Our daughter Annie has two terms to describe an event or situation: random or sketchy. Random is good sketchy is bad. We are in a time that celebrates randomness and decentralization. Random is good, because there is ample room for chance occurrences and new interpretations. However when things are simply chaotic or badly planned they are "sketchy". In a sketchy situation there are no creative possibilities and one is not enabled or empowered. From the WEB to the many interpretive communities in the world, there is a need for design languages that are responsive to the rapidly shifting, mutating and seemingly random cultural scene.

Designers are traditionally trained to give order to situations with strategies that often result in rigid design solutions that are intolerant of change or the way people use or perceive things. The rigidity usually results in people having to use their own ingenuity to subvert or modify the irrelevant structure.

There are some events occurring that hold out some possibilities We need to develop new design strategies that embrace and leverage chaos and change. The old formal systems are too rigid, too much about ideal compositions and not enough about the people using them.

One possibility is design that is completed by the user, that engages the users interpretive powers to create meaning. This means design that is not perfect or completed until the user interacts with it. Design that leaves some room for the users interpretation. Also design that accepts wear and time well with the patina of use adding to rather than detracting from its value. The object becomes a record of the person and the history of use. We might look at the strategies used in certain interactive art installations for clues about how to make more responsive design in which one’s presence matters.

In chaos theory there is discussion of certain boundary conditions, where things are unstable but not yet chaotic, that provide fertile ground for change, mutation and evolution. Design needs to be able to swim in such rich influx situations and help provide interpretations for people to help them make sense of the world. Two key goals of design are to enable and empower the user or the audience. We need to redefine what those goals mean in the time of randomness. What is design's role in the realm of self organizing systems. Can we set up conditions which help people create meaning and understanding?

The emerging techniques of looking at how people use and experience situations like video ethnography also might allow designers to design for situations that fit the user and the circumstance yet also allow for change in that circumstance. More insights into the situation might result in design that is responsive and changeable, a tool for the user rather than a fixed solution. A truly user-centered design would start from the experience of the user and build spaces, objects and communications from that understanding. The use of stories or narratives in the development of objects and spaces gives us a better understanding of the role of the object in one's life.

Post structuralist philosophy also focuses on the viewer as co-constructor of meaning, with meaning being very much in flux . Some strategies have emerged from post structuralism that result in open ended designs that engage the viewer or user. It is both a recognition that meaning is fleeting and culture dependent but also a way of bringing the user/audience into the creative process.

If design is about enabling and empowering rather than enframing and codifying then we need to embrace whatever strategies are available to us to help people make sense of their world and see the possibilities.

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© 1997 High Ground Design. Reprinted from www.2011_highgrounddesign.com