The catalogue of the future?
Imagine if your catalogue looked like Amazon Windowshop. Would this make you happy? Would it make browsing easier for your users?
We’ve taken out the text and created an immersive experience to help you lose yourself in exploration. Trailers for bestselling movies. Insight into the hottest TV shows and video games. Track samples from Tuesday’s new music releases. Audio reviews of books you should read. Amazon Windowshop lets you get a taste of many titles. They’re here - in one place - and all you have to do is move a few keys to zoom in on whatever flips your switch.
Three quick links for Easter
Three items that may be if interest:
- search-cube is a new visual search engine that allows previews of up to ninety-six websites, videos and images. Combining results from Google with images from Thumbshots, it creates a rotating 3D cube that the user can manipulated to browse the results. While it lacks any ranking capability, it is still an interesting variation on the search engine. Would it be a good way to present search results from an OPAC?
- If your interest was piqued by my previous entry on the Microsoft Surface, you can now have one for your own home, for a mere $350 dollars and some sweat and tears (tip o’ the hat to Captain Fold).
- Trying to collaborate on a project and need to share your computer screen? Have a look at Pocket Meeting, which can do just that for a one time fee of $5. A quick user review is available from ReadWriteWeb.
Will we all have a “SixthSense”?
I have spoken about the impact of multi-touch computer screens on the catalogue display, including the work of Jeff Han and Microsoft Surface. Now Pattie Maes and Pranav Mistry from MIT unveil the latest development, SixthSense.
‘SixthSense’ is a wearable gestural interface that augments the physical world around us with digital information and lets us use natural hand gestures to interact with that information.
Microsoft Surface and social computing
In an earlier post I discussed the possible impact of multi-touch computer screens on the catalogue display. Microsoft has just demonstrated the latest version of their software at the South by SouthWest Festival. While it is still in the development stage, it doesn`t stop us from imagining the possibilities.
According to the original story on the BBC
Devices like the Surface, as well as Apple’s iPhone, are at the vanguard of a shift in how we interact with computers.
“Everything is moving to touch and multi-touch so you had better jump on that bandwagon,” Mr Klimczak told the conference of web developers.
Data visualization, aesthetics, and a few useful programs
Most library OPAC’s, and even library websites, are lacking when it comes to the presentation of information or data visualization. They are difficult to navigate, boring to look at, and using them tends to be a chore. The blog Information Aesthetics authored by Andrew Vande Moere has some interesting thoughts on the connections between information and visualization;
…information visualization can be enriched with the principles of creative design and art, to develop valuable data representations that address the emotional experience of users, instead of solely focusing on typical task effectiveness metrics. As information access enters the everyday life of users and becomes increasingly ubiquitous and pervasive, novel approaches are required that take into account considerations of user engagement and visual aesthetics. Instead of evaluating such information applications by measuring task performance and comprehension effectiveness, one should consider to determine user interest, attention, focus, enjoyment and curiosity.
If you want to find out more, an excellent presentation by Eric Rodenbeck on mapping and data visualization has just been posted at Information Aesthetics, along with a few others that are worth checking out. Read more
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