Are you a designer who checks Twitter incessantly (or at least occasionally) and also wants daily insights into the thoughts and desires of the people who use the products and services you design for? Then perhaps you should start following your users on Twitter.

As a still relatively new Nokia designer, and having little experience with Nokia products and services previously, that’s exactly what I’ve started doing. I found, Mark Guim, a 25-year-old, self-described Nokia fanboy who currently resides in New York as he pursues a second bachelor’s in nursing. He has a Twitter feed and also is the editor of The Nokia Blog. I started following him on Twitter about a month ago, and have really been tickled by how much I’m learning about his feelings about Nokia’s products, from technical features to experience.

“after a week with Nokia E71, I’m back to N85. Love the qwerty but damn pics and videos come out purple.” -thenokiablog, 9:07 AM Dec 31st, 2008

Seeking out your users online isn’t a new idea, even on Twitter. Increasingly, marketing folks from the products and services I use (and likely complain about: hi Comcast!) have started following their customers on Twitter, which is great I’m sure for spotting trends, damage control, and promotions. But if Comcast follows me, they get mostly nothing about how I feel about Comcast services (though it might be good if they paid attention to all the user-centered design stuff).

Conversely, Mark broadcasts his feelings and day-in-the-life interactions with the Nokia products he uses in a way that most designers only dream of when putting together journals and other reporting paraphrenia for design research. It also feels a lot like another design research activity: shadowing. Not only do I get Mark’s thoughts, but also his interactions with other Nokia users who interact with him.

“interesting points from commenter: ‘Nokia N97 is no where near revolutionary enough to wait 6 months for’ http://is.gd/dQFD“-thenokiablog, 10:14 AM Dec 28th, 2008

Could Twitter or blog shadowing become a new design method? I’m curious if other designers are using Twitter or other services as a means to gain user insights by following specific people’s online publishing and behavior. And while I haven’t done it, I wonder what it would be like to start mapping the insights and really using them in future projects.

The innovation debate continues in the NY Times this morning with “The Risk of Innovation: Will Anyone Embrace It?” After wading through the reporter’s anecdote about not being able to  operate his Prius, a task that apparently requires the owner to adapt behavior (“I don’t think I can adapt to the behaviors required by the Prius.”),  we get to the thrust of the article.

“Whether humans will embrace or resist an innovation is the billion-dollar question facing designers of novel products and services.”

I like the reference to the billion-dollar question. I’ll have to use that when speaking about my projects.

So, what can we do to help solve the billion-dollar question?

“FOR technological innovators, the cash register can ring either way. They may achieve a smash-hit breakthrough, or simply make a slight improvement in a technology that humans already feel comfortable with. Most innovators no longer even try to predict human reactions to their creations.

Henry Kressel, a partner at Warburg Pincus and a co-author of ‘Competing for the Future: How Digital Innovations Are Changing the World,’ says, ‘You throw technologies into the market and see what sticks.’”

Apparently nothing! Just make stuff and see what happens!

While there is some truth in saying that you can never determine for sure what people will do with a new product or service, I believe the whole point of human-centered design is that we can do research that allows us to design product and services that actually improves peoples’ lives and that they desire rather than just throwing technology into the market.

I’m surprised to see that most innovators “no longer” try to predict reactions, as that is antithesis to a major theme of my graduate school education. Though I recognize that is how a lot of products and services appear to be currently design (perhaps why so many fail or suck), I would like to believe that with the increased focus on human-centered design the situation might be improving.

Maybe not.