Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved MASC 609 – Information Architecture Module 2 – Personas Mark Avnet office:

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Agenda Homework review and presentation More theory Personas Persona project and in-class work Additional assignments

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved For Today Stop signs

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved FOR TODAY: 1,2 read a bunch of stuff 3.Find and be prepared to present your weekly “coolest thing.” class - Is it cool? What’s the insight? 4.Identify and be prepared to discuss a few examples of information architecture at work in the physical world. See if you can differentiate between interface (surface) and strategy. REMEMBER CT track assignment - due Sept 4th: each student find and capture five (5) examples of your local environment that say “culture” or “giving” for the Brandcenter web site. Images, short video, graffiti, quotes, found objects, etc…

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Today

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Always Keep These in Mind Users Content Context ContentUsers Document/data types, content objects, volume, metadata, structure… information ecology Business goals, funding, politics, culture, technology, resources, constraints Audience, tasks, needs, information seeking behavior, experience

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Let’s start with users Users Audience, tasks, needs, information seeking behavior, experience

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved The way we’d like it to be 1.User Asks Question 2.Something Happens 3.User Receives Answer Reminded me of…

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved But what’s wrong with this model? 1.User Asks Question 2.Computer does something 3.User Receives Answer

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Common Information Needs The right thing A few good things Need it again “refinding” Everything - exhaustive research from M&R, p. 35  exploratory seeking  known-item seeking

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Additional Dimensions Not necessarily involving computers! Retrospective vs. prospective Focused vs. unfocused vs. serendipitous Finding information vs. finding people

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Basic Building Blocks of Information Seeking Behavior 1.Searching 2.Browsing 3.Asking

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved User, Task, Context Characteristics of the User –Expert vs. layman –Current state of knowledge –… Characteristics of the Task –Duration and scope of need –Complexity of the task –… Additional context –Requirement for specific sources –Reference to external events –…

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Relevance The property of how “good” the information is –Harder to pin down than you think! –Complex function of user, task, and context Types of relevance: –Topical relevance: is it about the right thing? –Task-based relevance: does it help in what I’m doing? –Utility: is it actually useful?

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Q0 Q1 Q2 Q3 Q4 Q5 A sketch of a searcher… “moving through many actions towards a general goal of satisfactory completion of research related to an information need.” Picking Berries Marcia J. Bates. (1991) The Berry-Picking Search: User Interface Design. In M. Dillon, editor, Interfaces for Information Retrieval and Online Systems: The State of the Art. New Jersey: Greenwood Press.

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Information Foraging Theory Analogy: human information seekers behave like foragers in hunter-gatherer society Wikipedia: “informavores” constantly make decisions on what kind of information to look for, whether to stay at the current site to try to find additional information or whether they should move on to another site, which path or link to follow to the next information site, and when to finally stop the search Information scent, information snacking Implications for system design? Peter Pirolli and Stuart Card. (1999) Information Foraging. Psychology Review, 106(4):

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Robert S. Taylor. (1962) The Process of Asking Questions. American Documentation, 13(4), Taylor’s Model The visceral need (Q1)  the actual, but unexpressed, need for information The conscious need (Q2)  the conscious within-brain description of the need The formalized need (Q3)  the formal statement of the question The compromised need (Q4)  the question as presented to the information system

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Taylor’s Model and IR Systems Visceral need (Q 1 ) Conscious need (Q 2 ) Formalized need (Q 3 ) Compromised need (Q 4 ) IR System Results naïve users Question Negotiation

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Mizzaro’s Model RIN 0 PIN 0 PIN m r0r0 r1r1 q0q0 … q1q1 q2q2 q3q3 rnrn qrqr Real information needs (RIN) = visceral need Perceived information needs (PIN) = conscious need Request = formalized need Query = compromised need Stefano Mizzaro. (1999) How Many Relevances in Information Retrieval? Interacting With Computers, 10(3),

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Observations about Users Users don’t read Users don’t scroll Users are easily lost Users are easily frustrated Users are strangely persistent Users are different! - so we have different ways of organizing things.

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Organization of Information Probably as old as writing itself Many different approaches: –Library and Information Science: thesauri, indexing, etc. –Computer Science: knowledge representations –Cognitive Science: how do humans grasp concepts? –Philosophy: epistemology (“the nature of knowledge”) –…

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved “Exact” Systems Alphabetical Chronological Geographical Organizational (for Intranets) Based on any inherent attribute of entities

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved “Inexact” (ambiguous) Systems Topic Task User Metaphors Hybrid Organizational (in general) Process Based on any inherent attribute of entities, interpreted

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Hierarchical Organization Systems of organization are mostly hierarchical –Represents a specific mode of thinking: reductionistic, decompositional, general-to-specific Why? –“Natural order” –Convention and familiarity –Physical limitations –Cognitive limitations Hierarchies are everywhere: –Human organizations –Computer file systems –Physical file systems –Biological organisms

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Depth vs. Breadth “shallow but wide” “narrow but deep” What are the tradeoffs?

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Non-Hierarchical Systems Hypertext Social tagging

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Hypertext Direct links between different information segments –Pre-dates the Web –Borges, The Aleph

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Social Tagging del.icio.us flickr YouTube Brandtags.net

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Ideas in Tension Does a hierarchical organization system defeat the entire point of hypertext? Does social tagging eliminate the need for organization systems?

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Personas

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved What are Personas? “A summary representation of the system’s intended users, often described as real people. Any project can have one or more personas, each representing a different kind of audience of the system. Also known as user profiles, user roles, audience profiles.” They describe a site’s target users.

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Why bother? They help us remember that actual people will be using the site. They help focus the design to support the kinds of things that people will be doing on the site. The process of creating them may reveal things we wouldn’t have though of otherwise. They help capture user needs and create a framework for making decisions about the architecture and design.

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved And now Mark reads… What the bleep is a buyer persona Create and satisfy demand: two tools to complete the marketing loop

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved People Have names Have motivations and needs Don’t exist in a vacuum when they’re not on the site Use the site within a context of expectation.

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Descriptions “Emma is a graduate student looking for a credit card.” Useful to an bank with an online presence?

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Descriptions “Emma is a new graduate student who enjoys traveling. She’s looking for a bank that can provide personal checking as well as alternatives that will work anywhere around the world. She’s had a checking account before, but isn’t very experienced financially. She’s going to the bank tomorrow to open an appropriate account.”

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Descriptions “Emma is 25 years old, a new graduate student who enjoys traveling nationally and internationally, and who is very comfortable with technology. She’s looking for a bank that can provide personal checking as well as alternatives that will work anywhere around the world. She’s had a checking account before, but isn’t very experienced financially. She’s going to the bank tomorrow to open an appropriate account.”

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Project

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Personas Project - due next week Three teams - each will: 1.develop a web or interactive concept that targets you and your peers - describe the function/purpose/features of the site - from the point of view of the site owner (ie: a bank trying to encourage graduate students to do online banking with them, a custom bike shop, etc). 2.develop a set of three personas based on anticipated users and user types 3.do some real-world research - interviews, questions, online information sources, etc. to collect at least a little real data to add to your assumptions 4.usefully document the personas 5.present to the class (about 10 minutes or more if needed), based on sample agenda on p. 40 of the Dan Brown book.

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved Personas Project - let’s start in class FORM THREE TEAMS (4, 4, and 3) - you’ll need to meet, so make sure you’re able to 1.develop a web or interactive concept that targets you and your peers - describe the function/purpose/features of the site - from the point of view of the site owner (ie: a bank trying to encourage graduate students to do online banking with them, a custom bike shop, an online music store, etc). Make it specific. Companies have names too.

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved For next time

Mark Avnet © 2008 all rights reserved For next time 1.Complete group Persona project for presentation 2.Read MR chapters 4 & 5 3.Weekly coolest thing - keep it focused on advertising/marketing (with or without some level of interactivity). Be ready to lead the class in talking about: Why is it cool? What’s the insight?