UX Week 2009 – Theme, First 3 Invited Speakers
by peterme
Though UX Week 2009 doesn’t happen for a while now (15-18 September 2009), we’re well into our planning. In 2008, some of our audience’s favorite speakers were folks from outside of user experience design — Jane McGonigal talking about games (video), Michael B. Johnson sharing Pixar’s process (no video — he revealed behind-the-scenes stuff!), Jay Torrence talking about how his theater troupe operates (video). So, we’ve decided to explore that further, and for 2009, we’re looking laterally to all manner of disciplines outside of design, though which all influence our work.
We were able to land three amazing speakers before this year’s end. I’ve already blogged about (and interviewed) Scott McCloud, the mad scientist of comics.
There’s also Erin McKean, lexicographer extraordinaire. We’ll pair her with an information architect and have them talk about the experience of words. If you’ve never seen Erin speak before, I suggest this TED talk.
And, we’ll have Genevieve Bell. Though currently titled as the Director of User Experience within Intel’s Digital Home group, her Ph.D. is in cultural anthropology. She’ll bridge the gap between experience design and anthropology, and help us understand just how we should be thinking about this “ethnography” thing.
The structure for UX Week 2009 will be similar to 2008 — single-track Main Stage presentations in the morning, and an array of hands-on workshops in the afternoon.
UX Week 2008 was our best yet, but I’m confident we’ll top it in 2009. Register now for the insanely low price of $1895 ($2,995 regular price), and use the promotional code RNSB and get an additional 15% off (lowering the price to $1610.75).