Phil Oye

I hate flying insects, though I do not have a regular old flyswatter around the house to combat these annoying things. I do, however, have a Phillipe Starck “fancy pants” flyswatter called “Dr. Skud”. I bought this device not to actually swat flies, but rather I thought it was a cool design—free-standing, with a wonderful Mona Lisa-esque face.

I have had it for 6 years or so and never used it for its purpose. Apparently, I’ve never had a flying insect problem in my house. That changed today. I had no less than four, including a monster that was the size of a nickel. Since I didn’t have a commoner’s weapon, I used my high design version. Well, it worked like a charm. I was able to smite three within five minutes, though alas, my white whale, in the form of a large fly, escaped out the window before I could dispatch him. We will meet again, and I will emerge victorious with my trusty ally, Dr. Skud.

Alright, that was a little flowery. Though this event did remind me of when I purchased Dr. Skud in the first place, which actually gave me a wonderful introduction into the different personalities of those engaging in multi-disciplinary design. How so? Well, three people saw my fly swatter after I opened the package. An industrial designer, an interaction designer, and a programmer.

The first to spot it was the industrial designer. From 15 feet away he spotted it and cried out: “What is that? It is beautiful!”, he then walked over and waxed poetic about its form.

The second, the interaction designer, started to question the design saying that the tripod base didn’t look stable enough and would fall over (all too true, it turns out) and doesn’t fit in your hand comfortably. He also pointed out that the small holes in the face would get filled with “fly guts” and would be a pain to clean (I avoided this problem by washing it right away).

In the midst of this lengthy usability and design critique, the programmer walked up and said “Stupid. Either you have flies or you don’t, a flyswatter does nothing to change the situation.” He then he grumpily walked away.

Turns out he’s right too, because a fifth tenth fly just flew in the window as I typed this. Dr. Skud? Get ready.