Product Design for the Web: Principles of Designing and Releasing Web Products

Introduction

“People think that design is styling. Design is not style. It’s not about giving shape to the shell and not giving a damn about the guts. Good design is a renaissance attitude that combines technology, cognitive science, human need, and beauty to produce something that the world didn’t know it was missing.”

—PAOLA ANTONELLI, MOMA’S SENIOR CURATOR OF ARCHITECTURE & DESIGN + DIRECTOR OF R&D

In January of 2010, I stepped into a job I’d never had before, in a situation I’d never been in before. It had been years since I’d done anything other than work for myself and at businesses I’d started. The job was Interaction Designer for Etsy, the global marketplace for unique goods. The situation? Well, at the time, Etsy was a 50-person company. ...