[Sigia-l] Google introduces animated icons on homepage

[Andrea Resmini]

Eric,

> I think you're right that there is some correlation between
> interpersonal bubbles and web design. That said, I would have
> expected more feng shui in Japan rather than amazingly busy sites
> such as Aiseikai Hospital (http://www.aiseikai.or.jp/)

I agree, although I tend to think every country is entitled their pet
disasters. For example, Italian web sites are somewhat lingering in
between being all 2.0-ish or just plain 1997-ish, but you normally do not
see things like this:

http://www.gat.gdf.it/

This is the web site of the Guardia di Finanza (the tax police, which is
an Army branch (corp?) in Italy), Special Squad for IT Frauds. So they
should know better that what lies ahead of the third link from the top
(the flash part). And this without taking into account the rest, which is
really poorly   designed to say the least. It's a personal favorite, and
I've been resisting the urge to bash it for a long time now: they managed
to have this somewhat quasi-normal homepage just a month ago. It was just
the flash things before. And believe me, the texts are just plain abysmal
as the presentation is. It reads like a prank.

So, yes, but I'd like to have some sort of real survey of this kind of
design / pattern, spanning different areas and with the time to check with
locals, since our personal perspective could be misleading due to our own
cultural biases. This is something I started to do, getting back to Hall
and those other books I mentioned, before Luca involved me with his new
research on bridge-experiences and findability and ate up my spare time.

BTW, I used your Rediscovering wayfinding article in my part on wayfinding
and the web and I think it will be part of our talk in Barcelona. So,
thanks. :)

> If I may digress a moment, I've long had a theory that the reason
> Americans find Scandinavians "cold" is that they run into this bubble
> sooner than they would with another American. And Scandinavians think
> Americans are "shallow" because they quickly pass the point at which
> they expect the bubble to stop them, assume they have now become true
> friends, and are subsequently taken aback when they unexpectedly hit
> the American bubble.

Yes, I think you have a point there, since it goes pretty much the same
between Italy and Scandinavia: our Italian friends cannot conceive of
living or even vacationing here (except for say a week) and the major
complaint, if you take out the bad weather and terrible food (none of
which is true but never mind), is that people are stiff and cold.

And being an Italian who has spent some 4-5 months in Sweden in the past
three years (and a fair number of months all over Denmark and Norway
previously) adds some spice to living here, let me tell you, although I'm
pretty 'cold' in comparison to the stereotype Italian guy.

But it's definitely fun and mind-opening. :)

--

Andrea Resmini
Information architect
root at resmini.net