Kommunikation
Das zentrale Thema im österrreichischen Mediamanual ist Kommunikation. Interessante Dokumente und online-Workshops über Semiotik, Cultural Studies, Film und Radio sowie Medienpraxis.

Lost in gallery space
Lost in gallery space: A conceptual framework for analyzing the usability flaws of museum Web sites by Paul F. Marty and Michael B. TwidaleThis article reports on a study which used results from 119 scenario–based evaluations of 36 museum Web sites to develop a conceptual framework for analyzing the usability flaws of museum Web sites. It identifies 15 unique dimensions, grouped into five categories, that exemplify usability problems common to many museum Web sites. Each dimension is discussed in detail, and typical examples are provided, based on actual usability flaws observed during the evaluations. The availability of this conceptual framework will help the designers of museum Web sites improve the overall usability of museum Web sites in general.

de bono institute, australia
This institute is well known all over the worlds. The claim see through thinking aims at the approach of Edward de Bono, who is is regarded by many as the leading authority in the field of creative thinking, innovation and the direct teaching of thinking as a skill.

One Plus One Equals Three: Design is… Quote Unquote
At this weblog about design, interactivity and culture you will find a avriety of different definitions of design.

UI Patterns and Techniques
Jenifer Tidwell, MIT, set up a website about UI patterns (it will be published at O´Reilly in late 2005) with very structured thoughts about topics like organizing the content, organizing the page, navigation, getting input…you will also find some good examples here!

HistoryWired: A few of our favorite things
One of the favorite works done with the Map of the Market technology of Smart Money. It is an experimental site that introduces visitors to some of their three million objects held by the National Museum of American History, Behring Center.
With less than five percent of their vast and diverse collection on public display in our exhibit halls, they hope that Web sites like this will bring many more of their treasures into public view.
The initial 450 objects, selected by curators from across the Museum, include famous, unusual, and everyday items with interesting stories to tell. They are not intended to be representative of the Museum’s entire collection.
Visitors can let the Museum and other HistoryWired users know what they think about the objects by rating them with the voting feature on each object page. Averaged ratings determine the size of the squares on the object map. This is meant to reflect the social cues and atmosphere found in a physical museum, and helps shape the exhibit….

Please make me think! Potential dangers in usability culture
Design by Fire, a weblog of Andrei Herasimchuk (claiming to be ne of the first official interface designers hired at Adobe Systems), reflects on the famous book of Steve Krug.
He raises the question if, by advancing the notion that almost everything should be obvious, usability might be dangerous to the world at large?

In the Bubble - The MIT Press
The great book of John Thackara: We’re filling up the world with technology and devices, but we’ve lost sight of an important question: What is this stuff for? What value does it add to our lives? So asks author John Thackara in his new book, In the Bubble: Designing for a Complex World. These are tough questions for the pushers of technology to answer. Our economic system is centered on technology, so it would be no small matter if “tech” ceased to be an end-in-itself in our daily lives. Technology is not going to go away, but the time to discuss the ends it will serve is before we deploy it, not after. We need to ask what purpose will be served by the broadband communications, smart materials, wearable computing, and connected appliances that we’re unleashing upon the world. We need to ask what impact all this stuff will have on our daily lives. Who will look after it, and how? In the Bubble is about a world based less on stuff, and more on people. Thackara describes a transformation that is taking place now — not in a remote science fiction future; it’s not about, as he puts it, “the schlock of the new” but about radical innovation already emerging in daily life. We are regaining respect for what people can do that technology can’t. In the Bubble describes services designed to help people carry out daily activities in new ways. Many of these services involve technology — ranging from body implants to wide-bodied jets. But objects and systems play a supporting role in a people-centered world. The design focus is on services, not things. And new principles — above all, lightness — inform the way these services are designed and used. At the heart of In the Bubble is a belief, informed by a wealth of real-world examples, that ethics and responsibility can inform design decisions without impeding social and technical innovation.

farbimpulse.de
Ein Onlinemagazin für Farbe in Wissenschaft und Praxis hiflreich und interessant, wenngleich von Brillux.

Apple Keynote
Characterisation of the presentation programme…that might push Power Point! Additionaly, you can find some informations about using XML in Apple’s Keynote.