the dotmatrix project

A great poster by designer/illustrator Frank Chimero, ripping on the pretentiousness of this t-shirt.

When I was in art school, I steered away from the graphic design program, primarily because of this type of attitude that ran rampant in studio classes.

When I was an art director in the late ’90’s, I switched up my career path because I didn’t feel like I was building anything. Rather, it felt like I was, at best, pushing pixels to improve the face of a system.

Kinda like pixel/pica/point plastic surgery.

Yes, Design can mean much more either of those two experiences. No, I’m not saying that Design doesn’t have it’s place in the realm of extremely important things in life. I’m a Design Director / Interaction Designer by trade, so I understand the power of good Design.

But such a broad expression of the power of Design is really saying something more akin to this statement:

Strategy with a twist of iterated specifications for implementation can save the world.

And that is neither a reductive nor elegant statement, let alone earth saving.

(via swissmiss)

Welcome to day one of an experiment that I’m calling the dotmatrix project.

Don’t look too closely. Take in the big picture. It’s all pie in the sky type stuff.

This spot is going to start off rather lonely — it’ll primarily serve as a place for me to share my thoughts on information architecture, design and the future of the internets (yes, those crazy tubes).

Much more of a dot than a matrix of any sort.

I mean, sure, my thoughts will definitely weave through and cross over numerous topics and mix in with commenter’s perspectives, eventually taking some form of a representative shape — you’ll know my approach to design and how I’m thinking — but that’s not necessarily the sort of matrix I’m interested in watching develop.

I deal with that mess every day.

Here’s where I hope it gets interesting:

• As time passes, I’m going to extend an invite — one at a time — to fellow independent colleagues to join me in this space. Further criteria I’m using is that the person will need to be either a designer, technologist, artist, musician or a thinker.
• Each person who receives an invitation will already need to be publishing to the internet. Tagging is going to play a large part in the evolutionary design of this space and I’m going to make cross-posting to the dotmatrix project super-duper simple.
• As consulting opportunities come my way, I’m going to tap into this organically developed pool of brilliance to form like Voltron on gigs. Hopefully, each member will feel free to do the same, creating a loosely connected network of professionals that are vibing with each other more and more each day.
• As our conversations develop in the ether, I’m going to keep an eye on opportunities to develop dotmatrix project conversations into potential service concepts. My underlying premise is the more smart folk at the table, the more chances for brilliant solutions to become exposed.

(originally uploaded by Robinnnnn)

After a period of time, I’m hoping that our individual personalities, experiences, skill sets and voices will begin to form a distinct shape, tone and representation — individuals crossing over and coming together as one for brief moments in time.

Is the sky the limit?

Only one way to find out.