Clear designs are so crucial that the report authors have urged the government to take action.
The recommendations out today (14 May) come from the Design Commission, the research arm of the All-Party Parliamentary Design & Innovation Group, an industry-led body conducting research aimed at driving thinking around design policy in the UK.
Professor Gillian Youngs, the 91¶¶Òõ's Professor of Digital Economy, and her co-author Lord Inglewood, said: "The digital economy now opens up new possibilities for design to play as yet unimagined roles in helping us to understand and navigate a newly connected world. Intelligent environments, where data can flow to and from users via the 'Internet of Things' will, if designed properly, create user experiences of day-to-day life that are more efficient, sustainable and enjoyable.
"Government should seek to use design to explore and demonstrate the potential applications of open data, in order to educate the public in how such information could be used."
Their recommends include:
- Appointing a Head of Design responsible for digital platforms in each government department.
- Government, through the Technology Strategy Board and its partners, should find ways to embed designers in testbed big data projects.
- Large infrastructure projects such as HS2 or future large-scale housing delivery should appoint a Chief User Officer with responsibility for the effective, relevant and transparent use of big data.
- The design sector should be encouraged to partner technologists and regional development mechanisms to develop Digital Design Clusters which would work together to develop networks of design-led digital activities.
- Children, further education students and undergraduates should be taught using up-to-date design software or appropriate open source platforms.
- Whilst the UK will be the first country in the world to teach children how to code as part of the curriculum (from 2015), there are still measures that can be taken to close the skills gap now.
- Expand and develop the current Research Councils UK funding work on linking design to the digital economy.
Professor Youngs and Lord Inglewood concluded: “More work needs to be done to develop ideas and stimuli for the digital economy (including concerns relating to intellectual property, ownership of data, and how digital innovation can be stimulated without infringing on personal rights). This must not be confined to design and digital experts, but should include contributions from a wide range of other disciplines, and include Parliamentarians, all of whom are, after all, ‘users’.
“The digital economy is tied strongly to physical location. We strongly recommend that any future government digital strategy should include current research in this area to help drive the digital design clusters and unleash growth throughout the UK, and not just in London. In addition, more detailed work is needed to explore how current education and research funding mechanisms might encompass ‘digital by default’ and correspondingly focus on user-centred design.”
The report said: “Designers now need to wrestle back the innovation agenda and work with technologists in order to create new forms of social and economic value in the ever-growing digital economy.”