World in my eyes
Short reviews of books I read and I found interesting or not.
I came across John Carreyrou’s book Bad Blood in a year-end LinkedIn post written by Bill Gates. He has made a list of top 10 books that impressed him in 2018. He does that every year.
And a great book it is, indeed. I couldn’t leave it for about 30 hours, counting my sleeping time. I found it very well researched and providing different aspects and references. Pure investigative journalism.
During the month of April, I have read some books and papers that left a deep impression on me. Previously I have shared on this blog recommendation on a book concerning Digital Marketing, UX, IA, and Social Media. Each and every one had its designated post. But lately, I have started pushing myself to find the time to read more. Consequently, I have decided to share with my readers a list of my readings on a monthly basis (whenever I have something to share, naturally).
I hope these collections of monthly readings inspire you at least a bit. They certainly put my mind into reflection mode. And here are the ones that made my April readings list.
Two Interaction Design books, “Evil by Design” by Chris Nodder and “Microinteractions” by Dan Saffer, have been sitting in my iBooks library for a while. I was deliberately waiting for a holiday, so I can read them in peace and without any distractions around. And, boy, was I glad I did so!
Service Design has been a field I wanted to dig in for a while. And the geek that I am, I was looking to a book to start… Well, apart from all the blog posts I read here and there. The book that Polaine, Løvlie and Reason wrote, indeed is a practical guide on how to start and march through this complex task of creating pleasant service design. In addition to the actionable advices there are many examples that put notions into perspective and create shared reference in the reader’s mind. And this certainly helps the newbie to start pondering on the topic.
This book is making constant references to the complexity of service interaction and the various touch points on different platforms/places. In the interconnected times we live in, it only makes sense to address design in a much more pervasive way than we used to a few years ago. Just going through the case studies presented in Service Design, one can get a few ideas on how to make the organization’s service offering better.
Recently, I have finished reading two books from the series “A Pocket Guide” by Five Simple Steps. One of them is “Psychology for Designers” by Joe Leech and the other one “The Craft of Words” by The Standartistas.
