June 2003

Brand Experience for Business Success

"Apple is an excellent example of building an organization, from products to market, around the people who will participate in the experience. Particularly for graphic designers and other creative types who grew up appreciating Apple but perhaps being unfamiliar with what marketing is and how it works, Apple Computer, Inc. is a textbook case of a company successfully identifying the needs of their market and participants." (Dirk Knemeyer - Thread Inc.)

Posted by PJB on June 27, 2003 | Classification: Information design | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Understanding Information Taxonomy Helps Build Better Apps

"Taxonomy represents the foundation upon which information architecture stands, and all well-rounded developers should have at least a basic understanding of taxonomy to ensure that they can create organized, logical applications. But before diving into the topic of taxonomy, let's look briefly at information architecture. That way, we can view taxonomy in its proper place within a broader field of study." (Jie-Hong Morrison - Builder.com) - courtesy of iaslash

Posted by PJB on June 27, 2003 | Classification: Metadata | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

What's In A Name? The Sequel

"Wouldn't we all have an easier time of it if we worked together to create a paradigm shift in terms of how corporations work? Or what they value? If we did that, maybe the resulting shift would create more work than we all could actually do!" (Beth Mazur - IDblog)

Posted by PJB on June 26, 2003 | Classification: Information design | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Master of Design

"Tim Brown, CEO of IDEO, describes the interplay between technology and design - a process that, at its best, yields products that change the way people live and work." (Technology Review) - courtesy of elegant hack

Posted by PJB on June 26, 2003 | Classification: Interviews | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Searching The Workplace Web

"The corporate intranet is an organism that is at once very similar to and very unlike the Internet at large. A well-designed intranet (...) is perhaps the most significant step that corporations can make - and have made in recent years - to improve productivity and communication between individuals in an organization." (Ronald Fagin et al. - IBM Almaden Research Center) - courtesy of column two

Posted by PJB on June 26, 2003 | Classification: Search | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Google Glossary on InfoArch

Definitions for 'Information Architecture' from the Web (Google Labs)

Posted by PJB on June 25, 2003 | Classification: Information architecture | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Haystack

"(...) a tool designed to let every individual manage all of their information in the way that makes the most sense to them. By removing the arbitrary barriers created by applications only handling certain information 'types', and recording only a fixed set of relationships defined by the developer, we aim to let users define whichever arrangements of, connections between, and views of information they find most effective. Such personalization of information management will dramatically improve each individual's ability to find what they need when they need it." (MIT Laboratory for Computer Science) - courtesy of antenna

Posted by PJB on June 25, 2003 | Classification: Information design | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

How To Design Newspaper Ads

A Sampler (Norbert Küpper)

Posted by PJB on June 25, 2003 | Classification: Information design | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Pie Menus

"Pie menus show a certain superiority over the ubiquitous linear menus we are so fond of. Why arenít they proliferated more showing up only on some applications?" (Juan C. Dürsteler - Inf@Vis!)

Posted by PJB on June 24, 2003 | Classification: Information design | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Determine the Best Elements for Web Navigation

"Navigation is only one segment of a Web site's information architecture, but it is the most visible segment to the end user." (Jeffrey Linwood - Builder.com)

Posted by PJB on June 24, 2003 | Classification: Navigation | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

FAQ Questionnaires in Usability Engineering

"Over the years, I have seen many questions asked about the use of questionnaires in usability engineering. The list on this page is a compilation of the questions I have heard most often and the answers I gave, should have given, or would have given if I had thought of it first." (Jurek Kirakowski - Human Factors Research Group) - courtesy of webword

Posted by PJB on June 24, 2003 | Classification: Usability | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Ten Quotable Moments: Challenges and Responses for UI Designers

"To many software team members who havenít worked with UI designers before, it seems unlikely that there could be demonstrable differences in usability based on small details like those. I understand this skepticism, and my background as an engineer has helped me to figure out how to overcome it." (Brian R. Krause - Boxes and Arrows)

Posted by PJB on June 24, 2003 | Classification: HCI | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Solving Mobile Challenges with Psychology-driven IA

"As the field of information architecture matures, we are beginning to understand the new challenges it raises for wireless media. This article suggests that some of these challenges can be best addressed through an approach called 'psychology-driven information architecture' (PDIA), which bases design decisions and solutions on the psychological profile of the end user." (Oded Napchi - Boxes and Arrows)

Posted by PJB on June 24, 2003 | Classification: Information architecture | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

CHI 2004 Connect

"Our conference theme is CONNECT, and we've created new opportunities for conference attendees to connect with technology, with each other, and with Vienna, a marvelous central European city of imperial tradition and modern creativity." (April 24-29, 2004 - Vienna, Austra EU - ACM SIGCHI)

Posted by PJB on June 24, 2003 | Classification: Events | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

The Most Important User Experience Method

"Changing the organization is the most difficult and most important part of user experience work." (Mark Hurst - Good Experience) - courtesy of guuui

Posted by PJB on June 23, 2003 | Classification: User experience | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Captology: A Bad Name for an Interesting Idea

"The idea behind captology is simple: computers (and other technological devices) can be used to persuade people to do things." (William Grosso - O'Reilly Network)

Posted by PJB on June 23, 2003 | Classification: Information design | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Ubiquity PR and the Search for the Final IA Tool

"I interviewed Victor Hsu at Axure software, who are developing a tool that provides a central modelling and documentation environment for information architects called Ubiquity RP." (Peter van Dijck)

Posted by PJB on June 23, 2003 | Classification: Information architecture | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Web Team Roles and Responsibilities Are Changing

"A major shift is occurring in relation to who is in charge of the Web. Previously, responsibility tended to be with IT. Occasionally, marketing was in charge. Today, the website, particularly the intranet, is the responsibility of the communications department. This is as it should be." (Gerry McGovern)

Posted by PJB on June 23, 2003 | Classification: Information design | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

AIfIA Job Board

"The AIfIA Job Board serves as a clearinghouse for position postings relating to information architecture and more broadly to information design, interaction design, and HCI." (Asilomar Institute for Information Architecture)

Posted by PJB on June 23, 2003 | Classification: Information architecture | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Precision and Recall

"(...) the most common measures of search performance. But they're not as helpful as we'd like." (Tim Gray - Ongoing)

Posted by PJB on June 23, 2003 | Classification: Search | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Themes in User Experience, Part III - Emotion in Business

"There's a tendency to assume that business is driven by numbers, and in talking to most user experience folks about their difficulties in work with 'business', the primary issue is a lack of good metrics." (PeterMe)

Posted by PJB on June 20, 2003 | Classification: User experience | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Interact Lab

"(...) a research centre concerned with possible interactions between people, technologies and representations. Its focus is on developing novel user experiences in a variety of settings, including the home, schools, public spaces and work. A major Interact goal is to create innovative experiences by embedding physical artefacts in the environment with intelligence. Another is to understand the socio-cognitive basis by which people interact with novel media and environments." (About Interact Lab) - courtesy of purse lip square jaw

Posted by PJB on June 20, 2003 | Classification: User experience | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

The Domain of Design

"Design is creation in or alteration of the world to meet the needs and desires of people." (Dirk Knemeyer and Nathan Shedroff)

Posted by PJB on June 20, 2003 | Classification: Information design | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Digital from Birth

Information Architecture for Building a Digital Library (Lillian Woon Gassie) - courtesy of iaslash

Posted by PJB on June 19, 2003 | Classification: Information architecture | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Publications of Yannis Tzizikas

Search, Faceted Taxonomies, and Information Retreival (Yannis Tzizikas) - courtesy of peter van dijck

Posted by PJB on June 19, 2003 | Classification: Metadata | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Special Track on User Modeling and HCI Approaches in Natural Language Generation

"(...) this special track focuses on research exploring the connection between user modeling - from the perspective of the user modeling community or HCI - and NLG." (FLAIRS 2004 - May 17-19, 2004)

Posted by PJB on June 19, 2003 | Classification: Events | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Access Keys: Unlocking Hidden Navigation

"Accesskeys can also be useful to people who have no trouble controlling the mouse and clicking on links." (Stuart Robertson - A List Apart) - courtesy of lucdesk

Posted by PJB on June 18, 2003 | Classification: Accessibility | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Information as Product

"What is data, really? Data is an idea, an abstraction, a particular collection of positive and negative assertions encoded on a spinning magnetic platter, later interpreted by the end user in a manner that they find pleasing." (Rob Flickinger - O'Reilly Weblogs)

Posted by PJB on June 18, 2003 | Classification: Information design | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

A Social Network Caught in the Web

"(...) an analysis of Club Nexus, an online community at Stanford University. Through the Nexus site we were able to study a reflection of the real world community structure within the student body. We observed and measured social network phenomena such as the small world effect, clustering, and the strength of weak ties. Using the rich profile data provided by the users we were able to deduce the attributes contributing to the formation of friendships, and to determine how the similarity of users decays as the distance between them in the network increases. In addition, we found correlations between users' personalities and their other attributes, as well as interesting correspondences between how users perceive themselves and how they are perceived by others." (Lada A. Adamic, Orkut Buyukkokten, and Eytan Adar - First Monday 8.6)

Posted by PJB on June 18, 2003 | Classification: Information design | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

On Search: The Users

"Nobody uses advanced search (...) Except the people who do." (Tim Bray - Ongoing)

Posted by PJB on June 18, 2003 | Classification: Search | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

A Designing Life: Blade Kotelly

"A speech-recognition software expert explains the difference between good design and ambiguity, how good designs go bad, and why everyone is a designer." (ACM Ubiquity)

Posted by PJB on June 18, 2003 | Classification: Interviews | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Interfaces

"(...) the quarterly magazine for members of the British HCI Group, with features, events, reviews and jobs. Back copies are provided here as PDF documents." (British HCI Group) - courtesy of ben hyde

Posted by PJB on June 17, 2003 | Classification: HCI | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

The Elements of User Experience

A conversation with Jesse James Garrett (Engaged) - courtesy of iaslash

Posted by PJB on June 16, 2003 | Classification: User experience | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Take Full Responsibility For Your Web Content

"You should only publish on your website the content that you can professionally manage. Managing content involves managing its entire life cycle. The life of a particular piece of content begins with its first draft. It ends when that content is removed from publication. Removing content is as important as publishing it." (Gerry McGovern)

Posted by PJB on June 16, 2003 | Classification: Information design | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Web Accessibility Learning Modules

"Universal accessibility to the Web means that all people, regardless of their physical or developmental abilities or impairments, have access to Web-based information and services." (CSU Center for Distributed Learning) - courtesy of elearningpost

Posted by PJB on June 16, 2003 | Classification: Accessibility | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Information Foraging

"Just collecting a bunch of links on the topic..." (Victor Lombardi)

Posted by PJB on June 16, 2003 | Classification: Information architecture | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

That Tricky Word, 'Design'

"What's wrong with 'design'? Well, there's nothing wrong with the practice, but plenty wrong with the word's associations." (PeterMe)

Posted by PJB on June 16, 2003 | Classification: Information design | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Diversity is Power for Specialized Sites

"Small websites get less traffic than big ones, but they can still dominate their niches. For each question users ask, the Web delivers a different set of sites to provide the answers." (Jakob Nielsen - Alertbox)

Posted by PJB on June 16, 2003 | Classification: Usability | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

DUX 2003: Opening Plenary

Bill Buxton & Mitch Kapor (Celia Romaniuk) - courtesy of iaslash

Posted by PJB on June 14, 2003 | Classification: User experience | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Adding Value through Search Engine Optimization

"The easiest way to increase your added value is to do small things that have a large positive return for the company. If youíre looking to find something easy to do that has a large positive impact on your value, look no further than thinking about search engines and how your portion of a Web site can be optimized for them." (Alan K'necht - Digital Web Magazine)

Posted by PJB on June 12, 2003 | Classification: Search | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Information Architecture: Theory & Practice

"(...) creating consistent and functional systems for navigation, graphics, page layout and title languages so that the user knows where to go, what to do, and encourages them to return." (Kelly Goto - GotoMedia)

Posted by PJB on June 12, 2003 | Classification: Information architecture | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Inside the PARC: The 'Information Architects'

"When the center opened in 1970, it was unlike other major industrial research laboratories; its work wasn't tied, even loosely, to its corporate parent's current product lines. And unlike university research laboratories, PARC had one unifying vision: it would develop 'the architecture of information.'" (Stanford and Silicon Valley Archives Project) - courtesy of jack johnson

Posted by PJB on June 12, 2003 | Classification: Information architecture | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Nathan Shedroff on Experience Design

"One of the problems I see with the Web right now is that we have a sort of crisis of innovation. There really isn't much new in the web. In some ways the Web is stagnating. Everyone's sites look and act the same. Every website has the same functionality within its vertical category, but there's so much more we can do." (Juan C. Dürsteler - Inf@Vis!)

Posted by PJB on June 11, 2003 | Classification: Interviews | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

[id]3

Three intensive course meetings, lasting three days each on Interaction, Information, and Interface Design (Ars Media and Istituto Europeo di Design)

Posted by PJB on June 11, 2003 | Classification: Information design | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

New Methods for Experience Design

"Designers need to better understand people's emotions, desires, dreams, and relations to others." (Nathan Shedroff)

Posted by PJB on June 11, 2003 | Classification: User experience | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Participation: A Dialogue with the Experts

"While the premise of paradigmatic change was well received, the specific solution of participant was not endorsed. Here are four alternatives that were suggested and my analysis as to why participant remains the best thesis to date: (...)" (Dirk Knemeyer - Thread Inc.)

Posted by PJB on June 10, 2003 | Classification: Information design | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Motion Graphics

"(...) here's a few of the short films I've made." (Nigel Holmes) - courtesy of elearningpost

Posted by PJB on June 10, 2003 | Classification: Information graphics | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Themes in User Experience, Part 2: Empathy

"Empathy is a critical quality for people working in the user experience field." (PeterMe)

Posted by PJB on June 10, 2003 | Classification: User experience | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

AIfIA-Metrics Mailinglist

"Towards standard methods and metrics for evaluating IA" (AIfIA) - courtesy of column two

Posted by PJB on June 10, 2003 | Classification: Information architecture | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Pace-Layering Meaning and Whatever Comes First: The IAs Are Back in Town

- "With IA Summit #5 now in view, IA may be mainstream or mature - and I have suspicions which of these comes first. " (Andrew Dillon - ASIS&T Bulletin June/July 2003)

Posted by PJB on June 10, 2003 | Classification: Information architecture | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

The New Media Reader Excerpts

"The new media field has been developing for more than 50 years. This reader collects the texts, videos, and computer programs - many of them now almost impossible to find - that chronicle the history and form the foundation of this still-emerging field." (Noah Wardrip-Fruin & Nick Montfort - NMR)

Posted by PJB on June 10, 2003 | Classification: Information design | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

DUX: Five Lessons Learned

"The days were interesting, I feel like I learned a few things and, most importantly, I felt excited to be a part of this vibrant, rich, and curious community, particularly at this point in time." (Erin Malone - Boxes and Arrows)

Posted by PJB on June 10, 2003 | Classification: User experience | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Deliverables and Methods: Special Deliverable #8

"(...) I would like to explore the relationship between deliverables and methodology. Unfortunately, this calls for a definition of IA methodology, which may challenge the definition of IA as the hardest question in our field." (Dan Brown - Boxes and Arrows)

Posted by PJB on June 10, 2003 | Classification: Information architecture | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

The Structure of Content and Metadata

"(...) I've been thinking about structured content a lot lately. Here are some thoughts (some extremely basic)." (Peter van Dijck)

Posted by PJB on June 09, 2003 | Classification: Information architecture | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Metadata is Essential Web Writing Skill

"Creating great metadata for your content begins with understanding who your reader is. What is the metadata they look for when they read a page of your content? What are the type of words they use when they search for your content? When scanning your classification, what are the "trigger words" that will make them want to go deeper into your website?" - (Gerry McGovern)

Posted by PJB on June 09, 2003 | Classification: Metadata | Comments (0) | Permalink | TrackBack

Vitruvius Pollio

The Ten Books on Architecture - ed. Morris Hicky Morgan (The Perseus Digital Library- Tufts University)

Posted by PJB on June 09, 2003 | Classification: Classics | Comments (0) | Permalink |