IA Institute Newsletter #5.02 2010

February 25, 2010 04:48 PM

The Information Architecture Institute (IAI) Newsletter features news about IAI and our partner's sites: Asis&t Bulletin, Boxes and Arrows and the Web Indexing SIG of the American Society for Indexing. Also, there's a brief list of events with discounts for members and job postings at the end, so read on!

In this Issue

* IAI News

-Explain IA Winners Announced
-Board Hires New Membership Coordinator
-Translations and Local Group Activity
-IA Institute Board F2F at IxD10
-Board Launches "Operations Switchboard"

* What's New with Our Partners?

* Upcoming Conferences and Workshops

* Job Postings

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IAI NEWS - http://www.iainstitute.org

Happy Chinese New Year!

Welcome to a new series of IA Institute news. IDEA 2009 sponsor MailChimp has offered us a free account. Let us know how you like it at: feedback[at]iainstitute[dot]org. (We previously told you we would have you sign up for the new newsletter separately, but found it to be easier than we thought to pull current subscriber list to the new platform. If you would prefer to not to receive this newsletter, please visit our Unsubscribe page.


*Explain IA Winners Announced*

The winner of the grand prize of $1,000 (co-sponsored by Endeca and the IA Institute) is:

A Dinosaur Family Explains Information Architecture
by Nate Bolt and Kate Nartker of Bolt | Peters, San Francisco, CA, USA.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/boltron/4329185089/in/pool-explainia/


The winner of the best video award of $500 (sponsored by nForm) is:

IAs are Like Robin Hood
by Matthew Hodgson of SMS Management & Technology, Canberra, Australia.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/magia3e/4330518973/in/pool-explainia/


The two winners (tie vote) of the best diagram award of $250 each (sponsored by Semantic Studios) are:

Information Architecture Connects People to Content
by Murray Thompson, Grande Prairie, Canada
http://www.flickr.com/photos/murdocke/4299568381/in/pool-explainia/

My Son's Take on Explain IA
by Scott Baldwin of Critical Mass, Calgary, Canada
http://www.flickr.com/photos/benry/4321042592/in/pool-explainia/


Congratulations to the winners! And, thanks to our sponsors and participants for making this game such a success! I hope you've enjoyed the experience as much as I have, and I trust that our new and colorful collection...

http://www.flickr.com/groups/explainia/

...will continue to help people who find themselves needing to Explain IA. Cheers!


*Board Hires New Membership Coordinator*

Tim Bruns was selected as our newest Membership Coordinator. Tim became deeply involved in information architecture when he witnessed the effects of mass rollouts of technology-driven solutions to core audiences who were highly techno phobic. His experience includes strategic analysis and planning, program management and defining information architectures that support a variety of platforms, including mobile devices. He finds great satisfaction in being able to build, not just solutions, but also relationships, between technology and audiences. Tim has earned a Masters degree in Human-Computer Interaction from DePaul University. Contact Tim at membership AT iainstitute DOT org.

Welcome, Tim!

*Translations and Local Group Activity*

The Year of the Tiger opens with a series of articles translated for our new Chinese website (http://iainstitute.org/cn/). The Translations Team has been busy working on Chinese, Italian Spanish and Portuguese translations including works by Jesse James Garrett, John Shiple and Peter Van Djick.

New additions:

"Bite Sized UX Research" by Steve Baty (Chinese)

"What an IA Does" by Jesse James Garrett (Chinese, Spanish forthcoming)

Webmonkey's "Information Architecture Tutorial" by John Shiple (Italian forthcoming)

"Information Architecture for Designers: Structuring Websites for Business Success" by Peter Van Djick (Portuguese)
To make our translations list, articles go through a rigorous process of team discussion, IP approval and peer review. The works translated often depend on the interests of the language group and books and articles cited at local group meetings, in presentations and on discussion boards. See the latest additions at http://iainstitute.org/translations/.

If you know of a work that you would like translated to your language, or if you want to join our team, contact us at translations AT iainstitute DOT org.

Also, please welcome the Chicago Content Strategists to our growing network of local groups. This montly meetup is for anyone who cares about Web/interactive-based content--editors, content strategists, writers, content managers, translators, communicators, and information architects, to name a few. For information or to join, contact Kristen Groh at http://www.meetup.com/Chicago-Content-Strategists/.

*IA Institute Board F2F at IxD10*

The IA Institute Board of Directors enjoyed a rare chance to meet in February. A quorum of the board met in Savannah at the third annual conference from our sister organization, the Interaction Design Association (in fact, the Institute was a sponsor of Interaction 10 and board member Will Evans was one of the organizers heavily involved in this successful conference). We congratulate our colleagues on another smashing success.

Noreen Whysel and Andrew Hinton presided at the IA Institute sponsor table, keeping their ears open for topics to bring to the Board's attention. The biggest topic was mentoring, with growing enthusiasm for mentoring activities like book clubs, "speed mentoring" and peer to peer coaching that gets groups together locally. Look for some interesting mentoring events at the IA Summit this April in Phoenix, including our annual "The IA Is IN" mentoring booth, and be sure to contact us at feedback AT iainstitute DOT org with ideas for mentoring and local groups in your area.


*Board Launches "Project Switchboard"*

Volunteer Nicola De Franceschi, working with Board member Christian Crumlish through the Institute’s mentorship program, has taken the lead on "Project Switchboard," the first step in improving some specific tactical workflows. Nicola has been planning the integration, both the technical and user experience design work. He is now about to build a sandbox proof-of-concept with real data that we will work with Tim to test and refine. Hurray!

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WHAT'S NEW WITH OUR PARTNERS? - http://iainstitute.org/en/about/people/partners.php

ASIS&T Bulletin - http://www.asis.org/bulletin.html

ASIS&T announced in December that Thom Haller is taking over the IA Column of the Asis&t Bulletin. Congratulations, Thom!

In his inaugural article for the December/January issue, "Making a Profound Impact," Thom explored his reaction to the passing of an elderly acquaintance and how Information Architecture can also have a profound impact.
http://asis.org/Bulletin/Dec-09/DecJan10_Haller.html

February/March brings us "Attending to Performance," in which he urges information architecture professionals to "...learn when our constituents are thwarted by information structure" and to employ benchmarking measurements "...to help us understand the consequences of good or flawed performance."
http://asis.org/Bulletin/Feb-10/FebMar10_Haller.html

Feel free to contact Thom with your own stories. We look forward to reading more from Thom Haller in future issues. See the column online:

Read it all at http://www.asis.org/bulletin/

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Boxes and Arrows - http://www.asis.org/bulletin/
The definitive source for the complex task of bringing architecture and design to the digital landscape.


Google, Stanford, and The Government Fight Swine Flu
by Nate Bolt and Tony Tulathimutte

Designers often work in less-than-perfect technical environments, but imagine being a local government trying to address an epidemic or natural disaster. Nate and Tony tell us about their research and design strategy approach for StanfordUniversity's effort to set up emergency response templates for local governments during the H1N1 outbreak.
http://boxesandarrows.com/view/google-stanford-and

Bringing User Centered Design to the Agile Environment
by Anthony Colfelt

Anthony Colfelt is not anti-Agile, but he believes strongly about how user-centered design can operate in an Agile environment. Here he explains how he came to feel this way, the major pitfalls of Agile, and how he sees Agile and UCD fitting together in harmony.
http://boxesandarrows.com/view/bringing-user

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Web Indexing SIG of the American Society for Indexing (ASI) - http://www.web-indexing.org/
Promoting the human indexing of Web sites and HTML documents worldwide.

The Web Indexing SIG of the American Society for Indexing (ASI) is now accepting submissions for the 2010 Web Indexing Award. The award recognises excellence in website indexing and is open to members of the ASI, affiliated indexing societies and the Information Architecture Institute. The deadline for entries is 23 April 2010. Further details, including the award criteria and how to enter, are available at:
http://www.web-indexing.org/web-indexing-award.htm


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UPCOMING CONFERENCES AND WORKSHOPS - http://www.iainstitute.org/calendar/

The following events offer discounts to IAI members. Visit our website for more information.

To add your event to our calendar contact us at events AT iainstitute DOT org.

ark Group IA Masterclass
March 24, 2010
Sydney, Australia
http://www.arkgroupaustralia.com.au/Events-D016-IAMasterclass.htm

IA Summit Warsaw 2010
April 15-16
Warsaw, Poland
http://iasummitwarsaw.com

IA Summit 2010
April 7-8, 2009 Preconference
April 9-11, 2009 Conference
Phoenix, AZ, USA
http://iasummit.org/

Fourth Italian IA Summit - FREE event!
7th - 8th May 2010
Pisa, Italy
http://www.iasummit.it/


Promo codes are available on the Member Discounts page in our Member Center http://signin.iainstitute.org/

To add your event to our calendar contact us at membership AT iainstitute DOT org.

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IAI JOB POSTINGS - http://www.iainstitute.org/jobboard/

The IAI Job Board lists job postings related to information architecture, as well as information design, interaction design, user experience, and HCI. Visit the job board at http://www.iainstitute.org/jobboard/.

The following are just a sample of recent postings:


Interaction Designers
Pharmacy OneSource, Bellevue, WA USA and Middleton, WI USA
http://iainstitute.org/jobboard/jobs/job.php?id=5353

http://iainstitute.org/jobboard/jobs/job.php?id=5354

User experience designer / Information Architect
Fondazione Enasarco, Roma, ITA
http://iainstitute.org/jobboard/jobs/job.php?id=5322

Associate Experience Director, Razorfish
Chicago, IL, USA
http://iainstitute.org/jobboard/jobs/job.php?id=5295

Sr Interaction Architect, Blast Radius
Amsterdam, NLD
http://iainstitute.org/jobboard/jobs/job.php?id=5256

Job board newsletter archives are available at: http://lists.iainstitute.org/listinfo.cgi/iai-jobs-iainstitute.org/

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Comments about this newsletter? Questions? Things you would like to see included in future issues? Contact feedback AT iainstitute DOT org.

Newsletter archives can be found at http://iainstitute.org/news/cat_newsletter.php.

Comments about this newsletter? Questions? Things you would like to see included in future issues?
Contact feedback AT iainstitute DOT org.

Thanks for reading and we'll be back with another newsletter in about a month!


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Join IAI and help build an international network sharing IA and UX related resources: http://iainstitute.org/join/