UXDers often rely on personas to build a more complete understanding of the types of users that will interact with the applications they are working on. Writing the stories for those personas used to be hard for me until I started using other stories as inspiration for them. This is a completely unscientific, highly incomplete look at some of the personality types you find in communities, online and off. Think about how these and other stories might be used as the basis for your persona development. This was a 5-minute lightning talk for Webstock Mini (http://www.webstock.org.nz/birthday.html) and updated to a 10-minute talk for UX Australia 2009 (http://www.uxaustralia.com.au/conference-2009/10-minute-talks).

1. Who are the people Stephen Collins
in your neighborhood? acidlabs

2. I used to
hate personas

3. Then I realised they were
just stories

4. I’m an
English Lit major

5. I’m into movies...
http://www.flickr.com/photos/lanuiop/2565966351/

6. … and comics
http://www.flickr.com/photos/roscoe/2598303289/

7. http://www.flickr.com/photos/redneck/186228784/
… and science fiction

8. … and weird stuff
on TV

9. Why not use the stories I love to
invent personas?

10. Let’s have some fun!

11. WTF?

12. The leader

13. The friend

14. The enthusiast

15. The odd but nice one

16. The one-topic guy

17. The odd couple

18. The grumbler

19. The newbie

20. So...
20

21. License
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/3.0/
http://www.slideshare.net/trib

22. Thanks!
Stephen “trib” Collins
trib@acidlabs.org
+61 410 680722
@trib
www.acidlabs.org