Foundations of ‘Information Design’

Because information design is not a unified field and because its practice is highly context dependent, it has long been a challenge for designers and researchers alike to develop a vocabulary to describe and pass over the essential ingredients necessary for effectively communicating meaningful and persuasive information.

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Defining ‘Entropy’

Entropy can be characterized by the term ‘randomness’ to express the phase duration in which a stable system’s state mutates due to expected or unexpected variables.

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Introducing ‘Systems Thinking’

Systems Thinking teaches us how the design of a complex information system often needs to include mechanisms to account for “short term” and “long term” (or chronic) disturbances of flow caused by environmental changes, by dealing with the “whole” system rather than its parts. By creating systems able to adapt to environmental changes and thus to learn to sustain themselves in the face of unforeseen shifts, design can plan for more effective and efficient complex information systems. This is depicted primarily in the study of Cybernetics.

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Kuniavsky’s “Information Shadows”

Information shadows enable users to access information about their products and experience them in very different ways than could have been imaginable before the Internet. Today, products mean so much more to people and impact their product/customer experiences in new ways. With built-in ubicomp, customers experience products that have a much wider network of associations.

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user experience in ubiquitous-computing

Because ubicomp is, by definition, present everywhere and at-all-times, it may either interfere or facilitate contextual actions, and hence change the ways in which we act upon and perceive the environment. For Greenfield, "we" –ubicomp designers– "are uniquely positioned to affect the emergence of this technological milieu for the better." We can partake in the paradigm shift from technologies that provide uncertainty, insecurity, and that violate privacy, to designing technologies that empower users, and that support ethical, social, and environmental well-being.

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