by promoting consistency and good practice. We use this list of guidelines in our consultancy work. For best results, remember to interpret the guideline in context - this requires a bit more thought but ensures you will get a lot more from your review."

an oldie... no, a classic and classics never go out of style.

"Numbers are problematic to the extent that they give the illusion of providing more truth than they actually do. They also favor what is easiest to measure, not what is most important."

Pitfalls to avoid when concerning the love of numbers