Paul Dourish about the designer's stance (embodied combuting), described in Where the Action is:
"while system designers have control largely over just the representations encoded in the software, the meaning of the system extends beyond simply the software to the whole environment in which the software is used. (...) The "designer" formally designated, still has the primary responsibility for the artifact. However, the second responsibility ascribed to the design - responsibility for the way the artifact is used - is open to considerably more debate. Obviously, artifacts must be designed with at least some expectations of their probable use. (...) Instead of designing ways for the artifacts to be used, the designer needs to focus on ways for the user to understand the tool and understand how to apply to each situation. The designer's stance is revised as the designer is less directly "present" in the interaction between the user and the artifact."
Why do I blog this? going through the book this morning (again), this quote echoed with some thoughts that I had lately about multiple affordances. Was thinking lately about how artifact interactions (like an "intelligent home, whatever that means) are fragmented in ubiquitous computing and how, at the same time, artifacts can have multiple affordances.