Love letters

Empathy is an important component of what has become known as Human or User Centered Design practice, a practice that seeks to develop products and services designed to meet user needs and the proliferation of which has lead to the ascendency of Design Research as a critical modality in the design process.

Consequently Design Research practiced in the service of Human Centered Design involves a variety of methods aimed at understanding how people “feel” and much is made of achieving “empathy” with current or potential users.

In this week’s exercise select a product or service that you use regularly and feel strongly about one way or another. Then write a love letter to that product or service making sure to point out all the reasons you really enjoy engaging with it. Imagine the features, the way it makes you feel, what it’s like to touch or engage with it. Once you’re pretty sure you’ve sold your “beloved” about the sincerity of your feeling, then imagine the opposite and write a letter “breaking up” with it. (If you’re beginning with a product or service you hate you can write the letters in the opposite order.)

Each letter should be no less than 500 words and should contain a minimum of 5 “reasons” for your emotional attachment/rejection.