[Sigia-l] Information Visualization

[Karl Fast]

> you seem to be saying some stuff takes much longer than others to
> percolate and information visualization is one of them. And that
> someday, some killer app/method will magically raise its profile
> fundamentally.

I should also point to Romano Rao's essay on this idea that a
killer-app is a prerequisite for commercial success.

Rao has been working to commercialize information visualization
about as long as anyone through his work at Xerox Parc and Inxight,
a Parc spinoff.

His essay "Information Visualization 2007" covers the ground nicely.
He speaks from an experience which vastly outstrips my own, and I
suspect, that of any else on this list.

  Information Visualization 2007
  http://www.ramanarao.com/informationflow/archive/2003-02.html
  
The snippets relevant to the killer-app suggestion are as follows
(the whole essay is short and worth reading if this topic interests
you):

  Looking forward, there are two paths to mainstreaming information
  visualization. One is captured in the ever seductive hope of a
  "killer application." This path focuses properly on the fact that
  visualization (like other user interface technologies) is just an
  ingredient technology, not an application in itself. The trick is
  finding an application that is not possible without visualization
  or else is significantly improved by it. Of course, innovation at
  application level faces equivalent challenges of getting something
  new adopted.

  ...The other path involves a more gradual diffusion. Say like the
  10 year diffusion of graphical user interfaces from Xerox Star in
  1981 to Windows 3.1 in 1991 in which every two years got you
  roughly a power of ten in number of users such that 1000 users
  climbed to (say) 100 million user. The diffusion would happen
  through multiple applications, some specialized with smaller user
  populations, others more general with larger user populations.

  ...The killer application idea assumes mainstream application draw
  so much attention that everybody gets converted rapidly, whereas
  the slow diffusion model most naturally works by starting with
  highend applications and then being filtered and refined down into
  more broadly used applications. I think the first path could
  happen still, but if not, the second path will lead to the spread
  of information visualization, anyway.


Rao believes that the adoption of visualization principles in
interfaces is inevitable. People on this light might not agree, but
Rao is the CTO of Inxight, so you'll be hard-pressed to convice him
otherwise (and he's spent a lot of time thinking about the problem).
  
Hope that was of some interest.
  
--karl