Talk:Universal design

rewrite in order

This article is very poor, especially considering the significant importance of universal/inclusive design to designers of all products and services today and the inevitable increase in the percentage of the population who will require more inclusive design in the future. The introduction is poorly written, the principles section is lazy and the examples are weak. If I have some spare time I'll rewrite it NinjaSteve (talk) 01:56, 18 February 2008 (UTC)

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for the 23 Nov 2004 edit: Universal design isn’t a proper noun, so the correct term should be all lower case. Merged with Universal Design.

The ISO links are just to abstracts or places to look when the standards are available. From what I can see, there isn’t the actual text available for free for Guide 71.

This had a definite POV slanted towards the Center for Universal Design. I put the author names with the external link to CUD.

I added accessibility, ergonomics, and Trace links – since these are relevant.

The paragraph with Oct 2003 seems out of date. This needs to be updated.

copied Talk from Universal Design

"*"Compiled by advocates of Universal Design, listed in alphabetical order: Bettye Rose Connell, Mike Jones, Ron Mace, Jim Mueller, Abir Mullick, Elaine Ostroff, Jon Sanford, Ed Steinfeld, Molly Story, & Gregg Vanderheiden - who are these people? -- Zoe

"The authors, a working group of architects, product designers, engineers and environmental design researchers, collaborated to establish the following Principles of Universal Design to guide a wide range of design disciplines including environments, products, and communications." - http://www.design.ncsu.edu/cud/univ_design/princ_overview.htm -- User:Thea Browne

Could you add this information to the article? -- Zoe

External links cleanup

The External links section needs cleanup per WP:SPAM, WP:EL, and WP:NOT. This not a place for a list of research labs, so most if not all of them should be removed. Are any of the research labs so exceptional that they deserve to stay? It also appears some of the links are to articles/sites that are pretty far from the article topic. --Ronz 16:44, 8 December 2006 (UTC)

I took a stab at cleaning them up with three edits so it's easier to follow what I did: 1) I updated a few links that were out of date and separated the schools and labs from everything else. 2) I removed one link to a commercial site. 3) I removed all the labs and schools.

It's a start. I didn't check to see if any of the remaining links go to a site that has a list of schools and labs. There's still some duplication in the remaining links that might be removed. I'm still wondering if some of the remaining links are too off topic. --Ronz 02:13, 28 December 2006 (UTC)

No criticism section?

this article grinds my gears. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.122.63.142 (talk) 19:46, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

If there has been notable criticism of the concept, it should be included here. I do not know of any secondary sources that have reported on criticism of "Universal Design" in general. It is likely that some points could be made against the adoption of "Universal Design." There may be some disadvantages to applying "Universal Design" - eg thicker spoons are easier to grip, so more accessible, but also require more materials and occupy more drawer space. However sources would be required and will probably be difficult to find. 216.36.186.2 (talk) 19:47, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Retrofitting is not barrier free design

The lead section says: "Barrier free design and assistive technology provide a level of accessibility for people with disabilities but they also often result in separate and stigmatizing solutions, for example, a ramp that leads to a different entry to a building than a main stairway." A ramp that leads to a different entry is probably not an example of barrier-free design but of retrofitting a solution to an entry that was not designed to be accessible. It would be better to remove that statement. --ChristopheS (talk) 19:27, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Merge proposal

Proposal Merge Design for All (design philosophy) into this page. Both articles are about exactly the same concept. "Universal design" is is the more "generic" of the two terms and is also not as slogan-like as "Design for All". Roger (talk) 11:59, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

Comment No objection, in principle, to merge. However, I understand that they are not "exactly the same concept" and that there are subtle differences between the two terms. As I'm not an expert on this, please don't ask me what they are. I do know that there has been extensive debate among the disability organisations in Europe and that the preferred term seems to be Design for All. Possibly the debate follows the line of "People with disabilities" vs. "Disabled people". Regards, --Technopat (talk) 17:06, 20 June 2010 (UTC)

Many publications about Universal design and Design for All (design philosophy) say that there is a distinction; some say there is no distinction. We need more clarity on this matter before we merge the articles. --ChristopheS (talk) 14:13, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Comment On the contrary, I think merging them will in fact allow a distinction to become clearer - if there is one. As I read it "Design fo All" was/is simply a catchy slogan that was initially used as the title of a European Commission publication about universal design and then subsequently adopted as a generic term in the UK/Europe. Roger (talk) 17:48, 21 June 2010 (UTC)

Comment As I mentioned above, am not an expert on this, but as I understand it, universal design refers mainly for objects, whereas design for all refers to the relationship between people and their everyday surroundings as well as objects. On the other hand, not so sure that the European Commission can frivolously be “accused” of catchy slogan-like marketing techniques. European disability organisations seem to have adopted it unanimously. As for the merge, the more I think about it, the more I reckon that any article combining the two concepts would be too long for ease of reading. --Technopat (talk) 18:25, 22 June 2010 (UTC)

The Universal Design Principles (by Ron Mace et al) talk about "products and environments"; they have also been applied to instruction, which is not simply a product or an environment. The European Commission promotes "Design for All" for products and services; for example CEN/CENELEC Guide 6 (which was adopted as a result of a European mandate) is about standards for both products and services. So it can probably be argued that universal design and design for all apply to the same things; the application to services is probably a more recent idea. --ChristopheS (talk) 09:59, 23 June 2010 (UTC)

Comment IMHO if they are to continue as two separate articles the difference(s) between them must be clearly and unambigiously stated. Roger (talk) 11:42, 23 June 2010 (UTC)