We’re excited to announce the 9th nearly-annual IxDebate at Threadbare, sponsored by Randstad Digital! 4 panelists, 1 empty chair.
Somehow, we let last year slip by without holding our most popular event. We vowed that wouldn’t happen this year, and we’re excited to announce that for the first time since 2019, IxDebate will be happening in-person at Threadbare Ciderhouse! Please join us for some sourdough pizza, fantastic beverages, and your favorite UX community while we do what designers do best: argue about what the heck we actually do.
You know the format: We have four starting panelists and one empty chair. We draw pre-determined topics randomly from a hat. Only people sitting on the panel can speak, but you are welcome to grab the empty chair at any time to join in, at which point someone else on the panel must vacate theirs.
We’ll be announcing the members of our opening panel leading up to the event, and we’re taking debate topic suggestions during registration.
Opening Panel
The first guest on our opening panel is Dan Saffer, who will be lending his saffervescence to our debate.
Dan Saffer
Dan Saffer is a designer, author, and educator, currently an Assistant Professor of the Practice at the Human-Computer Interaction Institute at Carnegie Mellon University, where he teaches classes in service design, interaction design, and designing for AI. Dan is also the author of four acclaimed design books including Microinteractions: Designing with Details (2013) and the seminal Designing for Interaction: Creating Innovative Applications and Devices (2006). His articles have been published in the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, Wired, Fast Company, and UX Magazine. He holds multiple design patents and is a frequent speaker at major design conferences worldwide.
Auldyn Matthews
Auldyn is an Assistant Teaching Professor at the Human-Computer Interaction Institute at Carnegie Mellon University. Her design research centers around “experience aesthetics”, a taxonomy of aesthetics to answer the question, “What makes humans connect with experiences?” based on the Mechanics, Dynamics, and Aesthetics (MDA) Framework from game design.
Previously, she worked for 10 years as a user experience designer and leader in healthcare and higher education, including companies such as Elsevier and Ellucian. Auldyn’s experience includes designing electronic health record software for nurses and patients, transforming patient experiences through mobile applications, and facilitating design thinking workshops across the globe. Most recently, Auldyn started the first UX team at Phreesia, a healthcare tech company.
Chris Roberts
I help people and organizations out-think and out-perform their competition. My unique value combines the empathy and creativity of a designer, the facilitation and communication skills of a corporate innovator, and the operational know-how of a startup COO. With over 18 years of experience in design, innovation, and strategy, I've launched four companies, helped 30+ organizations pursue innovation through design, and directly generated $67M+ in revenue. In 2022 Thrive Global recognized me as a leader in employee experience.
Page Clinton
Currently managing a UX Research and UI Software Design team in Pittsburgh, Page has 20+ years of experience working in academic and multiple industry settings, with both qualitative and quantitative expertise across the full research process. Having started in Industrial Design, she quickly found a passion for learning the ‘Why’ for both hardware and software design and becoming a strong advocate for the user, ensuring they have a voice at the table. She has conducted market research, organizational research, strategic planning, and consulting projects on five continents — making sure to eliminate unnecessary steps and inefficiencies and creating a clear pathway forward for achieving swift and measurable impact against critical business goals.
Introducing Our Guest Facilitator
We’re excited to announce that Keith Instone is driving in from Ohio to act as facilitator of this year’s debate!
Keith Instone
Keith is a Research Analyst for Stratascale, studying technology trends and innovative digital experiences. He is active in UX community service, serving as ACM SIGCHI Partnerships co-chair and leading the Ohio UX Roundtable. His career has spanned academia (human-computer interaction), consulting (Argus), and in practice in industry (IBM). He lives in Toledo, Ohio.
About Our Sponsor
We are grateful for our event sponsor, Randstad Digital. Without their support, it would be much harder to put on events like this one.
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