The need for a new term
In April 2000, more than 350 luminaries and scholars of computer science, communications and information technology gathered from around the world at the meeting of the American Society for Information Science (ASIS) in Boston. The subject of the meeting was an emerging field that the participants gave the temporary name "information architecture". The talks and questions raised showed that most actors of the IT field are searching for ways to define their work better and more precisely. It is interesting that the term "information architect" has been put forward recently as an independent profession, and many prefer it to "information scientist". The above event heralds the appearance of new interdisciplinary fields. In the coming century one perhaps cannot keep the customary boundaries between the sciences as they were in the industrial age. The growth of metaphorical approaches in the age of information's dominance has prepared the ground for an attention to the suitability of the methodology of certain sciences to these new fields.
Architecture is a field of human knowledge in which the process of solving the problem requires considering many varied aspects and managing matters of great complexity. From this point of view, the comparison of the working method of architecture with that of information technology is not accidental. These two fields have countless concepts to lend each other, and the metaphorical title "information architecture" goes far beyond a simple, surface resemblance. Information architecture covers a range of fields — from data analysis and electronic library science to the graphic design of websites, from computer science and technical relations to anthropology and the engineering of human-computer interaction. Anything that can be conceived in connection with information technology fits inside this domain. The job-search website Monster.com lists more than 189 job positions under the heading of information architecture.
Architecture and the connection of three spaces
If architecture is defined by the functional and aesthetic relations between actual activities and the bodies that suit them, information architecture is defined by the relations among three spatial environments: 1) Mind. 2) Real world. 3) Network. Information architecture brings these three environments together and defines the relations among them. Today we are witnessing the birth of a new field of which there was no antecedent. This new spatial field, which has a direct relation with the Internet and the World-Wide Web, makes us look afresh at the relations among environments — physical, mental and virtual — that we have long been used to using.
If we accept that information architecture is the simultaneous management of physical, mental and virtual spaces, the question becomes: where and how do these spaces interact? If the question of information architecture were merely the software used by the computer, the only task would be the simple judgement of whether or not a programme suits the intended end. But information architecture deals with a complex spatial structure that has become unavoidable in the contemporary period. The question now is how to think about that space. One cannot say that the duty of the architect is the same as that of the information-processing specialist; but, undoubtedly, architects can play an important role in shaping new spaces for the human being who finds himself at the contact-point of three spatial environments.
Architecture and the connection of mental spaces
The complex virtual space of networks is now within everyone's reach. The virtual space of networks is taking shape as a kind of territory between the mind and the world, and at the same time as a new connection between the private minds of individuals. The mind of one person is connected to the minds of others through virtual space. Virtual space — which in one sense resembles the human nervous system, sitting beneath the skin of culture — is also a space, since it has an inside and an outside (transmitted vs. not transmitted), and a multi-layered depth (depth of connection and multiplicity of texts).
The management of this new space requires a new profession. Just as architecture deals with the construction of real places for the activities of people in face-to-face presence, information architecture deals with the building of connections, the design of forms and patterns, and collaboration in networks. Architecture is an answer to the development of space in perspective; information architecture is an answer to the electronic explosion of space, time and architecture. A convergence between the design of real space and the design of information space is taking shape through the medium of computer technology.
Architecture and the design of cybernetic spaces
Many experts believe in the creation of a profession called the architecture of cybernetic spaces — "cybertecture". The etymology of the word "architect" shows that the word is composed of two Greek concepts: arkhe, meaning first or chief, and tekton, meaning carpenter or builder. This means that architects are "the chief builders". By replacing archi with cyber the building element is preserved, while a new domain of construction is given. The duty of the cybertect is to create reliable paths and useful environments inside virtual space and at the threshold between virtual space and real space. The term "connected architecture" also fits, since this kind of architecture brings two domains together. The connecting architecture addresses three areas of skill: the thresholds between real and virtual space, the construction of virtual environments, and the architecture and design of physical spaces affected by the network. As such it is positioned at the intersection of architecture, computer science and human–machine interaction.
Information architecture and the criteria of critique — Vitruvius and the three principles
The endurance of the three Vitruvian principles — solidity (firmness), utility, and beauty — throughout the history of architecture confirms their authenticity. The experience of producers and users of architecture has always confirmed these principles. Buildings are not built only as solid and useful places for work and rest; they are also a sight to behold. Vitruvius drew attention to many of the proportions among masses and the geometry of buildings, and showed that the final perception of a building is determined through what is seen. This visual inclination, deeply rooted in the unconscious of the human being, is challenged by the imagistic quality of the realities of virtual architecture. The basic question is: do those three Vitruvian principles also hold for the architecture of virtual spaces?
On one side, the natural aspect of these principles dictates their continuity in the space of networks; on the other, the challenging quality of network space requires a re-examination of the way they are applied. The architect of virtual space must not only consider how people will relate to environments connected to real and virtual spaces, but must also — by the Vitruvian principles — build social and guiding environments that are useful, reliable and attractive.
E-topia
Researchers in the field of information architecture have each, in light of their own studies, proposed certain qualities for virtual spaces. For example, William Mitchell suggests five principles under the rubric of E-topia, which can be applied in the design, production, architecture, urban design and planning at regional, civic and global scales:
1) Dematerialisation — replacing large physical objects with smaller equivalents that perform the same function: e.g., the replacement of letters by e-mail (which has eliminated paper consumption), or fibre-optic cables instead of heavy thick wires.
2) Demobilisation — moving bits is plainly more efficient than moving people and goods: e.g., watching a film at home instead of going to the cinema.
3) Mass customisation — by employing information technology, the automatic delivery of goods to the customer, and especially of just what is specifically needed and no more, becomes possible: e.g., requesting a particular newspaper, the timely delivery of fruit and vegetables, the electronic management of bills.
4) Intelligent operation — by placing intelligent controls in water, fuel and electrical-energy systems we can prevent waste and introduce floating pricing strategies that effectively manage demand and encourage thrift: e.g., intelligent irrigation systems, electronic sensors that switch lights on, automatic door-opening, and so on.
5) Soft transformation — in most developed regions, very different needs from those of the past are answered simply by harmonising existing buildings, public spaces and transport infrastructure.
Materiality and reality
The principle of materiality emphasises the value of anchoring the virtual in reality, and that no virtual space exists without practical support, especially where communities and services are at stake. The virtualisation of many human activities produces a kind of dispensability of their physical embodiment; whereas in connection, with face-to-face interaction, the senses of the body together with the brain have the highest information-processing capacity.
Every operation that the network performs gives rise to the construction of a community — a community in the present moment, which does not necessarily mean that it lasts less long than real communities. But the quality and durability of the project that brings such a community into being depend on its anchoring in reality.
Connectedness
Anna Cicognani, professor of architecture at the University of Sydney — who has analysed the similarities and differences between connected and unconnected architecture — recognises four basic elements: materiality, connectedness, speed and control. She points out that just as in the use of a material we apply the physical laws specific to that material, when working with networks we must, with equal rigour, apply the laws of protocol-use. In her reading, materiality means respect for the nature of the material with which one is dealing — that is, recognising the functions of each piece of software and using the capacities of that programme in a coherent way. With regard to connectedness, she likewise states that connected environments need to evoke the senses to the same degree as unconnected environments. For example, in the design of a website for a bank or a university, while the laws of gravity and material strength cannot be applied, spatial orientation and the suitability of types of services certainly affect the usefulness and flexibility of the design.
Utility
The quality of utility in architectural spaces is one of the inherent demands of architectural creation. Virtual spaces equally require a utility and stimulation comparable to that of physical spaces. This principle gives rise to a set of rules for network space that ensure ease and fluency in working with it. For an object in connected architecture — built of information — to be useful, the abilities to store, retrieve, search, analyse, update and edit are essential.
Reliability
Network reliability is an obvious principle, but the matter is not so simple. For example, any user of any version of Windows knows that the reliability of Windows depends on a variety of factors: the system used, both hardware and software, must not only respond to a variety of difficulties, but must also be resistant to human malice — viruses and worms. The continuation of the life of networks is bound to the reliability of the community, and this is possible only if the community keeps its own private and collective sanity. If we do not soon collectively prevail in protecting networks and using them in a sound way — free from harm to hardware and software — we will help spread a mental disease arising from the misuse of our own inventions and innovations. The matter is highly sensitive. The signs of this disease at times of rest, when one cannot connect to the network, may even paralyse those who use it. Our dependence on regular, harm-free access to networked communities is becoming, gradually, like dependence on narcotics — with the difference that access to the network is a right and is regarded as essential.
Simplicity
A simpler language is one that uses fewer primitive elements to reach a definite ability. Sometimes simplicity is mistaken for ease of comprehension. Simplicity is one of the other characteristics of virtual spaces that, by the explanation above, can be measured. From another angle, network spaces should have the capacity for development and updating, but this does not mean that they should be modular (repeatable) in a degraded sense. They should also be resistant to falling out of use and to premature technological death. The Berkeley group, professors of virtual architecture, propose four principles which — were Vitruvius alive — would perhaps be considered equivalent to his principle of beauty: simplicity, modularity (repeatability), tolerance and decentralisation. Simplicity also includes user-friendliness and sociability.
Thomas Horan, the author of Digital Places, proposes five key principles for the successful design of digital places:
1) Design for maximum potential — a digital place should be designed in such a way that it takes advantage of the fluidity of contemporary architectural space, allowing the user to perform daily activities at any time and in any place.
2) Design digital places on the basis of the values of traditional places — for example, public squares.
3) Design alongside architectures that focus on the cooperative relation between electronic exchange (e.g., e-commerce) and physical exchange (e.g., the display of goods).
4) Design for the community — which can greatly increase the opportunities for connecting to varied public networks, both electronically and physically.
5) Design in collaboration — which involves the participation of a wide range of users in the creation of new environments.
Speed and control
Interactivity is the tangible dimension of virtual space. Interactivity gives virtual space a kind of pressure, texture and connection, so that any tool of contact between two environments — even an instantaneous look at an active button — becomes a kind of touch. The requirements of interactivity are real-time response and control. Achieving real-time response is essential. In such an environment the user not only receives services, but designs the process himself. The capacity for the editing of a connected environment depends on the capacity to use tools of contact between two environments and on the responsiveness of the environment to the user. The execution of an instruction is usually instantaneous — depending on the speed of the machine — and its output is immediately observable to the user. The speed of feedback on decisions is an important aspect of the design. In virtual spaces designers can observe the effect of their decisions on the design of digital spaces just as they observe the effectiveness of operations performed in a physical space.
The principle of control is another fundamental requirement of design that guarantees the integrity of connected environments. Control is exercised through ownership and access. Each element has an owner, and only that owner can edit or destroy it. Control and the organisation of digital ownership in virtual spaces is easier than in the physical world. Control is a very powerful tool that can restrict the use of an environment to specific groups of users.
The Cathedral and the Bazaar
The connection in networks is designed on the basis of maximum accessibility. This makes possible the appearance of any conceivable form of human community, including those not yet imagined. The question that arises is: who must control the basic architecture of the Internet?
Eric Raymond has put the case of private control versus public management of operating systems used worldwide beautifully. In an essay that today is the reference point for many planners and philosophers of the Web, he draws a comparison between the cathedral and the bazaar. Unlike those who consider the cathedral to be the product of successive generations of unnamed builders, he sees it as the symbol of a centralised power that benefits all by imposing a single standard. He says that he initially believed in the cathedral model. With the start of a project based on free and open-source technology — Fetchmail — which, contrary to expectation, advanced successfully, his view changed. Hackers and programmers from everywhere began to use it and to debug it. The Linux community resembles a vast, busy bazaar made up of varied agendas, from which a stable and coherent system beautifully emerges. All networks are designed to be intelligent and to maximise connection, but networks completed by their own users mark a new revolutionary stage in the design of environments.
Community-building
If we create virtual spaces in which meaningful emotional relations occur only with environments in which we feel our own meaningful presence, will we still be able to choose and design realities in which others can participate and grow? This question raises the necessity of creating virtual spaces with a community-building quality.
Mark Surman and Darren Wershler, the authors of the book Common Space, hold that the differences in virtual spaces are due to the people present in them rather than to the technology used in them. They support their view with a list of seven points: 1) Collectivity is the salient face of the Internet — its essential difference from previous media lies in the role it grants to people; millions of people connected to one another invent communities, gestalts of information, connected intelligence, the collective mind, open source, and anything else that comes to mind. 2) Connected to the network we are always larger than the sum of our parts; common space is the direct result of cooperation. 3) In the economy of common spaces, progress is made by sharing power; sharing power lets us benefit from the success of other users and partners. 4) Mutual benefit builds community and overcomes the dominance of monologue. 5) In network space, fifteen minutes of fame is a better reward than money — in technological efforts the greatest reward is to do clever things and earn the respect of one's colleagues. 6) Technology advances by distribution and dies by being locked up. 7) Revolutionary changes spring from the strangest of places — really new ideas in common spaces rarely come from a laboratory.
Democracy
Some experts hold that virtual space is shaped at exactly the point where the traditional definitions of urban space — a physical site, a historic monument, a street or a square — become inoperable. Today architecture must understand how these forms become inoperable, and why these aspirations toward virtual communities are inoperable in their turn. As one means of mass communication, the value of universal access to a telephone system was demonstrated in spring 1989, when the Chinese government could not prevent the sending of faxes about the events at Tiananmen Square to the outside world.
The virtual space of networks is full of personal interests. At any given moment the ratio of public space to private spaces in e-mail and the other private and public virtual networks is not very different from that in cities. The key principle here is the protection of the right of access and use for all people on the part of governments and the international authorities of the Internet. This is done by maintaining standards, services and protocols, and individually grants users the freedom to put forward personal content in a public domain. Connection is the political essence of new democracy, which requires a clear understanding of its rights and privileges as well as the rights and privileges of community and the safeguarding of personal privacy.
A delicate question, related to the principle of res publica, is the safeguarding of private spheres in the bosom of public freedoms. How can the personal privacy and freedom of action of every "netizen" be preserved? The matter is complex. Networks are becoming a phenomenon present everywhere at the same time and, sooner or later, will be wireless. Politicians may be tempted to control activity among various groups, especially in powerful countries like the United States or France. To resist this temptation and to guarantee public freedoms in virtual space, many electronic foundations have been created.
The choice of method is essentially not political but deeply sociological and psychological. In effect, its socio-political result is the division of psychological space into private subjective mental space and public objective social space. The laws prescribed in one ensure the continuity of the other. The same condition holds for our present situation. One of the key questions to be answered in the coming years in all the planet's successful democracies is whether the existence of a particular individual — privately and as a living substance — will be able to continue inside a networked society.
Information architecture and globalisation — the individual as world
The property of being everywhere at the same time is no less important than the other principles. This property is something new and special about networks. Networks have brought about the abolition of distance. The abolition of distance has appeared in the form of a planet condensed into a single person. This phenomenon is conspicuous in global actors like Bill Gates or Osama bin Laden. Symbolically, one can say that wherever a person is present with his personal computer or mobile telephone, the entire world is present. Two-way access from and to the network gives validity to an important shift in scale that is currently spreading through every place. Globalisation is taking shape not only at the economic level, but, more importantly, at the psychological level.
We are now at the peak of the ubiquity that George Orwell, in his novel 1984, foresaw with darkness and pessimism. Satellite-link systems have not only continentalised Europe but have also gathered up South and North America and the Pacific region. What satellites do is bring closer the geographical and political areas under their influence — not only economically but psychologically. Each day we see our continent on television and so are placed in a state of half-awareness of our neighbours. At the same time the inner psychological territory…
Globalisation and a fitting attitude
For many people, "globalisation" is a dirty word; they naturally resist it, since globalisation appears to mean greater power for the powerful. The Internet is often accused of creating a deep gap between the haves and the have-nots. Judgement on this matter is very hard and complex. But the Internet has, at least potentially, the capacity to operate against that thesis. In the new world, having information is equivalent to having power. From this point of view the fruit of information technology is the distribution of power, not its centralisation. Furthermore, the Internet indirectly enables the members of various cultures and communities — even those who do not have direct access to it — at least to participate, through their representatives, in the international discourse.
We are now in a transitional period of the kind in which Le Corbusier found himself in 1924. We need to think again — not only about the concept of the city, but about the whole world. We must find a way to a global sense through a local community. The challenge of globalisation gives a sense of urgency to this demand among the inhabitants of the planet. Information architecture can do something here. The virtual extension and combination of the built environment gives information architects, for the first time in human history, the possibility of considering a truly global architecture.
The continuity of local communities in the global community
Globalisation, like the development of civility, is moving forward. Mastery over it is no easy matter, but architecture can play a role in it — just as it played a role in the development of civility by making cities safe and habitable. So globalisation must be redefined. Our world is not a vast, uniform mass. The territory in which people use networks is profoundly transformed by the local contexts in which they live. For this reason networks pass through many local situations and yield a varied, heterogeneous fabric.
It seems necessary that some kind of architecture with local characteristics accompany global connected architecture, and that global structures serve common ends. A Japanese-American organisation has under way a project called Green Space that tries to draw an image of the world in the twenty-first century. The aim of the programme is to describe and develop new global relations and information environments for the new century. They picture virtual environments capable of high levels of internal interaction, sensitively empowered to connect the minds of people across the world. The said programme believes in a new model of relations marked by the following: 1) It will help the people of the world to overcome cultural, linguistic and geographical differences. 2) It will accelerate global cooperation in solving comprehensive problems and identify untapped economic opportunities. 3) Through the movement of minds and information across the world at the speed of light, instead of moving mass, it will make relations more efficient and save energy resources.
The Global Village Square
To approach the goals of the global village many ideas have been put forward by experts. One of the most interesting is called the Global Village Square (GVS), which, with little technical investment, will yield the greatest social return. Imagine a public, but covered, place in the city or town in which you live. In this place, communication should be easy and inexpensive, and there should be space for installing large video-screens and the related electronic equipment. Each screen would carry an image and the possibility of video-conferencing simultaneously with another global village square at another point in the world. That other place could be Red Square in Moscow, Times Square in New York or Tiananmen Square in Beijing. Ideally, a network of these squares would exist throughout the world — wherever telecommunications companies decide to provide a free connection.
When people arrive at a place designed for connecting the people of the world, they must be able not only to see one another in real proportions, but to hear the sound from the other side — except for its noisy background. With today's advanced audio-visual equipment this connection is possible. One can easily imagine that crowds will warmly receive this technology and gather around these screens to talk with another group on the other side of the world, in another culture.
The Global Village Square project is like a permanent window between two cities, set up over the oceans. The space created must be able to maintain its effectiveness continuously, even if the work demands considerable expense. This structure is not for special occasions and ceremonies, but the foundation of a real space. People who live at very great distances will, in the end, come to feel that they share a common space — like those who can share the public space of a real park. The Global Village Square is founded in electronics, not in physical space, but it can be considered as enduring as electrical lighting, or at least as natural light. The first project of this kind was a space connecting Melbourne and Toronto. The natural expectation, however, is that one day many cities — even those whose societies are economically and politically struggling — will be linked. This kind of development may one day prove necessary for the establishment and continuity of world peace. Its other major social effect is that countries and peoples who, for political, social or economic reasons, may not yet count themselves part of the global conversation, will be counted in.
Networks and regional collaborations
Another idea for promoting understanding and friendship among nations through information technology is the creation of virtual places based on regional commonalities. Each nation, in addition to its own cultural particularities, belongs to a wider area with similar qualities. Identifying such areas at the global level is not difficult. Western Europe, Latin America, the Far East, the Middle East, and many others, are of this sort. In every city, town and even village inside such a particular community, an actual urban square or another suitable place would be selected and named after the region. This selection would be made by local powers in democratic consultation with the public. The duty of local powers would be to ensure free public access to network connections at the chosen place. An existing building — like the city assembly hall, a public library, a school, a post office or even a local café — would serve as the contact point of the community. As an example, consider the Middle East: the aim is for a stronger sense of a Middle-Eastern community to emerge in every part of the Middle East alongside the necessary diversity of nationalities. Another aim is to encourage the regular access to and use of network relations in every remote corner of the Middle East. The notion of this virtual place for the Middle East — accompanied by a number of real places — combines the virtual and the real, and works in the direction of supporting social and political solidarity beyond a single, vast and varied territory.
Virtual places of this sort depend on two kinds of information: local and continental. The local information is prepared locally by the general public of users and is accessible from every point. The continental information and services — services, news, etc. — would be prepared by central administrations and the management of such virtual spaces. As an example, preparing an archive of literature, the arts and the cultural creations of the countries of the region on the network in digital form will be very useful. This information would be available as the heritage of the entire region. The end result of such networks is the appearance of a kind of sense of identity and belonging — a belonging not only to the country to which one originally belongs, but to a wider area with which one shares undeniable commonalities. By this process no place is out of reach. Our feeling about the oppression imposed on women in Afghanistan, or the genocide perpetrated in some far-flung corner of the world, or the use of children in hard labour, becomes equivalent to the feeling we have for the poor living in the streets where we live. The field of human action is no longer confined to a particular nation.
The role of will and responsibility in destiny
The fundamental question we face at this moment of history is: what are our wishes, and do we want to be answerable to those wishes or not?
While the changes brought about by the spread of information technology are showing themselves in the most remote and least developed regions of the planet, they remain largely unconscious. Many of the concepts of information architecture remain abstract for most people. What is needed is a set of universal, fast, durable, linguistic metaphors, and alongside them metaphors that can be used for the empowerment of culture and the local. This is precisely the point at which a re-examination of architectural concepts is needed. In addition to the resources by which cultural creation can spread the necessary understanding of the equality of all the inhabitants of the earth, information architecture, in particular, will be an effective short- and long-term tool.
In closing, attention to one point is essential. In full awareness of all that is debated in the area of globalisation and the free flow of information, the reality in which we live is not the production and construction of information. Reality comes into being moment by moment from the configuration of feelings to which we have grown accustomed. If we know that the reality in which we live arises through the door of our minds, we know also that we must be able to act in line with that very awareness — in our liking or disliking of reality — to create the reality we live in. In a single word: we must be answerable for what we do, since we ourselves are wholly the doer of it.
Printed English summary panel (PDF 28)
Taking advantage from Derrick Dekerkhove's article, "Architecture of Intelligence" and Robin Peek's speech, "Defining Information" presented at ASIS session 2000, the author attempts to point out the similarities of the methods both used in architecture and Information Technology.
Footnotes: 1. American Society for Information Science. 2. Information Architecture. 3. Information Architect. 4. Information Scientist. 5. Mind. 6. Real World. 7. Network. 8. Cybertecture. 9. Connected Architecture. 10. E-Topia. 11. Dematerialization. 12. Demobilization. 13. Mass customization. 14. Intelligent Operation. 15. Soft Transformation. 16. Materiality. 17. Anna Cicognani has a study of the linguistic nature of virtual space and virtual communities. 18. Utility. 19. Reliability. 20. Private and collective sanity. 21. Simplicity. 22. Modularity. 23. Tolerance. 24. Decentralization. 25. Digital Places. 26. Interactivity. 27. Real-time response. 28. Control. 29. Linux. 30. Open Source. 31. Common Space. 32. Intranet. 33. Protocol. 34. Republica. 35. Netizen. 36. Ubiquitous. 37. Globalization. 38. Ubiquity. 39. Global Actors. 40. Continentalization. 41. International Discourse. 42. GVS — Global Village Square.
Sources cited: Derrick de Kerckhove, "Architecture of intelligence" (http://architecture.openflows.org/); Robin Peek, "ASIS Summit 2000: Defining Information Architecture" (www.findarticles.com).
