Personality is Inevitable

by February 22, 2006

“A personality trait describes the way people behave in a given situation. So we are automatically designing personalities into our machines, even if we don’t realize it. As soon as we design anything that behaves in a particular way, it has a personality. Even if we never thought about it that way.” –Don Norman, Interview with Don Norman, Ambidextrous Vol. 2

“When it comes down to it, you really don’t have a choice in whether or not you have a personality. Even if you were to restrain every part of your behavior that might betray your true demeanor, you would still end up with a personality: boring and cold. The same is true for Web sites. Even if you deliberately don’t think about your site’s personality during the design process, you will end up with one anyway. The colors, content, and visual elements (or lack of all three) of your Web site all make an impression on your audience, intentional or not. Therefore, it is in your best interests to be aware of the personality you are creating for your site and make certain it is telling the story you want.” –Luke Wroblewski, Who Are You? Get a Personality (PDF), Site Seeing: A Visual Approach to Web Usability