Personal InfoCloud

The Information

Not only does the software have to be simple to access information in our Personal InfoCloud (the information that we have stated we want and need near us, but have structured in our personal framework of understanding). We also interact with the Local InfoCloud with is information sources that is familiar to us to which we have set a means of easing interaction (cognitively, physically, or mechanically).

This "intelligence" that Ballmer refers to is information in the form of data. It needs to be structured to make solid use of that information in our lives. This structure needs to ascend below the page level to at least the object level. The object level can be a photo with the associated metadata (caption, photographer, rights, permanent source, size, etc.), event information (event name, location, date and time, permanent location of the information, organizer, etc.), full-text and partial-text access (title, author, contact info, version, date published, rights, headers, paragraphs, etc.).

These objects may comprise a page or document on the web, but they not only have value as a whole, they have value as discrete objects. The web is a transient information store for data and media, it is a place to rest this information and object on its journey of use and reuse. People use and want (if not need) to use these objects in their lives. Their lives are comprised of various devices with various pieces of software that work best in their life. They want to track events, dates, people, ideas, media, memes, experts, friends, industries, finances, workspaces, competition, collaborators, entertainment, etc. as part of their regular lives. This gets very difficult when there is an ever growing flood of information and data bombarding us daily, hourly, consistently.

This is not a future problem. This is a problem right now! The information pollution is getting worse every moment we sit here. How do we dig through the information? How do we make sense of the information? How do we hold on to the information?

The solutions is using the resources we have at our finger tips. We need access to the object level data and the means to attach hooks to this data. One solution that is rising up is Microformats, which Ray Ozzie of Microsoft embraces and has been extending with his Live Clipboard, which is open for all (yes all operating systems and all applications) to use, develop, and extend. The web, as a transient information store, must be open to all comers (not walled off for those with a certain operating system, media player, browser, certain paid software, etc.) if the information is intended for free usage (I am seeing Microsoft actually understand this and seemingly embrace this).

Once we have the information and media we can use it and reuse it as we need. But, as we all know information and media is volatile, as it changes (for corrections, updates, expanding, etc.) and we need to know that what we are using and reusing is the best and more accurate information. We need the means to aggregate the information and sync the information when it changes. In our daily lives if we are doing research on something we want to buy and we bookmark it, should we not have the capability to get updates on the prices of the item? We made an explicit connection to that item, which at least conveys interest. Is it not in the interest of those selling the information to make sure we have the last price, if not changes to that product? People want and need this. It needs to be made simple. Those that get this right will win in the marketplace.

What is Standing in the Way?

So, the big question is, "what is standing in the way"? To some degree it is the tools with which we create the information and some of it is people not caring about the information, data, and media they expose.

The tools many of the large information providers are using are not up to the task. Many of the large content management systems (CMS) do not provide simple data structures. The CMS focusses on the end points (the devices, software, tools, etc.) not the simple data structures that permit simple efficient use and reuse of the objects. I have witnessed far too many times a simple web page that is well structured that is relatively small (under 40KB) get turned into an utter mess that is unstructured and large (over 200KB). Usable, parseable, and grabable information is broken by the tools. The tools focus on what looks good and not what is good. Not only is the structure of the data and objects broken, but they are no longer addressable. There are very few CMS that get it right, or let the developers get it right (one that gets it right is Axiom [open disclosure: I have done work with Siteworx the developer of Axiom]).

The other part of the problem is the people problem, which is often driven by not understanding the medium they are working within. They are focus on the tools, which are far from perfect and don't care enough to extend the tools to do what they should. Knowing the proper format for information, data, media, etc. on the web is a requirement for working on the web, not something that would be nice to learn someday. Implementing, building, and/or creating tools or content for the web requires understanding the medium and the structures that are inherent to building that well. I have had far too many discussions with people who do not understand the basics of the web nor the browser, which makes it nearly impossible to explain why their implementation fails. Content on the web has requirements to be structured well and the pages efficiently built. The pages need to degrade (not with an $80,000 plug-in) by default. Media on the web that is for open consumption must work across all modern systems (this should be a 3 year window if not longer for the "modern" definition).

Summary

So what is the take away from this? Content needs to be built with proper structure to the sub-object level (objects need the metadata attached and in standard formats). The content needs to be open and easily accessed. Portability of the information into the tools people use that put information in our pockets and lives must be done now. We have the technology now to do this, but often it is the poorly structured or formatted information, data, media, etc. that stands in the way. We know better and for those that don't know yet the hurdle is quite low and easy to cross.

The I Go Get Web

Before we look at the "Come to Me" web we should look at what preceded it. The "I Go Get" metaphor for the web was the precursor. In this incarnation we sought their information. The focus was on the providers of the content and the people consuming the information (or users) were targeted and lured in, in the extreme people were drawn in regardless of a person's interest in the information or topic covered. The content was that of the the organization or site that provided that information.

This incarnation focussed on people accessing the information on one device, usually the desktop computer. Early on the information was developed for proprietary formats. Each browser variant had their own proprietary way of doing things, based around a few central markup tags. People had to put up with the "best view with on X browser" messages. Information was also distributed in various other proprietary formats that required software on the device just so the person could get the information.

The focus providing information was to serve one goal (or use) reading. Some of this was driven by software limitations. But it was also an extension of information distribution in the analog physical space (as opposed to the digital space). In the physical space the written word was distributed on paper and it was consumed by reading (reuse of it meant copying it for reading) and it took physical effort to reconstruct those words to repurpose that information (quoting sources, showing examples, etc.).

The focus was on information creation and the struggle was making it findable. On the web there were only limited central resources used to find information, as many of the search engines were not robust enough, did not have friendly interfaces. Findability was a huge undertaking, either to get people what they desired/needed or to "get eyeballs".

Just as the use of the information was an extension of the physical realm that predated the digital information environment, the dominant metaphor in the "I Go Get" web was based in the physical realm. We all designed and developed for findability around the navigation/wayfinding metaphor. This directly correlates to going somewhere. Cues we use to get us to information were patterned and developed from practices in the physical world.

Physical? Digital? Does it Matter?

You ask, "So what we used ideas from the physical world to develop our metaphors and methodologies for web design and development?" We know that metaphors guide our practices. This is a very good thing. But, metaphors also constrain our practices and can limit our exploration for solutions to those that fit within the boundaries of that metaphor. In the physical realm we have many constraints that do not exist in the digital realm. Objects are not constrained by the resources they are made from (other than the energy to drive digital realm - no power no digital realm). Once an object exists in the digital realm replicating them is relatively insignificant (just copy it).

Paths and connections between information and objects is not constrained by much, other than humans choosing to block its free flow (firewalls, filtering, limiting access to devices, etc.). Much like Peter Merholz desire lines where people wear the path between two places in a manner that works best for them (the shortest distance between two points is a straight line). Now, don't think of the physical limitation between two points, I need to go from my classroom on the fourth floor of building "X" to across campus, up the hill to the sixth floor office of my professor. Draw a straight line and walk directly. This does not work in physical space because of gravity and physical impediments.

Now we are ready to understand what really happens on the web. We go from the classroom to our professors office, but we don't move. The connection brings what we desire to us and our screen. In this case we may just chat (text or video - it does not matter) with the professor from our seat in the classroom (if we even need to be in the classroom). Connections draw objects to our screens through the manifestation of links. As differently as people's minds work to connect ideas together, there can be as many paths between two objects. Use of physical space is limited by limitations outlined in physics, but the limitations are vastly different in digital space, use of the same information and media has vastly different limitations also.

It is through breaking the constraints of old metaphors and letting the digital realm exist that we get to a new understanding of digital information on the networks of the digital realm, which include the web.

The Come to Me Web

The improved understanding of the digital realm and its possibilities beyond our metaphors of the physical environment allows us to focus on a "Come to Me" web. What many people are doing today with current technologies is quite different than was done four or five years ago. This is today for some and will be the future for many.

When you talk to people about information and media today they frame it is terms of, "my information", "my media", and "my collection". This label is applied to not only information they created, but information they have found and read/used. The information is with them in their mind and more often than not it is on one or more of their devices drives, either explicitly saved or in cache.

Many of us as designers and developers have embraced "user-centered" or "user experience" design as part of our practice. These mantras place the focus on the people using our tools and information as we have moved to making what we produce "usable". The "use" in "usable" goes beyond the person just reading the information and to meeting peoples desires and needs for reusing information. Microformats and Structured Blogging are two recent projects (among many) that focus on and provide for reuse of information. People can not only read the information, but can easily drop the information into their appropriate application (date related information gets put in the person's calendar, names and contact information are easily dropped into the address book, etc.). These tools also ease the finding and aggregating of the content types.

As people get more accustom to reusing information and media as they want and need, they find they are not focussed on just one device (the desktop/laptop), but many devices across their life. They have devices at work, at home, mobile, in their living space and they want to have the information that they desire to remain attracted to them no matter where they are. We see the proliferation of web-based bookmarking sites providing people access their bookmarks/favorites from any web browser on any capable device. We see people working to sync their address books and calendars between devices and using web-based tools to help ensure the information is on the devices near them. People send e-mail and other text/media messages to their various devices and services so information and files are near them. We are seeing people using their web-based or web-connected calendars to program settings on their personal digital video recorders in their living room (or wherever it is located).

Keeping information attracted to one's self or within easy reach, not only requires the information and media be available across devices, but to be in common or open formats. We have moved away from a world where all of our information and media distribution required developing for a proprietary format to one where standards and open formats prevail. Even most current proprietary formats have non-proprietary means of accessing the content or creating the content. We can do this because application protocols interfaces (APIs) are made available for developers or tools based on the APIs can be used to quickly and easily create, recreate, or consume the information or media.

People have moved from finding information and media as being their biggest hurdle, to refinding things in "my collection" being the biggest problem. Managing what people come across and have access to (or had access to) again when they want it and need it is a large problem. In the "come to me" web there is a lot of filtering of information, as we have more avenues to receive information and media.

The metaphor and model in the "I go get" web was navigation and wayfinding. In the "come to me" web a model based on attraction. This is not the push and pull metaphor from the late 1990s (as that was mostly focussed on single devices and applications). Today's usage is truly focussed on the person and how they set their personal information workflow for digital information. The focus is slightly different. Push and pull focussed on technology, today the focus is on person and technology is just the conduit, which could (and should) fade into the background. The conduits can be used to filter information that is not desired so what is of interest is more easily identified.