Understanding Context

We've moved rapidly from a world where digital networks were specialized environments accessed via desktop computers to one where people spend most of their waking hours "on the grid" of networked digital devices, consumer objects, and physical places. From Facebook identity to ubiquitous mobility, technology keeps changing what "here" means, confounding deep assumptions our brains make about perception and meaning. Context Design provides a powerful toolset for understanding and solving the many problems created by contextual ambiguity. This book is ideal for information architects, user experience professionals, and designers of medium-to-large websites and applications. Learn how to create "embodied cognition" to understand how users respond to digital products, devices, and environments Explore the difference between location-aware mobility (geographical context) versus simultaneous presence (virtual context) Discover how composition and narrative structure can create cohesion over time and across channels Learn strategies for dealing with the digital dimension's blurring of the line between map and territory Examine how contextual ambiguity complicates personal identity