World IA Day Switzerland is an annual one-day conference celebrating Information Architecture. Listen to fabulous Swiss and international speakers and meet other IA and UX maniacs.
No matter if you are new to Information Architecture or an experienced professional, let's get together and share the ways Information Architecture makes a difference in our lives.
What is Information Architecture?
Information Architecture (IA) are structures that we use to make sure that the information people need is easy to find and to understand. So when you use a website, a mobile application or go into a store and you can find what you need and everything makes sense, that means the information architecture is doing its job.
What is World IA Day?
World IA Day connects the world through Information Architecture. World IA Day is a free one-day annual conference organized by the Information Architecture Institute and held simultaneously in dozens of cities across the world. More infos: 2016.worldiaday.org
Who is the WIAD for?
Information architects, user experience designers, business owners, content specialists, developers and all you web enthusiasts.
Speakers
Abby Covert
Independent Information Architect, New York USAAbby is living and working in New York City. She specializes in delivering a collaborative information architecture process and teaching those that she works with along the way. She speaks and writes under the pseudonym Abby the IA, focusing on sharing information architecture content with those working within the design and technology communities. She is the author of "How to Make Sense of Any Mess" a book about information architecture for everybody.
Natacha Hennocq
Orange, Paris FRANatacha Hennocq is currently UX design strategist in the French Design team for the Orange multi-platform services. While she is mainly self-taught in her interactive design and information architecture skills, her formal training is an unusual blend of neurophysiology, evolutionary biology, theoretical ecology, photography and design. As always, she is quite enthusiastic about sharing, whether it concerns design, creativity or science.
Luca Mascaro
Sketchin, Manno (TI)Luca Mascaro is a designer, a strategist, an entrepreneur. In his 15+ years of professional experience, he has been inspired by sci-fi, architecture, Japanese culture and human experiences. He founded Sketchin in 2006 to meet a challenge: mould a world where people can live experiences over their expectations. In his time at Sketchin, he has worked with clients that range from start-ups to global brands like Google, Ebay, Yahoo, Moleskine, Eni and Swisscom.
Zahida Huber
Liip, ZürichZahida just started a new job as a Service Designer at Liip where she helps to improve the services the company offers to its employees. Five years ago she helped building up a UX team and implementing UX into the development process. In-between she went on an adventure and took an a UX job in an insurance company. An experience very different from everything she has done so far.
Indre Grumbinaite
Yaay, BaselIndre Grumbinaite (born in 1986 in Vilnius, LT) is an information designer, illustrator and co-founder of YAAY Visualising Complexity, information design studio specialized in analysis, storytelling and visualization based in Basel since 2011. She is also working at FHNW HGK Visual Communication Institute / The Basel School of Design as a research assistant, mentor and drawing instructor.
Konstantin Weiss
iA inc., ZürichKonstantin is lead information architect at iA inc. He combines needs, forms and functions, which often results in cross-channel experiences. Konstantin has been consulting for online stores, news publishers, and big data applications. Since formulating the Container Model principles, Konstantin explores the power of container based information architecture. He shares his research and prototypes in writing and speaking.
Oleg Lavrovsky
Datalets, BernOleg is a software engineer specialising in connecting web and mobile apps and collaboration platforms to diverse information services. Grounded in scalable architecture, agile engineering and beautiful code, he aims to accelerate startups and innovative projects with open data and open systems, support decisions with visualization, and help solve human problems with usable and sustainable technology.
Philipp Murkowsky
Puzzle IT, BernPhilipp lives, works and teaches in Berne, the capital city of Switzerland. He is the head of Puzzle ITC's User Experience Team and specialises in creating concepts and user interfaces for complex enterprise applications. He shares his knowledge by training interaction designers at the School of Visual Arts in Berne.
Anna Wiederkehr
Independent, AarauAnna is an American visualization designer. Her background is in multimedia journalism and her work spans across branding, design research and narrative data visualization. She has built digital experiences for Google, Facebook and Mozilla and worked on social change projects for organizations like Human Rights Watch. She is now pursuing her Masters at ZHdK.
Ron Hyams
Lean Information, BernRon Hyams founded LEAN INFORMATION in 2013 to help companies use their information for competitive advantage. Ron gained experience in information management working at companies such as Swiss Re, Chemtura and Roche. Ron holds an Executive MBA in Media & Communication from University of St. Gallen. He is a dual Swiss and USA citizen.
Michael Zimmermann
dotpulse, ZürichMichael works as a Interaction designer at dotpulse in Zürich. Following graduation he continued to work as a freelancer for startups and larger agencies such as Panter in Zürich while traveling and collecting inspiration from everyday life. After a few years as a freelancer and a stint as a digital nomad he’s immersing himself in Zürichs UX community. Few things excite him more than learning and problem solving through collaboration and design sprints.
Program
Use our official hashtags #wiadch and #WIAD16 for Twitter and Instagram.
Download Program
Friday, Feb 19
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13:15 Registration – Doors open
Grab your name tag, meet old friends, new friends and sharpen your pencil.
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13:30 - 17:30 Workshop «Information Architecture for Everyone»
Abby CovertNo matter what your job or mission in life: if you are working with other people you are dealing with information architecture. Information Architecture is the way that we arrange the parts of something to make it understandable. Whether it is determining the labels for your products and services or creating navigational systems to help users move through a complex ecosystem of marketing channels, everybody architects information.
The concepts one has to understand to practice information architecture thoughtfully are not hard to learn or based on expensive tools. In fact they are tools and concepts we at the Information Architecture Institute think everybody should know. This half day workshop is meant to introduce the concepts of IA and give you confidence in practicing IA yourself.
You don't need to bring a laptop. It's post-its time!
Saturday, Feb 20
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10:30 Registration – Doors open
Grab your badges, meet old friends, make new friends and prepare for our awesome lineup.
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11:00 Welcome
Howdy from team WIAD Switzerland.
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11:15 Opening Keynote – Architects Everywhere
Abby CovertWithin the user experience industry, information is architected by information architects as much as by people who hold titles like designer, developer, content strategist and researcher. Outside of our industry, information is also architected by business owners, marketers, teachers, writers, policymakers, parents and children.
Establishing language and structures that make sense to others is at the center of how we communicate effectively. The way we organize our world to reach our intended audience is more than a job skill or expertise. Information architecture is a life skill that can be applied to any medium you might be working in.
Without a name for this important practice, finding guidance is difficult, especially for those outside the UX field. With a name, people can find the guidance they need to get better at information architecture. In this opening keynote Abby Covert challenges us to share the responsibility of making sense with everyone regardless of title and experience. -
12:00 Ok, Information Is Everywhere, How Do We Really Deal with It?
Natacha HennocqOne of the challenges about information everywhere is not so much about the sheer quantity of information out there, but the ways that we are in contact with it. We talk a lot about sense-making, but recent research in neurophysiology brings a fresh look at memory and how the brain handles place-making; knowing where things are in real life and virtual spaces. We process neural information and synthesize it to allow us to navigate threedimensional space. These spatial representations not only help us to memorize, but, in fact, they affect how we reason. We have to know where we have been in order to know where we are now. So, when working on multi-channel services, how can we provide users with coherent space-making bricks.
Brain systems for navigation and brain systems for memory share a common infrastructure. When building a filing system we have to take into account the physical and mental navigations that are associated with it. Because infoglut is the context of our current work, what tools can we devise, expanding on domain modelling and storytelling, that can help us create sense and space-making bricks for the users? -
12:30 Lunch
Lunch is at your own expense. We organized a burger truck that sells yummy burgers right in front of the venue during lunch break. There are also a few restaruants and a supermarket nearby.
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13:45 Newspapers are dead? Long live the content!
Luca MascaroIn the last 5 years the way in which we inform ourselves every day has radically changed. A progressive evolution of the experience of discovery, use, and sharing of content is being generated by an ever-expanding and specialized availability of contents, different points of view, news technologies and devices at affordable costs, largely available connectivity and, more generally, the advent of new global platforms of communication. Sketchin has invested three years in attempting to understand readers and their experiences, thus identifying 11 behavioral trends that are potentially decisive in implementing a more efficient publishing design. The speech will focus in these 11 behaviors and on the evolution of how the publishing industry can better devise and distribute content.
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14:15 Between Graphic Design and Information Architecture
Indre GrumbinaiteWith a deep belief that there is a need for more structured information, we collaborate with variety of experts; not all of them are present in the debate of information architecture. They have an urge to provide access to information to larger public and our responsibility is to bring structure, as well as to communicate in beautiful and sustainable manner. Indre will talk about approaching a data visualization process through analyzing information and making sense out of it. This talk looks at the information architecture debate from a practical point of view on both analog and digital applications.
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14:45 Lightning Talks
Buckle up, 4 x 5 minutes full of insights and theories!
Information Fragmentation in Enterprise Applications
Philipp Murkowsky
Is Our Willingness to Share Killing Our Creativity?
Michael Zimmermann
Information Environments
Anna Wiederkehr
Efficient Information Everywhere
Ron Hyams
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15:20 Coffee break
Grab a snack and a coffee and look out for our goodies from our global sponsors.
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15:45 IA in The Context of Open Data
Konstantin Weiss & Oleg LavrovskyWhat is the intersection between information architecture and open data concepts and initiatives? Interconnecting and distributing, making accessible and reusing content and functionality is at the heart of both realms. Thus, it is only a matter of time until we information architects will use the mightiness of open data structures and its accessibility. Likewise, open data specialists will use our ability of sensemaking, our knowledge and our services within their concepts. In this talk, we would like to show how the basics of open data and IA play together. We will highlight opportunities arising from such a collaboration and highlight it through examples from the Internet of Things and Data Journalism.
In this talk, you will learn why open data initiatives and information architecture converge to build strong ties, how to use open data as an Information Architect for your products, projects and clients, and business models around open data and IA. -
16:15 Designing a Culture of Responsibility
Zahida HuberZahida works in a company that wants to get rid of management. All employees should have the same responsibility for the company. They should be made the architects of the company. But how should this work with 130 people spread over four locations, speaking different languages and having different goals and wishes? In a series of interviews she researched what people’s fears and hopes are about these plans.
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16:45 Goodbye
Raffle and a whole lot of Thank Yous
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17:00 – 19:00 Füürabebier in the Foyer ZHdK
Let's have a drink! Free beer for everyone! Es het, solangs het.
Workshop
Information Architecture for Everyone
Abby Covert
Date: February 19th, 13:30-17:30
Venue: Neue Zürcher Zeitung, Falkenstrasse 11, Zürich
Tickets: 200.-
No matter what your job or mission in life: if you are working with other people you are dealing with information architecture. Information Architecture is the way that we arrange the parts of something to make it understandable. Whether it is determining the labels for your products and services or creating navigational systems to help users move through a complex ecosystem of marketing channels, everybody architects information.
The concepts one has to understand to practice information architecture thoughtfully are not hard to learn or based on expensive tools. In fact they are tools and concepts we at the Information Architecture Institute think everybody should know. This half day workshop is meant to introduce the concepts of IA and give you confidence in practicing IA yourself.
Venues
Conference
Zürcher Hochschule der Künste ZHdK, Toni Areal
Pfingstweidstrasse 94
8005 Zürich
From Zürich Main Station take
- Tram 4 to «Toni Areal» (stops right in front of the venue)
Workshop
Neue Zürcher Zeitung NZZ
Falkenstrasse 11
8008 Zürich
From Zürich Main Station take
- Tram 4 or 11 to «Opernhaus» (stops right in front of the venue)
- S-Bahn to «Bahnhof Stadelhofen» (3 minute walk)
Hotels
For all our attendees, travelling from far away, we can recommend you the 25hours and ibis hotel, both located close to Saturday's venue (and Friday evening's Fondue dinner). And of course, there are also lots of Airbnb offers in the city.
Team
Questions about this event? Get in touch