Malloy 9 efforts confront the challenges of overwhelming students; in the case of visual communication, context is everything and will largely define how a designer can address each of Jensen’s points. Apply these approaches to design, and TCC begins to look feasible. What the above points imply is design and marketing (along with business and education) have largely been pushing propaganda while people, drowning out the white noise of 3,000 ads a day, want to be genuinely involved in something meaningful if we expect them to apply our messages in their lives. Not only that, they want to be challenged. They want to feel a sense of achievement, which is why interactive design has been so wildly successful. Apple, for example, sold over 10 billion apps as of January 2011, in the first two and a half years of app existence.11 As we can see, adaptation in businesses and education continue to make a positive difference for both employees/students and business/teaching objectives. Of course there will be differences between how educators and businesses apply these approaches and how visual communicators apply them, but those who are currently experimenting with these strategic techniques appropriately to their objectives are thriving. Logically, visual communicators would benefit in the same way. Rachel Bostman, who pushes peer-to-peer influence and the desire for community in What’s Mine is Yours: The Rise of the Collaborative Consumption, shares how only 14% of people trust advertisers while 78% trust peer recommendations.12 We are surrounded by a global culture of tribal niches waiting to participate in something meaningful. While the amateur may threaten the role of the traditional designer, the adaptive designer sees opportunities and builds relationships.
11
Eric Zeman, “What's Driving Apple's 10 Billion App Success.” Information Week.
http://www.informationweek.com/news/hardware/handheld/229100083 12
Botsman, Rogers, What’s Mine is Yours, 203.