The real estate market may not be as strong as it was a year ago, but in terms of web development, there’ll be none of that. Web tech, design and UI continues to push the capabilities of data view layers to new heights. Case in point, Trulia’s new “Snapshot,” a cool new bit of eye candy that gives users the ability to get results via sliders (with a slick motion touch on the thumbnail scroll). Another nice, albeit not particularly useful touch is that you drag photos out of the way to view what’s behind, then snapping back into place via a rubber band effect.

Although fun, it’s not very practical from a usability POV. I’d rather “fly through” or have the option to have the image automatically move out of the way if I mouse into an area. All in all, a solid visual take on an everyday application. At least Trulia is showing that they clearly “get it.”

via TechCrunch

In the world of innovation, the execution is as important as the exercise. If you can’t “sell” the idea with meaningful visualization and functionality, you lose. As part of the AOL Prototyping Team, I learned just how important the “pitch” or execution strategy was to help get support for an idea. One of the last projects I worked on was a blueprint for the future of online news. This included a comprehensive competitive survey, a robust ideation workout and initial visualization exercises. While I didn’t get to see if any of our work will come to fruition (having moved into a new role elsewhere), we stepped into some areas that still haven’t been thoroughly explored.

During the survey phase, we occasionally stumbled across efforts that warranted merit, but not many that were truly pushing the online news experience into the future. AOL itself made some inroads with its dynamic, blog-like approach. USA Today went two-point-oh with a strong emphasis on community (a la Digg), MSNBC has taken some progressive steps and UK’s Times has enriched their visual and user experiences for the better. All said, the jury is still out. Perhaps it hasn’t even been selected yet. Though not necessarily revolutionizing the news experience, but iteratively improving the user experience, the NY Times still reigns champ overall with its powerhouse user base and award-winning infographics.

So the question is where will this sector be in 4 or 5 years? Will we use news in the same way? Will it be highly portable and device-scalable? Will local coverage foster micro-communities? Will we have more immediate and personal relationships with the way we share news? Most likely.

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Disclaimer: The schedule has been hectic, so I’m a little behind here.

Started off Sunday in “Responsible Web Design,” but it felt like a dry run of Adobe feature sets through the web space. Making a safe exit, I headed over to “Meet the Architects,” which was essentially my first choice anyway, since I’ve been a fan of architecture since I was 7 years old.

The panel was mid-stream when I entered, talking about how architecture relates to digital media through a variety of ways. From using tools like Flickr to creating elaborate 3D fly-throughs targeted for wide, public consumption. Although, this panel seemed out of place for SXSW, it was quite fitting as it fundamentally poses the question to the audience of how to apply their skills to any discipline. While I couldn’t immediately make the connection from architecture to what I do, it became clear that there is a heavy reliance on digital media artists to help support a virtually unlimited array of arts, crafts and sciences. This was one of the better panels at SXSW.

Data as Art was another winner with digital media visualists Peter Kirn and Joy Mountford. Most stunning were the displays of data served up in a pastiche of ways. A continuously updating “live” data stream of Yahoo Mail was captivating as it showed the traffic on a global scale in it’s purest form, a rotating image of a gleaming, white globe with blue towers rising up and down as time zones and the hours spun by.

Stamen, a design and technology shop, is best known for its industry-leading interface work. Again, they deliver another crisp execution in the form of Oakland Crimespotting, a map-based visual informational device. Building upon the work of the Oakland Police Department, they were inspired to take matters into their own hands by reshaping the half-baked government mapping site into a rich web app.

It’s always a pleasure to see new work from this highly talented group of individuals from San Francisco.

On display at MOMA (New York), Design and the Elastic Mind “explores the reciprocal relationship between science and design in the contemporary world by bringing together design objects and concepts that marry the most advanced scientific research with attentive consideration of human limitations, habits, and aspirations.”

“The exhibition highlights designers’ ability to grasp momentous changes in technology, science, and history—changes that demand or reflect major adjustments in human behavior—and translate them into objects that people can actually understand and use.” The Web site “presents over three hundred of these works, including fifty projects that are not featured in the gallery exhibition.”

Highly recommended for anyone interested in design and especially, information design.

Compelling piece from Robert Hodgin from Flight 404, using Flash and technology from proce55ing, an open source programming language geared towards “visualists.” I could easily spend hours browsing the works on this site.



Solar from flight404 on Vimeo.

Shamelessly lifted from Josh Spear