On the novelty of software products

The identification of the key factors that make a tangible product creative has been the focus of significant research in the area of design. However, the same effort for software products is almost non-existent. With the ever-increasing importance of software applications in day-to-day life, such endeavour becomes more necessary. In this paper we report on preliminary results that build on our understanding of how we evaluate the creativity of tangible products, to identify key criteria that can be used in assessing the creativity of intangible software products. We argue that this provides a basis for designers to work together with software developers in pushing the boundaries of software innovation