The last years of usability engineering practice where shaped by a war of terms, among them interaction design, user experience design, information architecture and many more. This phenomenon could also be witnessed by reading through job descriptions in Europe and the U.S.
I also had my difficulties in finding my own place in this pool of notions. This is why I wrote about the topic earlier this year: http://www.usability-architect.com/2009/06/who-am-i-from-interface-designers-to.html
In the meantime, I have the impression that in 2010 and in the subsequent years, too, there will be a consolidation of terms. I believe that information architecture (IA) will disappear from the scene, because the web becomes increasingly interactive. IA was especially associated with an expertise in building content and navigation structures that rather had a static form. Today, technologies like Silverlight, AJAX and Flash turn the web into a highly interactive media. Because the design of interactive systems is headlined with the term interaction design (IxD), it will absporb IA as a discipline. Naturally, this comes with an increasing need for IAs to enhance their knowledge and design capabilities beyond static forms of content representation.
In addition, user experience (UX) will molt to be the umbrella term for the design of software systems people will like to use and buy. This will underline the relationship of software design and customer experience management. But first of all, UX relates to the goal companies want to reach. Hence, UX does only describe a few methods and tools that provide guidance in actually designing UX.
This is why both usability engineering and interaction design will be the more concrete terms and discplines below the umbrella of UX. Both fields are relevant for designing interactive software systems in the future and there will be an ongoing discussion about the interfaces between both populations, including the role of industrial and graphic design.
I believe this is a very positive outlook for 2010 and it will help to promote the ROI of usability and design activities. I think it is always difficult to convince a client of investing into your profession, if you are unable to explain your discipline in a few words.
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Great article! I think the key here is that usability testing is accessible to everyone now and ROI is the goal. Really you just need to define what that "return" is to you because its not always dollars :)
No, no, no.
Every time our Experience Architectures/UX people try to do the job that an Information Architect/IA people should be doing, it all goes to hell.
User Experience Architecture is about making something logical and easy to use for end users. It's got very little to do with content. The role is important on all sites/systems that have a user interface.
Information Architecture is about classifying content. It is what taxonomists and librarians and card sorting exercises and clever search engines do. Content needs a good IA even if it is never shown on a website, or is shown on multiple sites.
Occassionally I've met good UX people that can also do IA, and the other way round. But it is the exception, not the rule. Keep the disciplines separate please.
Thanks for listening
Jon
Hi all, I am happy my post raised some discussion. Maybe you like to read through the first chapters of Alan Coopers book About Face 3.0 - he also discusses the topic.
However, I agree with you that a combination of IA and UX in one person demands special skills and advanced knowledge in both fields. Speaking for myself, I think we will see more such generalist specialists in the future.
Have a nice year end party!
In my own experience working at larger companies such as Yahoo! and such, I see less and less IA's these days and more and more Interaction Designers. From my own experience, it's a little bit of a west coast vs. east coast thing, or in house vs. agency thing, whereas west coast & in house companies tend to refer to us Interaction Designers, and the east coast or agencies tend to prefer IA's.
Personally, I'd prefer my role to be titled "Product Designer" (and I've always hated trying to explain the title "information architect" to a layman), sense every in-house job I've had is working with product managers and we refer to our experiences/designs as "products". IA, Interaction Design, Usability, Information Design, etc., are all just skillsets that I've come to employ myself over the last 6-7 years to stay relevant in an ever changing career.
For me, it's more about making sure the designer is able to build time into the project schedule to flesh out the IA. Maybe I'm spoiled, or perhaps it's just that I expect to do some level of mentoring with any new hire to round out the skills I need them to use on a regular basis. But frankly, 90% of the IA I've done for my web projects in the past could easily be handled by thoughtful designer with a little time.
In addition, in my own experience, again at Yahoo! and at my more recent employer, I see more and more hybrid interaction visual designers. As I look to build my own team in the near future, this is definitely the type of designer that I'd prefer to hire. I'm not as concerned with hiring an IA because most teams I've worked with are able to work with the designer to iterate effectively on the this subject.
That all said, I guess my main point is that I don't see IA going away as skillset, but people who've been working solely in IA should start to round out their other skills more in order to stay relevant as I don't see the individual role staying around that much longer. Heck, I don't see my traditional of Interaction Designer staying around that much longer and I need to work on my visual design skills in order to stay relevant.
User Experience is rapidly becoming the catchphrase to drop every flashified, gimmicky junk gizmo into a UI.
Forget the future, User Experience has Already devolved to mean branding, which has come to mean nothing at all. Like all pop phrases, UX as bizarro world opposite to the spirit and letter of UX design.
In this brave new (old) world there is no user testing, no methodology (beyond usability on the rare occasion), just designer whim and fad chasing.
Not to mention you built your UX house on the warmed over leftovers of usability. Now you reap the consequence as the current Donald Norman's current "Technology First, Needs Last" crisis of faith.