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10/08/2008

IDEA2008 Recap

My brain’s still spinning from all the interactions and events from the last 48 hours… so before I forget many of the big ideas that struck me, I thought I’d recap the memorable concepts and ideas that stood out to me.

The Idea Conference put on the Information Architecture Institute has to be, hands down, the best two day conference event I’ve attended in the last three years. What made it the best, was the exposure to different thinking and different disciplines. And, given that “information architecture” is right up the MLS / MLIS degreed alley, I was surprised not to see any other library professionals attending (that is outside of Michael and I) this event. To top it off the conference was hosted at the Pritzker auditorium @ the Chicago Public Library!

Anyway… for anyone interested in attending a great conference, be sure to put IDEA2009 on your radar. I don’t know the location for next year’s event, but secretly I’m hoping for it to be some where on the east coast, so travel isn’t so far. [ x fingers ]

Anyway, here’s the high level recap of some of the ideas that caught my attention. And although many of these I kind of touch on in some of my talks, I enjoyed hearing them from another perspective …

  • David Armano = Critical Mass = Logic + Emotion (blog) >> Infinite touch points : Micro-interactions : 3 Us (usefulness, utility & ubiquity) : “Social experience is built upon micro-interactions” - - Slides, David’s blog

  • David Gray = XPlane >> Books & Browsers : “we’re still in the age of scrolls on the internet” : “Internet has done a really good job at making a huge file cabinet” – we can tag and refile things, etc: Big Opportunity is for Internet to figure out how to support creativity : interleafing -- David’s blog Hoping slides are posted soon on his Slideshare space

  • Elliot Malkin >> Eruv (I found this talk on orthodox Jewish social space fascinating) : Cemetery 2.0 : really great projects and studies at his project site Dziga

  • Jesse James Garrett = Adaptive Path >> augmented reality/data abundance/virtual indentity : Aurora concept browser videos ( watch ‘em all, lotsa great interaction concepts here) Adaptive Path blog

  • Alberto Cañas = IHMP >>“feathers & beaks” : “knowledge is formed by concepts and propositions” : concept maps : “ The key in knowledge construction is building upon what a person already knows” : IHMC C-Map tool

  • Jason Fried = 37 Signals >> “We're always scratching our own itch. If we need it, we figure hundreds of companies do too” : “We don’t pay attention to our competition, we pay attention to customers” : plans, personas, flowcharts are "holdovers from other disciplines." : need, just, only, easy = 4 letter words that shut down innovation - SVN blog

  • Aradhana Goel = IDEO >> Social Trends / Technology Enablers / Business Trends : Crowdsourcing – leverage the power of employees : Nomadism – defined by not what you carry, but by what you leave behind : Free - $$ is being replaced by attention, reputation & network - Talk on Ustream.tv (recorded thanks to D. Armano)

  • Bill Deroughy = Ziba >> Language of Interaction - Slides, Blog

I missed the last talk ( and half of Bill Deroughey’s – that’s why no notes) so I could catch a flight home. Am hoping to make next year’s event if possible.

Final Thought >>> Highly Recommend !!! this conference for anyone interested in “out of the design” thinking. :)

My Flickr shots : IDEA2008

Until next year …

PS: According to my stats, this is post # 777 - isn't that a lucky number or something ?

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Very nice recap--and great that you put up the photos, too!

There is a flickr group for IDEA2008 at: http://www.flickr.com/groups/750698@N20/

Thanks again!

stevenb said...

thanks for the notes about this conference - wish I could attend something like this. I hope they'll do something on the east coast - NYC area - next. Next best thing is for me to follow the blogs and articles of folks like Garret, Armano, Tim Brown and others who discuss design thinking. If you are exploring this area now check out my website page on design - with some of my videos on how it connects to librarianship. http://stevenbell.info/design

I explore these topics in my blog - Designing Better Libraries. Now that you are getting more interested in design you may find it of interest - and it will lead you to additional writings and discussions - but with a greater focus on libraries. I'm now more involved in examining how we can use design thinking to develop great library user experiences.