Category: 01-Reading

5. The Critical Engineer recognizes that each work of engineering engineers its user, proportional to that user's dependency upon it.

This tenet of the Manifesto talks about how people are influenced by 'works' and programs. The more you use something, the more you are being changed by it, and the more unaware you are of this, the more likely it is that you are being controlled by the thing than you are controlling it. Your life and your identity is shaped by the systems, objects, and ideas you are accustomed to using. The people who make these systems, objects, and ideas are in the end, able to decide how their users function in the world. Being aware that your life revolves around things that you consciously or unconsciously give power is important.

I think this is interesting since it is so obvious and prevalent in our everyday lives. Some examples would be the feedback system on social media sites, including likes, comments, followers, subscribers, etc. More examples would be dependency on autofill to remember passwords, cloud based storage, and auto-sync between devices and accounts.

5. The Critical Engineer recognises that each work of engineering engineers its user, proportional to that user's dependency upon it.

In other words, the design of a product affects its users' behavior. This can happen with or without the participants' knowledge and is nearly impossible to avoid. As a designer, this is a fact that I must constantly contend with. Recognizing these behavioral nudges and understanding how to shape them is a key skill for those in my trade.

One common example of this is the scrolling interaction on mobile phones. Scrollable pages often lack clearly defined bottoms. As a result, users are disposed to lose track of time and spend longer on an app or site than initially intended. Since we are highly dependent on smartphones, this interaction of 'endlessly scrolling' through a given feed has become a mainstay in contemporary culture and raised questions about the role technology can and should play in our lives.