Bio

Peter is an Experience Designer at Adaptive Path and our co-host for UX Week. Peter knows it is unlikely that he will discover the meaning of life, but believes that his work on designing systems that make dealing with large amounts of complex information easier to use, can bring humanity closer to that goal. Peter will always defend the position of the end user and often jokes that he has the word “user” tattooed on his upper arm, which, one day, may become true. He has a background in computer science and ergonomics. During his time at Twente University, he realized he was less interested in the (then predominantly) grey box and much more in the humans operating it. He put together an individual program around the theme of Information Ergonomics, getting rid of many Computer Science classes and including others from Business Science, Educational Science and Social Science, and got approval to follow it and still earn his Master's Degree. Peter admits he is a process freak. He has a large collection of design process diagrams that he loves to discuss with fellow designers. His presentations at professional conferences tend to focus on that topic too: He spoke about it at the Dutch The Web and Beyond conference, four Euro IA conferences, the IA Summit, an Adobe User Group meeting and the German IA Konferenz. Peter teaches a four-day Interaction Design class for a Dutch professional training institute and in 2009 adapted it to a two-day program for the Master of Design Management students of Barcelona's Istituto Europeo di Design. Since 2001, Peter has helped organize many user experience events, ranging from the local Amsterdam UX Cocktail Hours, via the Dutch CHI conferences (he was program chair for The Web and Beyond in 2006, 2008 and 2010), the first three Euro IA conferences and the IA Summit. If there is any time left, Peter spends it with his girlfriend and his two “Little IAs”, or rereading all of Stephen Fry's books and at least once a year gets on a snowboard. And he will always say yes to a couple of (microbrewery) beers and a good conversation in a bar.