Information Design Examples:

Power-point presentations – PowerPoint’s are designed to provide an informative yet visually pleasing presentation. A PowerPoint consists of a series of chosen images and information created for artistic and informative purposes.

Podcasting/ Instructional – Podcasting is a form of RSS feed technology represented through visual images portrayed with information aided through audio technology. Example would be Podomatic (http://www.podomatic.com) a website designed for users to able to upload and share your podcasts.

WordPress/ Blog spot – An open publishing application designed for blogging purposes. WordPress is designed to allow users the ability to provide informative as well as aesthetically pleasing information, for other users.

Online Kiosk’s – Online Kiosk’s for financial bank institutes such as Commonwealth Bank and St George are examples of instructional design. These websites are designed to allow users the ability to access banking information etc from the comfort of their own home.

Brochures – Referred to also as a pamphlet or note booklet, is usually designed to provide summarised or introductory information such as written text and pictures. Brochures inform the designed target market


Instructional Design Examples:

Manuals – A manual is another form of a booklet. Manual is essentially designed entirely for the purpose to inform as well as instruct the user on how to operate a particular designed function.

Instructional/ Interactive multimedia – Companies which design educational based interactive multimedia are also a form of instructional design. The learning company, provide a selection of instructional designed software, aimed at educating young minds. (http://www.learningcompany.com)

Online Video Media – Websites such as ‘Expert Village’ provide numerous instructional or “how-to-do” videos which are designed to educate the user without having the leave the comfort of their own home. (http://www.expertvillage.com)

Step-by-Step on 'How to make toast':

START

1. Get bread out
2. Get toaster out
3. Plug toaster into power point
4. Switch power point on
5. Place bread slice into toaster slots
6. Choose toaster settings
7. Push down toaster plunger (Is it toasting? Yes: Proceed, No: Repeat Step 7)
8. Wait till toast pops up (Has it popped up yet? Yes: Proceed, No: Repeat Step 8)
9. Carefully remove toast from toaster
10. Place toast on plate
11. Spread toast with favourite topping
12. Turn power point off
13. Unplug toaster
14. Clean mess up (Is everything back to place? Yes: Proceed, No: Repeat Step 14)
15. Eat toast!

END

Step-by-step flowchart on 'How to make toast'.


Storyboard on how to make toast:

Mood Board.

John is a 75-year-old retired carpenter who still enjoys hikes in national parks and ridding his Harley-Davidson. He looks forward to the local club raffle and a catch up with the boys on a Thursday evening. He also enjoys playing bingo, listening to local radio and watching old western movies with his wife Jill. As he gets older and has to visit the hospital more often, he prefers quick and efficient healthcare with simple, bold instructions and hospital signs. He aims to enjoy the rest of his life traveling a little and spending time with family, especially his grandchildren.

• Location: Hobart
• Toaster Usage: Unfortunately Johnny has never used a fancy new electric toaster
• Computer/Internet Usage: PC, Occasionally browses the Internet with the help of his grandchildren.
• Computer Skill: Novice user. Finds things too complicated on the computer to use. Has an email but doesn’t know how to use it properly.

Information Design. (definition)
Information design is the skill and practice of creating graphical information for users to communicate efficiently and effectively. How well the design of information is being presented is crucial, as information design which is relevant or good enables users to have better decisions, become more effective and build knowledge as well as a clearer understanding of what is trying to be communicated. For information to be designed effectively, information must carefully balance a variety of factors, including, but not limiting to clarity, relevance, timeliness, amplitude, volume, and differentiation.
In summary, it would be fair to say that the concept behind Information design is aimed at dedicating design that makes information effective as possible.

Instructional Design. (definition)
Instructional design can be seen as the skill and practice for creating instructional tools as well as content effectively for learning needs. The essential aim for instructional design is to deliver instructions effectively and efficiently, in addition to being appealing and cost-effective. In order for all these factors to be successful, the instructional designer would needs to address a variety of interactive Medias in order to improve learning and address learning objectives.


Reference.

Digital Web Magazine, The Information Design approach to Web development
http://www.digital-web.com/article/the_information_design_approach_to_web_development/ 13 March 2009

Instructional Design Australia, What is Instructional Design?
http://instructionaldesign.com.au/ 13th March 2009

There are many interactive products that are used everyday, this includes cell (mobile) phone, computer, personal organizer, remote control, coffee machine, ATM, ticket machine, library information system, the web, photocopier, watch, printer, stereo, DVD player, calculator, video game . . . the list is endless.

Examples of Interactive design include various forms of technology systems or via products and services, as well as organizations themselves, for the use of advertising, Entertainment, Info Design as well as Self Promo. In addition, interactive design from a computer and web point of view can be made up of E-learning, Web design, Flash Games & Animation and Disc-based interactive multimedia.

E-learning:
(eg. http://elearning.uws.edu.au)
Electronic based learning (i.e. e-Learning or eLearning) is a form of educational supported technology, which revolves around the medium of computer technology, particularly involving digital technologies. Essentially e-learning allows the user to learn almost anywhere, at any time, through the use of a working computer.

Web Design:
(eg. http://www.exa.com.au/)
Web design can be described as the graphical presentation of content shown on the internet through the use of Web Sites and various web applications. The primary intent of web design is to essentially create a web site; one which is designed to present content which caters to the end user in the form of a web page, via the use of interactive features or interfaces. Certain types of elements for web design can include HTML, XHTML, or XML tags, from which text, forms and bit-mapped images which are to be placed on the page. Other advanced features require plug-ins which are generally used for more complex media such as Flash, QuickTime and Java.

Flash Games & Animation:
(eg. http://www.dxinteractive.com/)
Flash games, or also known as browser games are electronic based games which are usually played over browsers. These forms of video and computer games generally run on general Web2.0 based plug-ins such as Java or Flash Player.

Disc-based interactive multimedia:
(eg. http://www.leapfrog.com)
Disc-based multimedia refers to interactive based media within the form of a CD-ROM. Companies such as Leap Frog provide products such as “Click-Start” collection, which allows children to interact with the media as well as providing an educational feel to the product.

What is interactive design?
Interactive design also known as interaction design, can be described as the art of helping interactions between humans mediated by products. The term interaction can be referred to as a form of communication, either one-on-one (telephone call), one-to-many (blogs) or many-to-many (stock markets). Interaction design can be seen as the way in which various products and systems of which a user can interact with. Essentially interactive design can also be the process of designing an aesthetically pleasing piece; which is designed to cater according to a particular target market.

Interaction design focuses on the behaviour of the product and how it actually works. Most of an interaction designer's time will spend perfecting these behaviours but not forgetting the goal to facilitate interactions between humans. It is about making connections between people, not making connections to the product or to the computer. As stated by the founder and principal of Kicker Studio, Dan Saffer's perspective of interaction design states "Interaction design should be to create things that make people's lives better, that make us all more connected to each other."

Reference.
Dan Saffer. A definition of Interactive Design. 9 March 09
http://www.odannyboy.com/blog/archives/001000.html

Today's entry will explain the various different examples that Web 2.0 has to offer. As mentioned Web 2.0 is the product of the open source which offers practical accessibility to a product's source (goods and knowledge). It allows new information and business opportunities to further develop information, provided before. Web 2.0 allows data to act as its own entity, which can be changed, altered or remixed by anyone for any specific purpose.

Web 2.0 is built on technologies like Ajax, a web development technology that is based on JavaScript and XML; which is used for creating interactive web applications or rich internet applications. This technology enables a user’s pages to function more like a desktop-based application, as you can retrieve server data asynchronously within the background without interfering with the display and behaviour of the existing page. Dion Hinchcliffe who studied various online products and services in the development stage, particularly mostly on Web 2.0 wrote:

"As important though, is the tangible value which the Web 2.0 provides today:

- Leveraging The Long Tail. Amazon and eBay used this idea to build companies worth billions and billions. This is how. Web 2.0 provides both the audience and the services.

- Small Pieces, Loosely Joined. Monolithism is dead, we can't build big stuff like that any more. It's not agile nor can what you build be aggregated, deliver sustained value, or even survive for long.

- Self-Service and Participation. Fostering this lets you capture new value in your Web 2.0 apps 24 hours a day. Examples: Tagging, ranking, trackbacks, reputations.

- Radical Decentralization. Single sources of function are single sources of failure and are unacceptable now. And they don't scale to either deliver or capture significant value.

- Emergent Behavior. Your Web 2.0 functionality can be reused, remixed, aggregated, and syndicated and the resulting value reintegrated back into your application."

RSS is also another cool technology that Web 2.0 endeavours. As you all know RSS allows user’s to receive automatic updates when a site changes or updates information; provided if you have subscribed to the site's RSS feed.

Other examples of technology that Web 2.0 strive on are:

• blogging: allows people to create personal online blogs (eg. http://blogger.com)
• tagging: a feature which helps organise and find URLs (eg. http://del.icio.us, http://flickr.com)
• social bookmarking: enables you to create a media monitoring tool, for your organization's internal. (eg. http://bloglines.com)
• Wikis: Wikepedia- largest free built encyclopaedia that allows anyone to update on it (eg. http://wikepedia.com)

Below are just a few Web 2.0 logos that are defined by internet users.

Reference.

Alexandra Krasne. What is Web 2.0 Anyway? 8th March 09
http://www.techsoup.org/learningcenter/webbuilding/archives/page9344.cfm

Web 2.0 : A mini Guide. 8th March 09
http://www.masternewmedia.org/web_2/web_2_examples/web2_examples_of_services_and_applications_20051006.htm

Image.
http://www.logosauce.com/blog/2006/12/12/web-2-logos

What is Web 2.0 ?
Web 2.0 is the second generation or can be called as "New internet" of web development and design that makes communication a lot easier and convenient. It also secures information sharing, interoperability, and collaboration on the World Wide Web. This new generation of web development created an evolution of web-based communities, hosted services, and applications such as social-networking sites, video-sharing sites, wikis, blogs and folksonomies.

Tim O'Reilly, founder and CEO of O'Reilly Media and philosopher behind the term Web 2.0 believes, "Web 2.0 is the business revolution in the computer industry caused by the move to the Internet as a platform, and an attempt to understand the rules for success on that new platform." O'Rielly believes that "2.0" refers to a "come back" from the collapse of the dot-com bubble in 2001.

Web 2.0 can provide users to do more than just to retrieve information. With the new web development, users are now able to run software-applications through browsers, built from Web 1.0 facilities to provide a “Network as platform”. Users can own the data on a Web 2.0 site and exercise control over that data.

Overall, the term "Web 2.0" can be used to describe the conquer of machines over humankind.