The Information Architecture of Emergency Response

Now that I have been accepted into the Pratt Institute Masters of Library and Information Science program, I have started a journey to document the convergence between two of my favorite disciplines, Geographic Information Systems and Information Architecture. In the past few months, I've noticed an explosion of conferences and meetups addressing the geolocational aspects of digital applications for the web and especially mobile. I am a member of 16 different Meetup groups, eight of which address some aspect of the User Experience umbrella, four of which specialize in mapping and/or GIS, two somewhat general technology groups and two more that approach these disciplines from the fascinating perspectives of digital semiotics and data visualization and infographics. Each have hosted topics on user experience and location based design at some point. Many maddeningly scheduled for the same evening.

Commiserating with some of my colleagues with whom I helped create the NYC GeoSymposium 2001-2011-2021 back in November, we have found that in each of our practices, cartographers, GIS specialists and those working with visualizing location based information are finding a great need for design assistance. This seems natural, if somewhat belated and perhaps even surprising. Think of some of the most beautifully designed images and one must of course reflect on the maps of National Geographic magazine, those gorgeous squares of folded paper that come in every issue. Certainly, there is a longstanding sensibility around the design of useful and pleasing maps. Increasingly, these maps are in our hands on tablets and smart phones, so optimizing the display of information that used to be represented in enormous, rolled or folded pieces of paper is a challenge for our community.

Let's Talk About Maps

So I am doing my part in continuing this discussion of the place for design in online mapping. In March, I presented a talk in New Orleans at the 2012 IA Summit on The Information Architecture of Emergency Response. The presentation explored the evolution of technology in emergency response, with a special focus on advances in geographic systems, incident management, social media and policy in New York City since September 11, 2001. In it, I cover questions like:

• What technologies do emergency responders in NYC use?
• How have events like 9/11 and other incidents influenced technology advances?
• What effect, if any, has the change from a Law Enforcement Mayor to a Media Mayor had on data policy?
• What are the challenges and opportunities of open government data?
• How is social media being used in NYC and elsewhere to engage the public in emergency preparedness and response?
• And, finally, are app contests and hackathons an effective way to improve public services in difficult economic times?

I reprised the presentation, modified somewhat for an emergency responder audience for the Office of Emergency Management's annual Women's History Month Breakfast, where I had the pleasure of sharing the stage with Dr. Irene Osborne of Mount Sinai Hospital, who treated patients' internal injuries during the Haiti earthquake, and IA Institute founder and Development Manager, Bev Corwin, who presented on language translation in crisis situations, in particular a handheld Creole language translation device that she developed with colleagues at Carnegie Mellon University.

Continuing the Discussion

I have been asked to present another redux of Information Architecture of Emergency Response at the IxDA NYC's July meetup. I hope to conclude the IxDA with a Town Hall discussion of how the IA community can support emergency response efforts throughout each of our own neighborhoods. I ran out of time in New Orleans and would like to get a good conversation going with the UX community on issues and ideas for further exploration. My daughter's 6th grade graduation is June 7, so I will be missing the IxDA meeting that focuses on the Social Lives of Maps, with UX designer Ray Cha and Green Map's Thomas Turnbull. But I understand the GIS community will have someone there. If you attend, please introduce yourself to Jack Eichenbaum, who founded GISMO, a 20+ year old, NYC-based GIS user group. In the meantime, stay tuned for RSVP information for the July event.

It may also be interesting for my UX friends to hear (as I've heard through the grapevine) that ESRI, leader in GIS software, is developing an internal UX practice and should be hiring soon.

Slide decks of my IA of Emergency Response talks are now available at Slideshare:

March 23:

Information Architecture of Emergency Response

View more presentations from Noreen Whysel

March 28:

OEM Presentation - IA and Emergency Response

View more presentations from Noreen Whysel

Open Government Forum at Internet Week NYC

Over the next couple of days I am going to post summaries of Internet Week sessions that I attended last month. Here is the first, a panel on open government in NYC:

In June, I attended a panel on Open Goverment in NYC, hosted by Time Warner as part of Internet Week NYC. I joined my friend, Queens Community Board 3 member, Tom Lowenhaupt, who has been advocating for a .NYC top level domain for over ten years. Given some of the road blocks he has faced in his campaign, I knew attending an Open Government forum with him would be interesting.

Presented in a panel format, the event focused on Setting the Digital Standard for open government. NYC Deputy Mayor for Operations Stephen Goldsmith introduced Jesse Hempel, a senior writer for Fortune Magazine, who moderated a panel of experts in government information technology including:

• Adam Sharp, CEO, Twitter
• Carol Post, Commissioner, NYC Department of Information Technology and Telecommunications (DoITT)
• Rachel Sterne, Chief Digital Officer, NYC
• Seth Pinsky, President, NYC Economic Development Corporation

Commissioner Post opened with a brief description of the city's plans for a digital roadmap, including a range of web 2.0 tools that allows the City to to communicate and join with citizens to make a better city, break through hardened boundaries between people, neighborhoods, agencies, etc. "The fundamental responsibility of government being to allow access to information," she said.

I Joined Google+ Today

I appear to be a late joiner to Google+, if the list of people in my contact's circles are any indication. It appears to have pulled my info from LinkedIn and has features of Facebook and a very interesting what if discussion among designers going on. I expect it will be a similar experience to LinkedIn and Facebook, perhaps with less of the silliness of Facebook but with similar features, such as Circles which lets you categorize people into groups. 

Just like Facebook, only better.

I've always liked that Facebook lets you group people. It's so natural. I tend to get frustrated by LinkedIn's degrees of separation - you are either in someone's network or you have someone or a chain of people between you and the other person. In a way this is nice because you are still able to contact people in your second network while preserving how you know that person (so and so's friend). Without a grouping feature, once you accept a person to your network on LinkedIn, you lose information about how you are connected to your new contact, unless you go to their page to see shared contacts.

Circles makes Google+ more personal and organized than LinkedIn. It is also more spare, sort of like the defunct Facebook Lite, but I'm witholding judgement for now. Facebook ended up dropping its Lite feature, and I suspect Google will eventually add in Facebook-like distractions and ads, since advertising is their ballywick.

If you are interested in learning more, let me know and I'll invite you to my Circle.

How Did the Internet Change Networking?

In response to a LinkedIn discussion thread about how the internet changed networking, I had the following to say:

I'll state up front that I'm in a field (information architecture) that is heavy user of social media and I have been involved in internet technology since I was at the College in the 80s. I have been networking frequently on the internet since 1997. Starting with AOL and Compuserv chat rooms, then Usenet and Yahoo! group type affiliations and then virtual meetups on Fast Company and other social networking pioneers.

The impact of the internet on networking is immediate, cheap and global.

The internet makes it easier to connect, increasingly in real time with tools like IM, Skype and Twitter and related apps built directly within the social networking site. I'm in NYC and with AOL Instant Messenger, I know when a colleague is away from his computer in Panama City. With Twitter, I know what a friend in London had for lunch and whether a group is meeting at a Thai restaurant in Tribeca later this evening. TripIt tells me if a certain user experience blogger I like is planning on attending the IA Summit in Memphis, and if I want I can send her an In-message via LinkedIn to see if she plans to attend a particular conference session.

The internet also makes it cheaper. There has never been so many free ways to contact people. I had a year long project with a colleague in Stuttgart. We connected exclusively on Skype and used online groupware software and FTP to manage the project. If I wanted to bring in another person for the project, I have access to several email lists and social networks.

The internet also makes time disappear in a way that is disconcerting. There is so much online to read, and in my field the most interesting stuff is published online, linked from Twitter or the IAI-members discussion list. It's hard to keep up. And with immediate the feedback of social networking sites, it's hard to pull away.

I do go to conferences and meetups, but I find myself choosing my F2F networking opportunities very carefully, because there are so many interesting opportunities in my field. Sometimes, it's the social networking sites where I find out about a workshop or lecture of interest. At one recent lecture, the speaker made a joke about how we are so tied up with Facebook that we need subway ads for Dentyne chewing gum to remind us how to be friends. But at this same meeting I could point to several dozen people whom I had followed via blogs and twitter, with whom I've had IM conversations very recently. and with whom I could essentially carry on an already ongoing conversation.

It's kind of bizarre. I met my German colleague in person at the IA Summit in Las Vegas, after we had been working together for many months. It was my first IA Summit and I didn't know many people well, so I mused that he was already my best friend in the room and we hadn't even met. It really changes your perspective on the big room full of people. If I'm feeling shy and can't find someone to chat with, I could conceivably twitter my whereabouts and get a response from someone over by the crudité table.

Knowledge Management and Social Networks

While trolling the Social Networks board at Ryze I discovered a couple of interesting links to articles on Knowledge Management and Social Networks which was the topic I was pursuing and a side link on Weblogs as Filing Cabinets, both posted on Dave Pollard's How to Save the World blog.