Design Jams are one-or-two-day design sessions, during which people team up to solve engaging User Experience (UX) challenges. Similar to developer ‘hackdays’ they aim to get designers together to learn and collaborate with each other while working on actual problems. The sessions champion open-source thinking & sharing and are non-profit, run by local volunteers.
What is it?
Design Jam London #1 is the first in a series of physical collaborative design events helping to spread the concept of ‘Open Design’.
It is organised by local champions – Johanna Kollmann, Joe Lanman & Franco Papeschi.
Taking place on Saturday, the 20th November 2010 at City University London within its Centre for Human-Computer Interaction Design – the event will bring together over 50 local design enthusiasts and is supported by Mozilla Labs, City University London [1] & Johnny Holland [2].
Who should attend?
Anyone really – Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) & Design Students, Interaction Designers, UX Researchers, Information Architects, UI Designers, Web Designers, Graphic Designers, Developers + more…
The day aims to improve collaboration skills and help attendees learn and practice various UX techniques including but not limited to Research, Brainstorming, Sketching, Wireframing and Prototyping.
What happens at a Design Jam?
Attendees sign up in advance. Upon arrival they assign themselves to teams based on the skills they could contribute and what they’d like to learn.
Teams are then presented a design challenge that they tackle by doing research, sketching, guerrilla testing and other UX techniques. They are encouraged to share their process and ideas halfway through enabling them to get feedback from other teams as well as other mentors in attendance during the day.
The day concludes with final presentations to the entire group. Outcomes could take the form of sketches, storyboards, a video or even a prototype – whatever communicates the idea best.
All output materials will be shared on the public Design Jams wiki, and teams will be asked to compose a blog post about their design process and ideas.
Keeping track off Design Jam London #1
Follow @DesignJamLondon, @MozConcept and the #DesignJam hashtag on Twitter for the latest news and updates (schedule, activity, outputs etc.)
Also keep an eye on the Design Jam London #1 wiki, which will collate a repository of outputs from the day.
Outputs. How will they be shared?
To facilitate the free exchange of ideas, all outputs, visualizations and other contributions made during the day must be contributed under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY) license. This basically means anyone can use ideas generated at the Design Jam, as long as they credit the original authors.
That’s great! How do I run my own Design Jam?
If for whatever reason you missed and couldn’t attend, don’t worry. We’re fully committed to helping support and spread these initiatives as far afield as possible.
Email cyberdees[at]mozilla[dot]com today and let’s discuss getting a Design Jam going near you!
[1] City University London – providing students, the professions and business with the knowledge and skills essential to the success of London as a world city.
Computing and Information Science staff and students benefit from state-of-the-art premises in City University London’s historic College Building. Located in the heart of London, our approach to education draws on more than 100 years of tradition.
The purpose-built space includes specialist teaching rooms, a SAP Product lab and a high-tech Human Computer Interaction Design lab supported by The Vodafone UK Foundation.
[2] Johnny Holland – is an open collective talking, sharing and finding answers about all aspects of interaction design. It’s about you, me, us.
Johnny loves interaction. Johnny loves creativity. Johnny loves sharing. And Johnny loves you.