A wheelbarrow of PPT slides
As those of you who have been unfortunate enough to spend some time with me over a coffee or two know very well, I happen to have some interest in the education side of IA. Syllabi, courses, programmes, university seminars, that kind of things.
IA for Ubiquitous Ecologies
Not anyone has access to either the ACM library or any of their proxies. So here's the full paper on 'Information Architecture for Ubiquitous Ecologies' written by me and Luca Rosati and presented at the ACM Medes '09 conference in Lyon, France. Enjoy and comment. And for those of you who are on the impatient side, the manifesto is towards the end of the paper.
Bridging Media
Information is going everywhere, bleeding out of we thought was cyberspace and back into the real world: Internet access has moved into cellphones and hand-held devices; social networks are now mobile and constantly connect physically separated users producing unexpected scenarios; shopping remixes web sites, brick and mortar stores, and user-generated content in novelty ways; devices acquire uniqueness, stories, and a capability to generate meaning.
Many tasks we perform every day not only constantly require us to move between different media, but actually have us move from the digital to the physical environment and back: we talk about convergence, ubiquitous computing, media ecologies, and cross-media. What role do information architecture and user experience design play in such a scenario?
Bad places, good places
Are there bad places on the Web?
And I do not mean one of those web sites that look like they are straight out of 1992, nor places which offend a coder's sense of beauty or the browsers' by using malformed XHTML or whatnot. I mean the bad places for real, those places you might get uneasy, upset, or scared visiting.
My gut answer is yes, there are plenty. As much as we have come to terms with the idea that a phone call can be as threatening as bumping into the wrong guys on the street, I think it is entirely plausible that we have such things. But then, what exactly makes a bad place bad in information space? Is it even entirely possible to think of bad places on the Web as places? And if it is, how?
Big rock, small rock, and chorizo sausage
As it seems to be a common pattern with me in recent times, this post has been long in the making and even longer in the thinking. And I'm not done yet, really, but since the 10th IA Summit in Memphis, Tennessee, seems to have expanded our horizons in novelty ways, I have a feeling the times are ripe for a first attempt at my tuppence on the subject. What subject? IA, IxD, UX, and where we stand, of course. And thanks to JJG.
