Inmates Are Running the Asylum, The

Imagine, at a terrifyingly aggressive rate, everything you regularly use is being equipped with computer technology. Think about your phone, cameras, cars - everything - being automated and programmed by people who in their rush to accept the many benefits of the silicon chip, have abdicated their responsibility to make these products easy to use. The Inmates are Running the Asylum argues that, despite appearances, business executives are simply not the ones in control of the high-tech industry. They have inadvertently put programmers and engineers in charge, leading to products and processes that waste money, squander customer loyalty, and erode competitive advantage. Business executives have let the inmates run the asylum! In his book The Inmates Are Running the Asylum Alan Cooper calls for revolution - we need technology to work in the same way average people think - we need to restore the sanity. He offers a provocative, insightful and entertaining explanation of how talented people continuously design bad software-based products. More importantly, he uses his own work with companies big and small to show how to harness those talents to create products that will both thrill their users and grow the bottom line.

Alan Cooper, known as the father of Visual Basic, leads Cooper Interaction Design, a California consulting firm that creates breakthrough interactive product designs for companies such as 3M, Ericsson, IBM, SAP, Sony, VISA, and more. He has been designing and developing consumer hardware products for over 25 years and is a member of the Corporate Design Foundation and the American Center for Design. In 1994 Bill Gates gave him the rare and coveted Windows Pioneer Award, recognizing how his part in the invention of Visual Basic contributed to the success of Microsoft Windows. He also received the Software Visionary Award in 1998.