Better Bills

Added on 9 June 2008 Peter Bogaards
“The bill is a cornerstone communication in the customer experience, especially when it comes to billing for services. Customers want to easily understand and pay their bills, and businesses want to get paid on time. One would think a business would value the bill enough to invest in a thoughtful design. Yet many bills are poorly designed, causing needless confusion and frustration for customers and businesses alike—not to mention expensive customer service and customer churn. To encourage forward progress in the design of bills, this column profiles three common types of bill readers, discusses nine tips for improving bills, and notes some common implementation challenges.” (Colleen Jones – UXmatters)

User Experience Design: The Evolution of a Multi-Disciplinary Approach

Added on 6 June 2008 Peter Bogaards
“Recently, I have discovered a new emerging type of user experience specialist: the ‘persuasion architect’. This specialist has a marketing and sales background, and focuses on aspects of a Web site user experience design that contribute to ‘conversions’, that is, to the number or percentage of site visitors that ultimately contribute directly to the business goals of the site, such as buying a product, signing up for a newsletter, registering, using the site for support, etc. The design aspects that contribute to converting visitors into customers are quite different than aspects that contribute to making task completion easy and fast, making a site visually appealing, or architecting the site information or functionality in the most natural way.” (Deborah J. Mayhew – Journal of Usability Studies 3.3) – courtesy of markvanderbeeken

Clarify and Refine

Added on 3 June 2008 Peter Bogaards
“(…) with respect to guided navigation, we should distinguish between clarify and refine. First, we must clarify the meaning or context. Are we in the right ballpark regarding the searcher’s intent? Clarify is all about disambiguation. Then, we’re ready to refine or narrow. Exactly what type of widget do you want? Refine is about increasing specificity.” (Peter Morville – Findability)

Exploring Exploratory Search

Added on 3 June 2008 Peter Bogaards
“Exploratory search research opens new opportunities for information architects to grow the profession. Research discoveries are unleashing profound enhancements in search engine technology. To increase the value of the findings of the research on exploratory search, information architects need to explore new methods and approaches to designing information displays for expert systems. As professionals, we need to exert more influence over the devices, appliances and software that govern the production of content. Enhancements to the production of content will cyclically increase our understanding of designing information solutions for experts, adding additional value to the user interfaces designed for less expert solutions.” (Mark Nolan – ASIS&T Bulletin April/May 2008)

Interview with Joy Mountford

Added on 3 June 2008 Peter Bogaards
“What are your favorite prototyping tools? (…) I think paper and pencil are really the most important, and the reason for that is that you can use them without any difficulties except for the fact that most people these days don’t know how to draw anything. In the good old days we used to teach engineers how to draw. I don’t mean draw a beautiful picture, I mean like draw a rectangle for a screen. Teaching them how to draw was essential. You and I could sit and draw, and then stick our drawings on the wall or on paper.” (Ambidextrous Magazine Issue 9)

Bringing Information Architecture to the World’s Great Cities

Added on 2 June 2008 Peter Bogaards
“With the publication of his first book in 1962 at the age of 26, RSW began the singular passion of his life: making information understandable. He chaired the International Design in Aspen in 1972, the first Federal Design Assembly in 1973, followed by the National AIA Convention in 1976, before creating and chairing TED (Technology/Entertainment/Design) conferences from 1984-2002. He is the current Chair of the TEDMED Conferences. A B.Arch and M.Arch 1959 graduate with highest honors from the University of Pennsylvania, Mr. Wurman’s nearly half-century of achievements includes the publication of his best-selling book Information Anxiety and his award winning ACCESS Travel Guides. Each of his 81 books focus on some subject or idea that he personally had difficulty understanding.” (BIF3)

Leading the Rebellion Inside Large Organizations

Added on 30 May 2008 Peter Bogaards
“What are the stories behind the truly great ideas? What are the obstacles that got in the way of these ideas? And, what’s the real story behind visionary products that do manage to make it through otherwise hostile environments? From sticky notes to the RAZR phone, the stories of how these things came to be typically includes some form ‘rebellion’ against business as usual— which in large organizations has a tendency to be about power, position, predictability, and a score of other concerns fairly well-removed from the idea itself.” (Stephen P. Anderson – poetpainter)

Urban procedural rhetorics

Added on 28 May 2008 Peter Bogaards
“This is a transcript of my presentation at The Web and Beyond 2008: Mobility in Amsterdam on 22 May. Since the majority of paying attendees were local I presented in Dutch. However, English appears to be the lingua franca of the internet, so here I offer a translation. I have uploaded the slides to SlideShare and hope to be able to share a video recording of the whole thing soon.” (Kars Alfrink – Leapfrog)