Time to open Pandora’s Box! This post touches on some deep and controversial problems surrounding information today, most of which have been heightened by this year’s election. More work is needed to develop this thinking-in-progress further. In the past twenty years or so, we have seen an information explosion the effects of which are all too familiar these days. That so much …
Tag: change
Saving Information Design History, Part 2
Information design has had more than a few missing pieces in its story for some time, as described in Part 1, so rather than curse the fact that the problem exists, it makes more sense to start filling in the gaps, one by one. With knowledge. What follows is a very preliminary reading list on information design’s formalization, from the early …
Saving Information Design History, Part 1
This post arrives coincidentally at the same time as the Information+ conference at Emily Carr University of Art + Design in Vancouver, British Columbia. It is among the few (and most recent) forums where serious information design practitioners and researchers are able explore and discuss key issues in the field. The spectacular lineup of speakers and talks reflects the calibre of discussion. …
Bridging Generations
As someone who’s slowly inching toward 40, I feel distinctly out of place with the present. It doesn’t feel like my present. The more I age, the greater the sense of anachronism. Three distinct realities are blurring together: the old world wisdom my grandparents conveyed to me during my childhood, the analog-to-digital transition through which I have …
The Things You Don’t See
Information design, by nature, is concerned with making sense of the known: data, facts, observations, ideas. It involves taking existing content and putting it in a format that makes it more readily know-able. But rarely does information design acknowledge the missing, the unknown. A recent talk by Andy Kirk on representing the absence of data …
Change the Conversation
I’ve never been much of a talker. As much as I enjoy rich, far-ranging conversations, at heart I’m a quiet recluse who prefers silence to chit-chat. Dialogue is great and necessary, but there is a point where talk must translate into action. Looking back on the content I’ve read over the past year, a good …