Information Design, Instructional Design: Which Is It?

Of all the topics I have to talk about, information design and instructional design are the most straightforward. Instructional design tells you what to do (remember that flowchart a few posts back?), and information design provides you with information. Now the basics are out of the way, let's look deeper...

>INFORMATION DESIGN

As mentioned above, information design provides information, or data. However, it is important to note that successful information design also provides a means of understanding said data. This can be done through graphics, text, audio, interpretative dance, whatever-have-you.
Also, information design can be used to disguise data. Take, for example, a survey about donut consumption. A bar chart says that donut-eating is up 30% more than last year. Informative, sure, but very misleading. 30% of what? Whose donuts? Which flavour? Where?

Summary: Information design can inform and increase understanding, but it can also hide the facts. Its usefulness is directly proportional to how much data it provides.

>INSTRUCTIONAL DESIGN

This is really quite simple. Instructional design, which often goes hand-in-hand with information design, tells you what to do. Every time you see a stop sign, you're looking at instructional design at work. Manuals? Maps? Exercise tapes? It's all instructional design, my friend.

That's all for now, I'll be back later.

Interactive Design: A Definition And An Introduction

Interactive design. Sounds simple, no?

Firstly, let's try the simple, confusing and unclear definition: Interactive design is used to create interactive works.

Well, great, what does that mean?

Interaction design is all about using many different concepts to help draw the end user into an experience. Sometimes, the end user becomes so involved that they become one of those concepts themselves. The most obvious example of interactive design is a game. Using visuals, audio, text, film, interaction, time and motion. Most likely, there are others parts to it as well, but for the life of me my brain can only remember so much.

Interaction design i all about involving the end user by using the aforementioned concepts to the best effect. But that doesn't mean using all of them - I'll expand upon this in the examples post.

What is Web 2.0?

Web 2.0. Everyone has heard of this. And everyone has a different opinion on what it is.

The textbook definition of it is "The change from static text webpages to interactive media webpages." For an example of the former, take any old "Build A Wepage With HTML" tutorial. You'll make one as your first shot. For the latter...

Youtube. Google. Myspace. Twitter. Facebook. Blogspot. Wordpress. DailyMotion. Yahoo. Dogpile. Tripod. Pick any one you like, they're all what's generally called "Web 2.0."

Technically, the textbook definition is right. Technically. It's like calling a dog a domesticated wolf. Technically you're right, but the truth is far more complex.

I'll expand upon this in later posts. Web 2.0 is a lot more interesting than you'd expect.