[Sigia-l] IA with Flash sites

[Dave]

I like what Anthony said.

What I would add (or twist in there) is that you are the advocate for
the user experience. You need to be thinking about ...
goals, motivations, usability, findability, etc.

Even the most experiential directions if for a brand purpose have a
goal in mind and make sure that the goal of the brand is not the goal
of the user.

It might be good to read up on some game design books as they seem to
balance very well the pure experiential with what will motivate the
user to bother with and stick with the experience itself.

I am not sure I agree w/ the thought that anthony said "as taster".
Not knowing your exact role it is hard to say more, but if you are
relegated to just validator and evaluator, I'm not sure you are
serving a very proactive and productive role. An IA, or a UX person
for this project needs to manage the project strategy and direction
and be able to take ideas and not accept them all, but create a voice
for creativity, but constantly come up with their own ideas, or tweak
existing ideas, or drive the framework (strategic part of the design)
that the more visual ideas can sit on top of, or be contained in.

-- dave

On 8/4/05, Anthony Hempell <anthony.hempell at blastradius.com> wrote:
> I've worked on a few projects like this and I find it's my job to try
> and keep the creative team centered on a key concept or idea and not add
> too many elements to the mix.
> 
> Try not to be another cook -- be the taster.  Try suggesting creative
> subtractions.
> 
> There will be those who will always say that doing the typical workflow
> of user scenarios / tasks / profiles / activities / use cases , etc.
> blah blah blah will always work regardless of the project type -- they
> haven't worked on these kinds of projects.  Pull the typical
> IA/usability stance and you risk alienating the other team members.
> Yes, you can try to stick to generally accepted UE or UX practices, but
> even then sometimes the fun is in breaking the rules.
> 
> Essentially the team is creating a marketing-based work of art. Use your
> role to ask questions, challenge their assumptions, but also enjoy the
> fun of working on something that is non-linear and (hopefully) fun.
> 
> I wouldn't know how to start with 'best practices', in my experience
> projects like this require you to rethink and try new ways of working
> and documentation to fit the project.
> 
> Anthony
> 
> 
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: sigia-l-bounces at asis.org [mailto:sigia-l-bounces at asis.org] On
> Behalf Of lee sachs
> Sent: Thursday, August 04, 2005 11:59 AM
> To: sigia-l at asis.org
> Subject: [Sigia-l] IA with Flash sites
> 
> Gang -
> 
> I'm working on a very creative, experiential pure Flash site.  The site
> is
> for a major brand and very high profile, supported with a large media
> campaign. So its not entirely about getting lost in an interface, but
> there's
> a lot very wild ideas being cooked up.  I've worked on IA over 10 years
> (before it was even called IA), but I've never encountered a project
> like
> this.  The creative team keeps dreaming up amazing ideas and I keep
> running
> over to document what they just cooked up, occasionally reminding them
> when
> something is just too out there.
> 
> I'm curious about anyone's direct experience as IA on this kind of
> project.
> I definitely have a role and we're working together, but it's *so*
> different
> from transactional, complex applications capturing data, functions, etc.
> I
> wonder if there's any best practices out there.
> 
> Let me know...would love to hear.  Thanks!
> 
> -lee
> 
> 
> visit the new site
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> 
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-- 
David Heller
E: dheller (at) gmail (dot) com
W: www (dot) synapticburn (dot) com