What is an artifact? Why should you care?
Sunday, July 1st, 2012Artifacts are what designers and innovators create. How you think about them determines how creative you will be.
Artifacts are those abstractions, objects and activities that are designed for a specific purpose. They are the stuff and events created by people rather than nature. In general terms artifacts are a collection of four levels of overlapping features and functions with a distinct form that have been designed to:
- Be useful or deliver the core functionality of the artifact (level 1)
- Be easy to access or give the artifact usability (level 2)
- Delight senses or give the artifact a look-and-feel (level 3)
- Move hearts/minds or give the artifact a think-and-feel (level 4)
Take the radio for example. It is useful because it has been engineered to play music. Playing music, news and other audio broadcasts is the radio’s core function. Most modern radios have digital displays, scan features and memory buttons that make them very easy to use. These features give radios usability. Some radios are almost a work of art in the way they stimulate our visual and tactile senses with a sleek high-tech form, diode illuminated displays and grip-right buttons. Whereas other radios are plain in appearance and sensory experience and deemphasize features at level three.
