Author: Vince Kimball

A research agenda for Information Architecture. Peter van Dijck expresses frustration with the slow pace of new thinking in his information architecture research agenda. Lots of good response on SIGIA and the aifia-members lists that Peter sums up on his blog. In particular, the question of whether we need more research, or whether we need… Continue reading A research agenda for Information Architecture

Hotspot Security for the Average Person. Protecting your passwords and your data at a hotspot, in two parts: I've written a brief, two-part series for The Seattle Times's SOHO (small office/home office) focus in their Monday Business section on how to secure yourself at a Wi-Fi hotspots. This week, I point to email protection; next… Continue reading Hotspot Security for the Average Person

Tolkien's house protected. J.R.R. Tolkien's house in Oxford is now protected by the British government with a Grade II listing, which means improvements or alterations to the building must take into consideration its original design & preservation concerns.  I've always wanted to see Tolkien's house, and now I know it will be there a while… Continue reading Tolkien's house protected

How much does ROI matter?. UIDesigner points to The Tao of ROI, a must-read article for UX types looking to communicate business value. The key take away for me, something I’ve had a gut feeling for, but never articulated, is that the value of an ROI exercise is in the process, not the result. This… Continue reading How much does ROI matter?

Software factories: a conversation with Ward Cunningham and Jack Greenfield. On Friday I had a talk with two of Microsoft's patterns & practices leaders: Ward Cunningham and Jack Greenfield. Ward (along with Kent Beck) ignited the patterns movement with a seminal paper at OOPSLA 1987. Jack developed NeXT's Enterprise Objects Framework (now Apple's WebObjects), was… Continue reading Software factories: a conversation with Ward Cunningham and Jack Greenfield

Product plug: Campaign Monitor. We recently switched from Topica to Campaign Monitor to manage our email newsletters and mailing lists. We couldn't be happier with it. If you manage a list you deserve to be happy too (cause, let's face it, list management can bring you down). CampaignMonitor can get you there. From the beautiful… Continue reading Product plug: Campaign Monitor

The top 20 IT Mistakes to Avoid. Chad Dickerson and his Infoworld readers come with this list which is a bit uneven but includes common sense tips: 1. Botching your outsourcing strategy 2. Dismissing open source — or bowing before it 3. Offshoring with blinders on …. [Olivier Travers]

Useit.Com: Undoing the Industrial Revolution. We typically overestimate what can be done in the short term. Improvements seem so close we can smell them, but human behavior and social institutions are slow to change. At the same time, we underestimate what will happen in the long term, because changes accumulate and accelerate. [Tomalak's Realm]

Long Copy vs. Short Copy. MarketingExperiments.com recently set out to see what impact the length of sales copy has on a website's conversion rate. The results: long copy clearly outperformed short copy in all three of their tests. This is something we've wrestled with at BasecampHQ.com. We like to be as descriptive and informative as… Continue reading Long Copy vs. Short Copy