Bill Verplank

William (Bill) Verplank is a designer and researcher who focuses on interactions between humans and computers. He is currently a visiting scholar at Stanford University's CCRMA and is involved in Stanford's D-school. He received a bachelor's degree in mechanical engineering and product design from Stanford, then went on to MIT to complete a PhD in man-machine systems. Together with Bill Moggridge he coined the term interaction design.

He worked at Xerox Parc and Office Systems Divisions from 1978-1986 refining the design of the original graphical user interface and mouse, in the Xerox Star. He went on to work with Bill Moggridge, first at IDtwo and then at IDEO (1986–1992), bringing graphical user interfaces to the world of product design. From 1992-2000 at Interval Research, he directed the design and research for collaboration, tangibility and music. Since then, he was on the steering committee and taught at the Interaction Design Institute Ivrea (2000–2005), and has worked at Stanford's CCRMA as a part-time lecturer teaching courses in interaction design and input devices. He also teaches and lectures internationally on interaction design.

An interview and a video of Verplank, featuring his signature sketching while talking, is in the book Designing Interactions, published in October 2006.