Helicopters and vending machines

For our senior show invitation, each of us got a card to design with our favorite design-related quote. One of the quotes sort of stuck with me over time, although it's evolved a bit in my memory. Wanting to give credit where credit is due, I dug up one of the decks we sent out as an invitation and took a picture of the quote. Here's what it actually says:

Basically, there are two kinds of designers. Helicopters and vending machines. The helicopters fly around the landscape, zooming in to investigate, backing off to get a better panoramic view. Vending machines tend to be inert until someone shoves money in the slot. They then produce a lot of buzzing, whirring, and clanking until out pops a product. It is invariably the same, the same, the same, the same as the previous one, and will be the same as the same as the same as the next. The only difference is the next is usually staler.

- Jay Doblin

Being a designer wasn't the easy path for me. I'm good at a lot of things, but they didn't challenge me. Design challenged me. Hell, it was hard for me. That's why I picked it. When I got it right, the reward was that much sweeter. Hot damn!

I've spent my entire adult life trying to avoid being a vending machine. In the process, I came to resent the vending machine -- and anyone who asked me to be one. I don't mean just being asked to produce the same thing over and over. It's more than that. It's the idea that I exist at the pleasure of someone else to come and tell me what they want as if I'm supposed to spit it out without even thinking about it. I'm worth more than that.

I've spent a long time learning what I know, and it has value. Come to me with a problem or a challenge and let me meet it. There is far more satisfaction in that than just spitting out what someone else wants.