Small Streams

Design as Writing, Writing as Design

You can call this a wonderful thing found on the way to discovering other things. I was trying to think of examples of advanced technologies that don't really advance anything: How gas barbecues don't really improve on charcoal barbecues; How leaf blowers are a step back from rakes; Perhaps even how writing on-line isn't as satisfying as writing in a journal. How we miss so much, we miss unexpected encounters with beauty, we miss touch, we miss external cues that help us find our place in the world. In place of that we get a lot of shiny, noisy crap. So I checked out Donald Norman's site to see what kind of related information I could find, but instead got to read what he had to say about the connection between writing and design.