Comments on: We Can Critique Information Architecture

By: Andrew Hinton

Andrew Hinton — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 16:20:06 +0000

James — I keep meaning to drop a line to say this is a nice start to this conversation.
And I like the “procedural vs intentional” distinction. It’s an especially powerful one that isn’t discussed enough in IA circles (though this year’s Summit was a great start).
Procedural is, of course, one of those terms that isn’t immediately understood by most folks — but I’m not sure what term would work that would also be precise?
I wonder, too, if “prescribed” or “prescripted” would work instead of intentional? Hrm… static maybe? I dunno — but thanks for making us think about it!

By: Caleb Brown

Caleb Brown — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 03:40:05 +0000

Hello, great, important discussion, and I find myself nodding (not nodding off!) as I read.

However, I think apart from the words or frameworks we use (and Andrea, I think you’ve got it, we have to spin up new frames of reference for each “age” of UE we are discussing), we also have to get better at the social stuff. *How* we critique, in groups. We should choose a kind of feedback that prods the product or the thinking forward, rather than shuts people down. And once we are doing better within our own circle, I think it behooves us to model good, concise, supportive communication to our business partners and clients. This isn’t new territory, but I think too often we wing it. There is no moderator in our feedback sessions. We speak without patience. We let loose frustrations that don’t convey new insights. I believe everyone who works on interfaces needs help talking about them constructively and encouraging quality. This is about how we relate as people as well as practitioners.

I would love to keep kneading this out. Thanks.

By: jamesmelzer

jamesmelzer — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 13:13:52 +0000

You are absolutely correct – that pair needs further explanation. To me, intentional means a designer carefully crafted the IA and is directly responsible for the results. Procedural means a designer set up the rules by which the IA would operate, but is not directly responsible for the resulting IA.

Twitter, Google search, Digg and Delicious are all great examples of procedural IA, although they all have aspects which are intentional too. In each case, the little IA (interface, info design) is intentional, but the big IA (content model, rules, layers of participation) is procedural. Amazon would be an example of intentional big IA (categories, layers of navigation, layers of participation, content model) and intentional little IA (flows, details of navigation, page layouts).

By: Nigel Hill

Nigel Hill — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 02:36:06 +0000

Can you explain why you paired intentional and procedural? On the face of it these words don’t seem like strong antonyms. Thanks.

By: Jackson Fox

Jackson Fox — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 22:31:43 +0000

The more I think about this, I wonder if we haven’t missed an obvious example of critique in UxD/IxD/IA/etc: heuristic analysis. It’s obviously not an aesthetic framework for critique, but isn’t a method of critiquing interactions and user experiences?

By: Andrea Resmini

Andrea Resmini — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 19:37:54 +0000

James, thanks for fueling this up. Great work.

I love your list, perfectible as it might be, but I’d like to add my tuppence to the conversation from another point of view, and accept my apologies in advance if it feels that I get to be overly complicated.

I have a feeling that we need not just the language, but also a grounded critical framework (or frameworks). Critique cannot stand in the void: it’s a politically and culturally charged view we impose on reality.

When offering critical views on artifacts from 1998, for example, we are talking an entirely different age of web design / IA / UX. And when judging contemporary paintings I cannot use the same canons I use for cave paintings. As such, some values, insights, or parameters might hold, others might change. This kind of historical perspective on the field is necessary as well, and I believe as valuable as a common language.

I’m quite sure I haven’t really cleared up my point: I’ll see if I can articulate that a tad better on the members ml tomorrow or during the week-end.

By: jamesmelzer

jamesmelzer — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 16:53:43 +0000

Chris, I definitely agree – I refactored a couple triples into dichotomies because they were easier to express. However I recognize they might be richer as a triple. For example, Playful and Authoritative are opposites, but a third ‘neutral’ option definitely exists on another plane. Those three might be better expressed as a triplet.

Can I use the word trichotomy?

By: Nathan

Nathan — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 15:04:01 +0000

Not a critique per se, but I’ve found that such spectrums are good ways to plan collaborative participation. Design project teams, staff hiring, and even partnerships benefit from “tuning these dials” to balance the yin and yang of contribution.

By: Christopher Fahey

Christopher Fahey — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 14:44:23 +0000

These are great. It’s a *little* overly simplistic (many conceptual/critical continuums are not linear, and may be rather triangular, multi-faceted, spacial, etc), but it’s a great starting point to focus on the simple question of identifying some basic dichotomies.