SIGIA-L Mail Archives: Re: SIGIA-L: Restoring hard-wired cues t
Re: SIGIA-L: Restoring hard-wired cues to navigation
From: Chris Chandler (cchandle267_at_yahoo.com)
Date: Tue Feb 13 2001 - 02:39:47 EST
Interesting.
One the one hand, I think it's very important for us
Information Architect type people to not get too
attached to the 'screen.'
Someday we'll look back at the desktop/window
metaphors with the same feeling we have towards the
handcrank on early model cars -- although I've become
resigned to just how long these things take.
On the other hand, talk of a "future navigational
schema of unparalleled intuitive usability" strikes me
as pure hyperbole -- a product perhaps of an
uncritical view of "progress."
Architect-architects (if you'll pardon me falling back
on the foundational metaphor) have been dealing with
that gravity/friction/acceleration stuff for ages and
still miss the "intuitive usability" mark more than
they hit it.
--
Chris Chandler
Information Architect at large.
--- Adam Greenfield <agreenfield_at_e-agency.com> wrote:
> Here's an idea I've been kicking around for awhile -
> actually more like a
> probe. I've thought it over for awhile and can't
> find any gaping holes in
> it; I'd love it if you knowledgable folks on the
> list would help me vet it
> and find the logical flaws I know must be resident.
>
> This is the gist of it:
>
> Far from being "99% bad," my guess is that Flash
> actually points towards a
> future navigational schema of unparalleled intuitive
> usability. By endowing
> objects with attributes such as gravity, friction,
> acceleration, and bounce,
> designers like Joshua Davis (www.praystation.com),
> James Patterson
> (www.presstube.com) and Yugop Nakamura
> (www.yugop.com) are beginning to limn
> a transparent interface in which *computational
> objects behave like
> real-world objects*.
>
> In such an interface, objects fall, until they hit a
> surface. They move,
> slow, and stop. They bounce off each other. Each of
> these attributes can
> either be utilized to facilitate the organization of
> objects (preferable) or
> mapped to other qualities of those objects (less
> preferable but still
> interesting.)
>
> As we continue to develop and concretize the
> metaphor of informational space
> through which the user navigates in search of a
> given object, such
> attributes should aid recall and use tremendously.
> If objects behave in a
> manner more reminiscent of that which our meatspace
> experience has led us to
> expect, my expectation is that children, the
> elderly, untrained users and
> absolute beginners will find that they "already
> know" how to use such an
> interface to achieve what they want. After all,
> they've been navigating it
> since they first grabbed for a spinning mobile or
> knocked a glass of milk
> off a table.
>
> I know this is a little more abstract than some of
> the issues the list has
> been mulling lately, but I'm preparing an article
> for publication that
> depends heavily on this idea and I was hoping that
> some of you would have
> some divergent opinions.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Adam Greenfield
> Infotect
>
>
> < next > http://www.v-2.org
>
>
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