Oz-IA 2006 - News & Updates

IA Summit 2007 - Las Vegas - Call for proposals

2006-10-09T12:20:52+10:00

News via Donna Maurer ...

The Information Architecture Summit is a premier gathering place for information architects and for discussion about information architecture. Everyone who touches on IA is welcome to share and learn. Last year’s IA Summit attracted over 500 attendees, including beginners, experienced IAs, and people in a range of related fields.

In this call, we seek proposals for presentations, panels, research, pre-conference workshops & posters.

All proposals can address core IA principles, emerging trends and technologies, or the business of IA. We are also interested in cross-disciplinary contributions to the practice of IA from related fields such as library science, user experience, interaction design, and user centered design. Sessions may address core IA skills or advanced IA topics.

We encourage submissions from practitioners, academics, and students. We also love hearing from developers, business analysts, managers, and others who work with information architects and/or information architecture.

We also seek research papers. Submissions in this format should make empirical or theoretical contributions to information architecture. You do not have to be affiliated with an academic institution to submit a research paper.

For more information please see: www.iasummit.org/2007/

Tags: Oz-IA

Quickie links

2006-10-04T18:54:14+10:00

Some post-conference bloggings I've spotted...

OZ-IA 2006 -- Patrick Kennedy
Oz-IA presentation in progress -- Steve Baty
Explaining Those Women -- Mark Bernstein
User Research: Questioning the Answers -- Dan Saffer
Women, Fire, and Dangerous Things: What Every IA Should Know -- Dan Saffer
I survived WD06 and OZIA and enjoyed every minute -- Nick Cowie
Sydney Update -- Thomas Vander Wal
OZ IA Presentation - Folksonomy for IA is Posted -- Thomas Vander Wal
False Intentions and the Fallacy of Finding -- Mark Bernstein
OZ-IA wrapup -- Donna Maurer
Presentation: Oz-IA conference (Sydney) -- James Robertson
Notes from Enterprise IA discussions (Sydney) -- James Robertson
OzIA Day 1 - the short and the sweet -- Ruth Ellison
Back to reality -- Ruth Ellison

... do please tell me about any other posts.

I’m gathering the last few presentations and will be posting the lot soon.

Tags: Oz-IA

Quick post-conference note

2006-10-03T09:17:07+10:00

A quickie note while I retain fleeting sanity: huge thanks to everyone that helped out on the day, and thanks to our presenters, and thanks to our sponsors

I’ve been reading the feedback forms, and it’s safe to say it was quite a success, at the very least.

Shoot me an email to info@oz-ia.org if you have any extra feedback.

There’s a bunch of followup things for me to do, so stay tuned.

Tags: Oz-IA

Participate in the Australian Web Analytics Survey 2006

2006-09-27T15:01:39+10:00

Hurol Inan, one of our presenters, is conducting a survey on Web Analytics.

We invite you to take part in the first-ever Australian research study into how organisations measure, report and optimise their websites.

The Web Analytics Survey 2006 aims to investigate not only current practices, but also the barriers to measuring online performance and how they can be removed.

Participants will receive a full report. The results will enable you to benchmark your current practices and get insights into the priorities set by your peers for 2007, ultimately helping you improve your website management practices.

Take the survey >>

The survey will be open until October 13, 2006. Thank you in advance for your participation. We’ll email you with the research report later this year.

To ensure the research is as comprehensive as possible, we need your help!

Please refer a friend or colleague.

Regards,

Hurol Inan
Web Analytics Consultant and Author
(02) 9319 2122

We respect your privacy. Data collected from this survey will be used in accordance with our privacy policy.

Tags: Oz-IA

Program Update

2006-09-27T14:18:01+10:00

Two changes in the session descriptions:

“Extending IA beyond the web to ITV” has an updated abstract, explaining some of the challenges they addressed.
Glenda Browne’s “Websites need A to Z indexes, so why do so few have them?” has an updated abstract with more insight as to what will be covered in that interactive session, and has also been renamed to “Enhancing access to website content - with indexes”

Tags: Oz-IA

Program Schedule is up - plus a bonus!

2006-09-20T17:52:48+10:00

Finally!

As you can see, each day starts at 8:30 AM and sessions conclude by 5:00 PM. We’re providing lunch and teas, and there will also be a Saturday eve cocktails on the balcony. Theme for the cocktails is “come as you are - be ye bedraggled, weary, or excited”.

On Sunday, we’ve set aside time for some ground-up sessions - this is where the delegates organise their own sessions, be they a networking opportunity, show and tell of pretty diagrams, a panel debate, or even your own mini-presentations. We’ll provide the rooms and facilities, you provide the content.

Tags: Oz-IA

Be an IAI ambassador!

2006-09-07T20:23:08+10:00

The Information Architecture Institute are offering an exciting opportunity to attend the OZ-IA conference. We are offering a complimentary full-conference registration to one IAI member. You’ll represent the IA Institute at this important conference and help inform fellow IAI members by writing a follow-up feature for our newsletter.

Please write to membership AT iainstitute DOT org and state your interest in the registration. This is a limited offer, so please contact us by 9/15/06.

This offer is valid for current member of the IA Institute. Visit www.iainstitute.org/signup/ to join IAI today.

Learn more about IAI at www.iainstitute.org

Tags: Oz-IA

Session details now available

2006-08-23T16:42:03+10:00

Just a quick note to let you know we now have detailed descriptions for all the presentation and workshop sessions for the Oz-IA/2006 Conference/Retreat.

We’re still looking for ideas for panels, please tell us yours

We also had a rush on registrations late last week, and thus also have a pretty good idea of which sessions everyone will be wanting to go to. We’ll be working this week on scheduling as many of these sessions such that there are the minimum of clashes. Stay tuned for more news.

We still have tickets available, so register today and avoid missing out.

Tags: Oz-IA

Information Architecture on Drugs

2006-08-23T00:10:44+10:00

Stephen Hall and Andrew Boyd have sent through an updated description of their session, plus a new title sure to grab attention!

Tags: Oz-IA

Lakoff’s ‘Women, Fire & Dangerous Things’ - What every IA should know

2006-08-17T00:16:41+10:00

Five hundred and thirty eight pages? Sheesh, I’m so glad we’ve got such a smart cookie in Donna Maurer

George Lakoff’s book ’Women, Fire and Dangerous Things’ is a fundamental work on categorization theory, explaining categorization from a linguistic and cognitive perspective. Many IA’s (myself included) have had a paradigm shifting moment on reading it.

But it is 583 pages long, weighs a kilo, and is a very, very hard read. Let’s take a short cut - let me do the hard work.

In this presentation, I’ll examine the fundamentals of Lakoff’s theories and those scholars from which his theories draw. I’ll explain prototype theory and basic level categories and will discuss classical categorisation theory and how it fails to describe the real world we live in.

More importantly, I’ll discuss how these relate to everyday IA - particularly how we can use basic level categories and prototype theory to create more intuitive structures. I’ll even explain how folksonomies/tagging are a natural outcome of the failure of classical categorisation theory.

Only two more days before Early Bird Registration closes.

Tags: Oz-IA

Registration is open - early bird rates fly away this Friday!

2006-08-14T13:53:27+10:00

Registration is open, and the early bird rates end this Friday.

As an Early Bird No Risk Special Offer, for those of you you are considering attending but are a little uncertain, then go ahead and register before Friday to secure the cheapest rate ... and then make the payment at your leisure. We’ll even offer a 100% refund if you decide to cancel before September 15th. So, secure your Early Bird Registration today!

Tags: Oz-IA

User research: Questioning the answers

2006-08-14T03:34:30+10:00

In addition to strengthening our quantitative skills for user research (thanks Steve!), Ash Donaldson will be addressing the qualitative side of things:

One of the weakest parts of the software development life cycle has always been requirements gathering. Misleading or incorrect requirements are often uncovered from business analysis. These days, many of us are asked to do user research. But how effective is what we do? Can we believe what the users tell us?

Recent advances in social psychology, neuroscience and other disciplines have provided a greater understanding of thought processes and how to best discover natural behaviours. Ash will be providing a brief overview of some common misconceptions of how we think, then exploring some qualitative techniques that are more effective at gaining a true insight into the mind of the user and what they really need.

Ash also finally sent thru a headshot pic, but don’t let that scare you ;-)

Tags: Oz-IA

Statistical concepts & techniques for the practicing IA

2006-08-10T13:29:59+10:00

Steve Baty will be explaining how to make better use of the research data we gather by applying more statistical rigour. Sounds boring right? No - statistics is a means for extracting meaning from masses of data. Seeing as I don’t know much more beyond calculating Avg(x) this will be quite interesting for me.

This session introduces you to some basic concepts in quantitative research and analysis, including examples, real-life cases, and a dab of theory. Topics covered include:

Understanding research measurements

Selecting Research Subjects (Statistical sampling)

Describing our data (Descriptive and Summary statistics)

What the sample can tell us about the ‘population’ (Inferential Statistics Part I)

Comparing two samples (Inferential Statistics Part II)

Data with multiple variables & the ‘average user fallacy’ (Inferential Statistics Part III)

A rollicking, jaunty, 45-minute roller coaster through elementary quantitative analysis for the practicing IA.

Tags: Oz-IA

The IA of iTV, vs the IA of PDA

2006-08-08T17:47:54+10:00

Very soon after announcing the program for Oz-IA/2006 we had a late entrant: “Extending IA beyond the web to iTV.” This comes from the good people at the University of Technology Sydney: Linda Leung, Scott Bryant, and Adrienne Tan.

This presentation discusses the application of information and interaction design principles to the design of iTV applications. It details the authors’ experiences of teaching a subject in Digital Information & Interaction Design as part of a postgraduate program in Interactive Multimedia. Students worked on a design project for a common client - Austar, an iTV service provider in rural and regional Australia - in which they developed the information architecture and interaction for proposed new iTV applications.

Which should provide an interesting contrast to another session: ”The IA of PDA” by Stephen Hall & Andrew Boyd

Describes the IA for PDA work that we are currently doing for the Dept of Health and Ageing in Canberra. This involves developing for PDAs and smartphones a highly usable version of the Pharmaceutical Benefits Schedule (all the info needed by doctors and pharmacists about 90% of the pharmaceutical drugs subsidised by the government - which is currently in print as a 550 page book of considerable information complexity).

Tags: Oz-IA

Conference Program & Registration

2006-08-07T14:23:02+10:00

We’ve finally worked out the list of sessions for the Oz-IA/2006 Conference & Retreat.

Over the next few weeks we’ll be expanding the detail on each session. Stay tuned for more news, or sign up for announcement emails. Subscribe to the RSS/Atom news feeds today!

There’s quite a few sessions planned and so we will be scheduling them into two concurrent streams. We haven’t decided which session goes into which stream just yet, but you can help: if you tell us which sessions you are most interested in we can try to make sure there are no clashes :-)

We’ve also opened registrations. The conference fees are detailed on the website.

Tags: Oz-IA

Discounted accommodation

2006-07-07T10:41:04+10:00

We’ve secured discounted accommodation at the conference venue, The Mercure Sydney on Broadway. Mention "OzIA2006" when you book and you’ll pay just $185 per night for standard double room (1 double bed) or a standard twin room (either 2 x single beds or 2 x double beds). This conference package also includes discounted breakfast. All rates quoted include all tax and GST.

This is of course subject to availability and conditions.

Tags: Oz-IA

Suggest a panel topic

2006-07-20T22:46:08+10:00

We want you to suggest some topics for a panel discussion at the Oz-IA 2006 conference. Go take a quick look at our distinguished presenters and then fill out the form on the website.

Tags: Oz-IA

Three more presenters

2006-07-19T17:34:10+10:00

We have three more presenters lined up. Go read their bios: Alexander Johannesen, Glenda Browne, and Eric Scheid.

Announcing Oz-IA 2006!

2006-06-30T17:17:25+10:00

On the last weekend of September 2006 there will be a conference/retreat on information architecture in Sydney, Australia. We’ll have a packed schedule featuring international and local speakers, you’ll get to engage with panels, and participate in group sessions. And of course, there’s the opportunity to catch up with your peers, network your way to new contacts, and have a good time.