Insights curated by Experientia, the international UX consultancy
Insights curated by Experientia, the international UX consultancy
To prepare students for an evolving information-based society, architects are designing innovative schools to support new models of teaching and learning. Read full story (Related story: Students at Roy Lee Walker Elementary School don’t just study textbooks to learn about…
Axel Soojung-Kim Pang, research director at the Institute for the Future and lead blogger of the Institute’s Future Now website sent me some thoughts on how the isolated, autonomous science city has now been displaced by the model of…
Ethiopia, one of Africa’s poorest countries, is spending one tenth of its GDP every year on IT. Over the next five years, the government plans to invest more than $100m (£56m) in public sector computers. It aims to equip hundreds…
Recent experiences in the struggle against terrorism have shown not only what a critical role the public plays in preventing and responding to crises, but also the importance of a widely available tool the public can use to prevent terrorist…
John Thackara, director of Doors of Perception, just posted a critical comment on how the EU’s innovation and research programmes put an emphasis on tech rather than on people. For instance, the EU’s Information Society Technologies programme contains, according to…
San Francisco’s Department of Elections has become very interested in usability issues of voting quipment. Recently, the department had usability expert Scott Luebking come in to provide the staff some basic training on usability and voting equipment. The training included…
Does design have a role in implementing social policy and addressing political challenges? In an informal debate on “Design and Social Policy”, the July meeting of AIGA Experience Design in London weighed up just how far designers should be engaged…
Moving beyond recycling to preventing garbage itself as the next generation of social and civic responsibility, Seattle Public Utilities is launching an initiative called Wasteless in Seattle. With the long-term goal of “zero waste,” the city hopes to drastically reduce…
As China races toward a more market-driven economy, it is building new theatres, concert halls and museums nearly as fast as it is erecting Western-style shopping malls, hotels and business complexes. But the government is also decentralising control of the…
Digital technology is providing people with the tools to produce and share content like never before, and it is set to throw the relationship between them and institutions into turmoil, say experts. “I am predicting 50 years of chaos,” said…
The British Library recently published “Redefining the Library: The British Library’s strategy 2005 – 2008” and lists as its top 3 strategic priorities: enrich the user’s experience, build the digital research environment, and transform search and navigation.Read more
In his weekly BBC opinion column, Brian Walden considers spin and how it has resulted in politicians losing control of the democratic agenda.Read full story
A series of articles on the current European debate: Meet me in Eumerica for the best of two worlds [International Herald Tribune, 22 June 2005] Grass roots change for Europe (by EU Commissioner Margot Wallström) [International Herald Tribune, 21 June…
A collaboration between the Department of Urban Studies at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the University of Architecture Venice (IUAV), the project uses video-equipped cell phones, PDAs, and location-based technology to deliver multimedia walking tours of lesser-known Venetian neighborhoods.…
This week, the International Telecommunication Union unveiled the Connect the World initiative, with the double goal to push “digital divide” issues to the top of worldwide policy agendas and to connect all communities worldwide by 2015. Founding members include Alcatel…
Last week was not a great time to unveil a new pan-European initiative. Yet the programme is an important source of funding for IT-based innovations in public services. It is aimed not at putting services online (most already are)…
The main topic in March 2005 was a mid-term review of the ongoing Lisbon agenda, which could lead to a reform of the whole process. It was Europe’s aim to become the most dynamic and competitive knowledge-based economy in…
“Digital media have not only made in-roads in the way visual artists, musicians, designers, film makers and other cultural practitioners work – they have created a new context”. Michiel Schwarz’s insightful Dutch policy paper on “e-culture”, that has just…
The Chinese government intends to build 1,000 new museums across the country by 2015. A scary piece by Elizabeth Casale in The Platform, an e-zine on cultural policy, says that China’s “place-based cultural strategy” is leading to a glut of…
Designers look into the future to meet people’s needs. Design for Future Needs is a research project that discovered how their methods can help policy makers do the same. The 2002 project, run for the EC by a group of…