ABC’s Nightline goes behind the scenes at Zappos to see why they have become the leading example in customer satisfaction and expose the company’s enviable corporate culture. By making investments in company moral, and customer satisfaction, their long-term vision has returned huge dividends. Zappos offers newly trained workers $2000 to quit and gives customers 365 days to return purchases with free shipping both ways. CEO Tony Hsieh has kept the call centers based in the US and says their number one focus is building the company’s culture. Whether they teach the practice in business schools or not, the proof is in the pudding. Also check out Zappos’ 10 Core Values.

An oldie, but goodie, Bill Buxton of Microsoft Research, speaks at Stanford’s Human-Computer Interaction Seminar on topics discussed in his book Sketching User Experiences. A little more lengthy than his recent talk at Mix ’09, Bill goes into greater detail about the importance of sketching in design. He also provides examples of how sketching can be applied to the design process in a meaningful way.

Industrial design and human factors legend Niels Diffrient talks at TED about his quest to design the perfect chair. In full director’s commentary, Niels shares how he redesigned a chair by looking at the human body in all aspects, including the user experience of using a chair.

Why can’t furniture fit like a suit?
- Niels Diffrient

Jeff Veen, a founding partner of Adaptive Path speaks at the Web2.0 Expo in San Francisco about data visualization and the future of Big Data. Jeff gives a brief history of information design and talks about the future of visualizing self-generated data to find stories important to individuals.

Bill Buxton Principal Researcher at Microsoft Research and author of Sketching User Experiences, takes the first 30 minutes of the MIX ’09 keynote. One of my favoUrite speakers, Bill talks about the importance and power of sketching user experiences. Citing many examples, Bill stresses the importance of experience design in a bad economy and thinking about the transitions between states and not simply the states themselves.

These things are far too important to take seriously.
- Bill Buxton

Jacek Utko, art director of several European newspapers, talks about how a focus on design has lead to significant growth in newspaper sales. Inspired by Cirque du Soleil to transform the mundane into something extraordinary, Jacek has accomplished that with great vigor and has the awards to show for it.

John Thackara, Director of Doors of Perception, speaks at Interaction ’09. In a sleep inducing talk, John speaks about the ways in which business as we know it will change, and how designers can take on the challenges associated with this change and take them on as design challenges.

Rachel Hinman, Mobile Design Strategist for Adaptive Path, talks at UX Week 2008 and imagines the future of mobile technology. Rachel covers three emigrant and important themes. 1) Re-thinking the relationship with devices and how to make them less consuming of people’s attention and more of an enabler of contextual tasks. 2) Instead of looking for answers, it is much better to seek understanding when it comes to mobile needs. 3) Senses can play an important role in creating powerful experiences for mobile devices.

Mark Rolston, Chief Creative Officer at Frog Design, talks at the 2009 Emerging Communications Conference in San Francisco. In his talk, Mark describes how tangled the virtual and physical worlds are becoming and how the software is going to dominate this new world. Mark cites numerous examples ranging from the software in devices such as the iPhone to the rapidly growing field of augmented reality.

From the IxDA library, Robert Fabricant, Creative Director at Frog Design, talks about Interaction Design and why he believes that behavior is what it is all about. With his own examples dating back to ancient history, Robert believes the practice of Interaction Design can and should be communicated through examples of behavior beyond that of technology.

Thomas Friedman, New York Times columnist and author of The World is Flat, speaks at MIT. Friedman discusses his experience of being inspired to write the original book, the fundamental ideas mentioned in his later edition The World is Flat 3.0, and how shares how that has lead to his latest book Hot, Flat, and Crowded.

MEGAphone is… phone-call controlled, real-time, multi-player gaming on big screens. At UX Week 2008, Dan Albritton talks about the challenges related to designing for such an experience. With mobile servers linked to the phone network via a measly 3G connection, the system must account for the differences between button presses on various phones, handle volume normalization, and be responsive with a large number of users.

Alex Lee, president of OXO, speaks at Gel 2008 on the company’s commitment to good design. Alex stresses how good ideas can come from anywhere and shares several stories of designs which have come from outside inventors.

Don Norman, one of the Godfathers of user experience and known well for ‘Norman Doors’, talks at TED in 2003 about beauty, fun, and emotional design. Don talks about the three ways that good design makes you happy, including the visceral, behavioral, and reflective aspects of design. For more, check out his now ubiquitous book The Design of Everyday Things.

Richard A. Muller, physics professor at Berkeley, talks about the importance of educating everyone about physics. While he reaches about 1000 students a year, over the past few years he has been reaching thousands more through his class’s online web cast and popular book. Muller stresses the importance for policy makers to have an understanding of physics and his course teaches principals in an entertaining way that everyone can relate to.

Scott McCloud, author of several books including Understanding Comics, presents at TED a sketch of his life growing up and and a look into the future of comics. After a brief overview of understanding comics, the meat of the presentation lies in how the medium has moved from printed media and into fully interactive mediums such as those offered through the computer.

Evan Williams, founder of Blogger, ODEO, and most recently Twitter talks at TED about the amazing uses Twitter is seeing. With just 140 characters, but complete mobility, people are using the micro-publishing platform to broadcast their status, coordinate with others, and monitor any and every type of activity.

David Armano, VP of Experience Design with Critical Mass, speaks at the Motion Graphics Festival on how to visually convey information, stories, and a point of view.

Effective communication is everyone’s job—whether you are trying to sell in a concept or convince a client. Visual Thinking can help us take in complex information and synthesize it into something meaningful. In an increasingly fragmented and cluttered world, simple imagery, metaphors and mindmaps can get people to understand the abstract and make your ideas tangible. Find out why thinking visually may be one of the most sought after abilities of the 21st century.

Janine Benyus, author of Biomimicry: Innovation Inspired by Nature, talks about utilizing engineering principals developed by nature to tackle modern day challenges in every aspect of industry. Between frogs, spiders, and leaves, Janine inspires designers, architects, and engineers all the same.

In 1968 Douglas Engelbart and a group of 17 researchers from the Augmentation Research Center at Stanford Research Institute in Menlo Park, CA, presented a 90-minute live public demonstration of the online system, NLS.

The research they had worked on for 6 years was shown to an audience of 1000 and demonstrated many innovations which are used today including the computer mouse, hypertext object addressing, dynamic file linking, and collaboration with audio and video involving persons at two different sites.