Designing for and against the manufactured normalcy field (2012)

urbanhonking.com

27 points·nvader··6 comments

"In cultural practice this process of minimal change takes two primary forms. First, we create stories and metaphors that map strange new experiences back to something we already understand."

This is quite common in creative fields as quick shorthand for a new concept. For example, in filmmaking you might introduce a new crime thriller as script as "It's like Michael Mann's Heat but set in the high finance world of *Wall Street."

Probably true for a lot of innovation programs. "It's like Reddit but for hackers"

Yeah, giving the article more charity, I see it as "Reddit for hackers" really adapting the aesthetics and norms of Reddit, so that hackers who are Redditors have a sense of comfort. Whereas if we'd designed from first priciples for hackers, we might arrive with something more irc-coded[0], perhaps.

[0] Or my personal favourite, a MUD-style environment!

Making normal things feel weird is basically the whole premise of the delightful webcomic Strange Planet: https://www.instagram.com/nathanwpylestrangeplanet

I'm a big fan of Strange Planet too!

I think one lesson I'm taking away from the article is that we're not so much seeking "weird for weird's sake", but expanding that weirdness into direction that's useful, to specifically highlight the novelty of something.

This is just the Overton Window applied laterally, no? In particular the intentional expansion or movement of the window by someone who seeks gain?

Overton E { Social, Political }

Normalcy Field E { Commercial, Experiential, Product }

I think that's quite a significant difference, sufficient to change the tone of the discourse.

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