John Boykin

Award acceptance speech: video      script

Video scripts

Radio commentary: “Free Christ from Christmas,” National Public Radio, All Things Considered (a bit of heresy)   script

Memorial service remarks

Song lyrics

[User experience (UX) is the practice of designing websites, mobile apps, and other products to delight the people who use them.]

Simplicity: It’s Complicated (the ultimate UX virtue is not simplicity, but ease)

Everything I Really Need to Know about User Experience I Learned in Sunday School (good design treats people right)

UX Haikus (30 bits of design advice in 17 syllables apiece)

Stop Helping Me (Google Calendar’s overeagerness to help does more harm than good)

Probability: A UX Designer’s Second-Best Friend (ways a strong sense of probability improves design)

The Entrance Is the Exit… Obviously (confusing signage at a medical clinic)

Half-Math and That Gushing Hole in Your Bucket (why e-commerce sites should kill their intercept at checkout)

Why reinvent the phrasebook?  

Why redesign a design classic? (Minard’s graphic of Napoleon’s fiasco in Russia)

 “A Ride to Remember,” Stanford Magazine (profile of astronaut Sally Ride, based on exclusive interview)

“Creative Wars,” Women’s Sports (story of Dana Kramer-Rolls, one of the first female fighters in the Society for Creative Anachronism, which stages battles using medieval weapons and armor)

“Be, Maybe Not Be, Which Decision Better?” Dramatics Magazine (profile of a man who signs theater—onstage, among the actors—for the deaf)

[All Stanford Magazine, except where noted]

 “The Heart Facts” (primer on cholesterol)

“Amazon: The River and the Rainforest” (based on a trip there)

“On Call with Life Flight” (day in the life of Stanford Hospital’s emergency helicopter service)

“Monterey Bay Aquarium” (how it was designed, built)

“Surgery Without Scalpel—or Cure,” (a magician and physician who expose the fraud of psychic surgery)

“Enclave of the Castaways” (based on a visit to the Galapagos Islands)

“Liquid Life: The Water Beneath Us” (the geology, economics, management, politics, and pollution of groundwater)

“Going for the Gaps” (interview with Nobel Prize-winning physicist Arthur Schawlow, co-inventor of the laser)

“The Editor as Photographer,” Folio (three-part series)

“Building ’em Like They Used To,” Stanford Magazine (how craftsmen hand-built and tuned Stanford’s Renaissance organ)

“Without a Word,” San Francisco Focus (review of performance by mime Marcel Marceau)

“Marcel Marceau Speaks,” Dramatics Magazine (freewheeling conversation with the mime)

“Welcome Aboard the Sea Cloud,” San Jose Mercury News (history and spirit of a remarkable tall ship)

“International Eisteddfod: The Welsh Song of Peace,” World’s Fair (first-person account of singing in this Welsh music festival)

[All Stanford Magazine]

 “Abortion: Which Life? Whose Choice?” (a presentation of each side’s case, with point-by-point replies from the other side)

“The Great Budget Balancing Act” (interview with Michael Boskin, chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers)

“Making Sense of South Africa” (history)

“Still Changing After All These Years” (U.S. Constitution, the unwritten constitution, comparisons with other constitutions, the notion of rights, judicial activism)

“With a Small Stick, Loudly” (do economic sanctions work? If not, why are they our preferred weapon of foreign policy?)

“Making Sense of the Middle East” (ghostwritten, based on interviews, two parts)

“Why Do We Have a President?” (comparison of the parliamentary and presidential systems of government)

“Philip Habib: Whatever it Takes” (rare on-record, substantive interview with the diplomat)

“Accessible Websites: The People and Their Tools” (how visually impaired people use the Web and how best to accommodate them; the technical specifics are out of date, but the ideas remain valid)