Comments on IA Summit 2008, Day 1

Chris Baum — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 18:36:25 GMT

@ Paul – Hallie’s presentation was, unfortunately, not audible on the recorder. We’ve encouraged her to record it again, and we’ll post it for her.

@Rebecca Cox – Claude’s talk was recorded, but it’s very dependent on having the full presentation. He’s provided the presentation here, but I don’t think he’s found a way to synch it with the audio. Zipped it’s 65MB, so no current service can stream it correctly. If I hear that he’s been able to take care of it, I’ll post it here.

Rebecca Cox — Sat, 31 May 2008 09:48:51 GMT

I was really interested in the Blind Ambition talk (Claude Steinberg’s), but haven’t been able to track down any discussion about it online… just wondered how it was received at the conference and if anything’s come out of it?

Paul Trumble — Thu, 29 May 2008 12:31:55 GMT

On a lighter note…

Is there a podcast of Hallie Wilfert’s presentation from Day 1 that is available?

Jeff Parks — Wed, 21 May 2008 21:04:30 GMT

While I agree with your point about users not knowing “back stories”, Rhonda, my hope is that people will simply enjoy the opportunity to hear from presenters at the Summit and to learn more about articles written on Boxes and Arrows through conversation.

I put the iTunes feed in place to make it easy for people to stay up to date with shows when they are published. (So they don’t have to keep returning to the site if they choose not too.) You can also download each show individually, or bookmark them in Delicious so you can find them no matter where your travels may take you.

I know your comments were about the navigation within Boxes and Arrows, but since I came on board to get this up and running not long after their re-design, please contact me off line to discuss a better way to integrate the Podcast into the existing IA, in your opinion, at jefferyparks@gmail.com You can also find me on Skype jeff_parks (Ottawa, Canada)

It has been a thrill for me to be able to interview some of the most creative minds in the fields of IA, UX, and IxDA for Boxes and Arrows, and my own show, over the past couple of years.

It is my hope that the BA Podcast will help to promote the ideas of others and in some small way bridge the divide between professions. In my experience there is a hell of a lot more that binds us than separates us.

Cheers!

rhonda gilligan — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 20:09:19 GMT

In a previous comment, it was stated that posting these podcasts would have the benefit of drawing new people into the conference and association. I’d assume if that was a goal that you’d want to put the most professional foot forward. And I wouldn’t expect a professional IA to need to be paid in order to design usable interfaces with valuable content. I’d expect that to be a given. I think it’s terrific that you got your conference pod casted for the first time, but if you’re only talking to yourselves and making it overly difficult for the rest of us to get the value from them, what’s the point? Of course, I sympathise with Mr. Parks’ personal tragedy and it may well be that his situation mitigates the usability challenges. If your goals were achieved, good for all of you. But users don’t know your back stories, they only know what works and what doesn’t.

Christina Wodtke — Fri, 16 May 2008 14:16:43 GMT

I’m sorry I’m usually more polite than this, but

No one got paid to do this, Jeff Parks has worked in all his spare hours through a personal tragedy to get these up. Rhonda, you are a spoiled git who has no help to offer, just whining.

Sure we could do better, but this is the first time anyone has managed to get the Summit podcasted, and our first time doing it. I’m proud of a team who worked hard when they’d usually have the pleasure of relaxing and learning so more folks could learn from this fine conference. Next time will go more smoothly, I’m sure.

And sonali, if you have the equipment and time to make video podcasts, we’d love to have you join our team to help out. We have made audio available to the speakers so they can create screencasts if they have the time. Some have. I hope you enjoy those.

rhonda gilligan — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 20:06:38 GMT

I would have expected IAs to do a better job including text links in their stories. Your blurb encouraging me to “check out the presentations from ” should be a link to that podcast. When I find “podcasts” in your left nav and click to the page, you organize the individual podcasts by not date even though the sort criteria is labeled “date”, not “day of conference”. Finally, all the descriptions for each day’s casts are the same, so I have no content clue as to what the topics discussed that day might have been in order to determine which ones might be of interest to me. So, I guess in order to “check out the presentation from April 12” I have to first find the link in the nav for podcasts, then figure out which day of the conference (1,2,3, or 4) the 12th was, then take a shot that it might contain something of value or interest to me. Not exactly what would pass muster on my team for usability or content strategy.

Russ Unger — Mon, 12 May 2008 14:10:40 GMT

Go to www.whitneyhess.com/blog for some of the best notes from the conference.

Then follow her on twitter.

—Russ

Jon Hadden — Wed, 21 May 2008 21:05:08 GMT

Hearing the podcasts is not only away to re-live the IA Summit, but also a way to share the knowledge spread to fellow colleagues who were unable to attend. Seeing all the slideshare presentations and following along with the podcasts was invaluable to my team.

I love it guys. Keep up the great work Jeff, Chris and team!

Cheers,
Jon

sonali sridhar — Sun, 11 May 2008 01:00:07 GMT

I wish you guys had made video podcasts – it would have been quite helpful watching what they were referring to…

Chris Baum — Thu, 08 May 2008 06:09:47 GMT

If you visit the IA Summit conference program, some of the presentaitons
are available for download (possibly with notes) or available on slideshare.

http://www.iasummit.org/2008/conference.html

C L — Wed, 07 May 2008 14:20:58 GMT

Are there notes available for any of the presentations?

Jeff Parks — Tue, 06 May 2008 02:35:16 GMT

Hey Joost,

I’m publishing and testing in Fire Fox and have had no issues. I’ve had to record the longer shows like Jared’s and panel discussions at a lower bit rate to keep the file sizes to a reasonable level.

For the short term, you can subscribe to this and all Podcasts for Boxes and Arrows in iTunes. Simply click on the iTunes link at the top of every page. Alternatively, you can download only the shows you want and burn them to a CD or drop them into the MP3 player of your choice.

Apologies for your troubles with the audio in the browser. If you need to discuss this issue in more detail, drop me a note at jefferyparks@gmail.com and I’d be happy to discuss.

Cheers,
Jeff

Joost Verweij — Mon, 05 May 2008 07:53:30 GMT

Good story, but I’d like to report a technical problem in firefox: the audio plays much too fast. It’s allright in Internet Explorer though.

Kind regards,

Joost