[Sigia-l] Keeping pages current on an intranet / Best Practic es

[Fiorito, David]

> > Yes.  The process is basically the same although the speed at which it
is
> > completed is very different.  All you are talking about here is
gathering
> > data and presenting it to an audience.  There is nothing revolutionary
about
> > it.
>
> This is beginning to sound really absurd. By this definition there's been
> nothing new about, say, telephone or television and that they've had no
> transformative effect.


The effect of a medium of communication is different from the general
principles used to convey information.  There is no difference between the
guy designing the information transaction of an 1890's train schedule and
someone designing the latest greatest web app.  The immediacy of the medium
may have changed but it is still human communication.


> I have five minutes to select a movie: Watson allows me see all theaters
> within, say, 5 miles of my house showing a particular movie, or shows me
all
> the movies being shown in those theaters and start times; it shows me info
> about those movies and perhaps reviews; and it actually shows a streaming
> preview of each. All with a few mouse clicks. In real-time. I make a
choice.
> The process is done.

Yes but you are talking about immediacy.  If I am a Paleolithic hunter
looking for a herd of bison I can check my local cave wall to see if any of
my fellow hunters left any indication of where the herd can be found.  Where
are the local watering holes, etc.  I go to the cave check the paintings
there and set off to feed my village.

No difference.

> If I can't do this in the next five minutes, I will have missed the show
and
> I don't really care what other laborious, Paleolithic processes I'd have
to
> go through to get the same info the old fashioned way, if I had to wait a
> whole week. 

Again you are talking about pace not communication.  The Paleolithic hunter
and the 21st century movie goer have different needs and different ways of
collecting the data they need.   In the end, however, the basic
communication of data is exactly the same.  
 

> > > Yeah, but one would hope the means by which we deliver that exchange
and
> > > thus the effect it can have on the users have evolved a bit since
1895.
> >
> >Mechanisms may change but the essential transaction has not.
> 
> Well to the extent that as homo sapiens we still have the five senses, not
> much is going to change in that regard. But to claim that, again, the
> telephone, the television or the PC changed nothing is, I think,
> trivializing the issue.

Is it trivializing or is it a honest admission that these new media have
only widened our world and have not really changed the way we communicate.
Now its instant messaging and in the cave it was conversations around the
fire.  The sphere in which our early ancestors could function was smaller.
Telephones, television, and the Internet have expanded or range of
communication - essentially globalizing the planet but to say that human
communication has changed is a gross over statement.  The role of the
IA/ID/UX folk can be applied to any form of communication - even cave
paintings.

> > Frankly I see little difference between a cave painting telling where
good
> > hunting could be found and the wireless service that tells me all of the
> > traffic conditions between my current location and my destination.  Its
all
> > just communication.
> 
> You mean the a child's scribbles on a piece of paper (or the monkey's
> tapping on the typewriter) are the equivalent of "War and Peace"? Sure
we're
> all made of molecules, but do we just stop with that notion?

A child's scribbles can convey volumes of information about the kids mental
state.  Psychologists use drawing as therapy.  Now animals (the monkeys in
your example) are not involved in the act of purposeful communication.  But
the Paleolithic hunter was purposefully communicating in a medium that other
hunters would use and understand.  I see no difference between the data
transmition (communication) between Paleolithic hunters and folks who design
sophisticated web apps.

Cheers,

Dave