Comments on: Being Shallow

By: shazam

shazam — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

This was a really enjoyable and stimulating article. It’s a rare treat to have someone write about the larger view of an industry in a clear and approachable manner. I am curious to see how it is received though. I have a quote by Machiavelli that I keep handy for when things get a bit tough:
“And let it be noted that there is no more delicate matter to take in hand, nor more dangerous to conduct, nor more doubtful in its success, than to set up as the leader in the introduction of changes. For he who innovates will have for his enemies all those who are well off under the existing order of things, and only lukewarm supporters in those who might be better off under the new.”

By: richard13

richard13 — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Nicely written article Grant, I want to take one contrary point about the “insular” tag though – your description of the summit is very accurate – but being a strong community does not necessarily go hand in hand with being insular. I have seen many occasions when people or techniques from “outside” the IA community have been embraced and many occasions when people new to the “IA community” have been welcomed at the summit. Almost every summit lunch/dinner i’ve been to (many!) has included someone new to the summit or the community.

By: ericreiss

ericreiss — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

This is the most intriguing piece I’ve read in ages. Simply wonderful, Grant. Do you have any thoughts on what the common denominator is for the people who call themselves “information architects”? For my part, I’ve long suspected it’s our particular way of observing the world around us – our peculiar way of thinking, our ability to find the “eye of the hurricane.” Perhaps this is why “IA” difficult to define and even more difficult to teach. And it makes me wonder, is information architecture a discipline or a lifestyle?

By: grant

grant — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

You’re quite right, Richard: I didn’t make that point as well as I’d hoped. A better analogy would probably be having dinner with your in-laws. While there’s no question (hopefully) that your in-laws care about you, and welcome you, and want you to be there, they have a rapport with your spouse that goes way, way back, and to some extent you have to be a good sport and listen to that history play itself out in anecdotes, news of people you’ve never heard of, and old jokes that don’t split your side the way they split everyone else’s. That’s what I mean by “insularity”: I was trying to rescue the word from its negative connotation, and suggest that the awkwardness a newcomer feels is not the result of deliberate exclusion, but simply the inevitable discomfort at being among people with a history that he or she hasn’t yet begun to share. And frankly, I’d rather have that then the reverse phenomenon: being fastened on to voraciously by veterans who are lusting for new blood for their task forces and committees.

By: leenjones

leenjones — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Reading this article was a pleasure. It raises substantive issues in an articulate and personal way. On shallowness, I think that’s a challenge several related fields face. One factor I’ve noticed is that we tend to propose or use new names for our fields, our roles, and more–frequently. I’m not saying we should completely avoid new labels. But to grow in our establishment academically and professionally, we need some labeling constancy.

Related to that, I greatly appreciated the points on history, and not just because I like T.S. Eliot. I’m getting “older” in this field and am amazed at how often I have seen colleagues (or even myself) discussing an insight as new, when it really isn’t. It may have a new application or permutation, but the essence is the same. It’s our awareness, not the insight, that’s new. Understanding our history can help us identify our true innovations.

By: madonnalisa

madonnalisa — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Grant, very well-written, engaging, and thought provoking article. In some funny way I started thinking about the Meyers Briggs Test while reading the 3 accusations. Somehow I’ve noticed we all exhibit varying degrees of them and it really effects interactions with other IAs (and even non-IAs) because there’s some sense that I’m right, you have to listen to me attitude. While I was away from the “scene” for a couple of years and stepped back in, I arrived when all these accusations were flying around as topics of writings/conversations. At first not at all encouraging for me, however at the same time I believed there were opportunities that were forming and in some way your article has summed up some of my gut feeling when you described that “stillness.”

By: terrybleizeffer

terrybleizeffer — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Any article that makes me laugh out loud is a-okay in my book, and “But like most Ph.D.s, I emerged from my final thesis defense, not empowered by a sense of mastery, but horrified at how little I knew” made me laugh out loud. As Homer Simpson would say, “It’s funny because it’s true.”

As someone who is new to IA (I visit here to extend my user experience background gently into the IA arena, which I think is a valuable skill), I’ve noticed the insular nature of the community – but not in a bad way. Any vibrant community is going to have a natural case of insularity, and as others have pointed out, this doesn’t mean newcomers aren’t welcome, it just means newcomers have a motivation to join the group. Completely distributed, non-insular communities are not attractive to join.

By: tputkey

tputkey — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

In all my networking, I’ve found a lot of IAs who don’t know many other IAs. But this is more human nature than IA nature: not to get out there into the palm-pressing when other things are more pressing, so to speak.

I also have a fear of being shallow – there are so many things to know, how can I know them with enough depth to be good enough? Yesterday I did a compilation of some IA job descriptions and found that the skill set required ran the gamut from business analysis to interaction design. How can you have depth with that kind of breadth?

Also, in all my non-IA community networking, I’ve found that most people don’t know what any of our titles mean. Right before I read this article, I was thinking about my new business cards and questioning whether I should put a job title on them. I use any skills to create usable products, and the most heavily used skills are communication skills (i.e. face to face discussions or email threads).

By: adampolansky

adampolansky — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

I really enjoyed your article. I like the way you’ve taken the most common knocks and essentially validated them by changing the context around them. You’re musing on the appeal of Information Architecture was particularly on point for me. It gave me another way to know why I love what I do.

When it comes to being shallow, I’ve talked about maintaining what I call a “willful ignorance” when it comes to back-end systems. By that I mean I try to envision somthing without immediately tearing it down with a knowledge of system constraints. If I can communicate it to someone who is as creative and passionate about software development code as I am about UX, there’s a better chance that vision will be realized. I’ve seen it work.

We’re all such junkies for external validation. Thanks again for what I thought was an afffirmation.

By: dmooresatx

dmooresatx — Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000

Grant, your English background shines wonderfully through in this thoughtful story. I often get burned out from reading so much of “the literature,” but I was able to sail through your article. I am an IA wannabe that simply does not have the time to get involved (“there’s more to read, more to write, more to think about, and more to solve, than you could ever possibly manage in your lifespan” [amen]).

I especially appreciate your notion that there must be be apoint at which a curriculum of study can be developed for a discipline. We IA voyeurs need the “informationarti” to let us know what do do without us having to go through the pain you have already experienced. I, for one, am ready to learn from the historical tale of our IA forefolks.

Thanks for the experience.

Don Moore