Web Directions Podcast

We’ve always had metaphors to understand and design for the Web. The original conception of the Web was as a library of documents. Our building blocks were derived from spatial ideas: "breadcrumbs", "visits" and "homepages" were used to understand the medium. Website-as-application was a new and novel metaphor in the late 1990s. The spatial concept of navigation was replaced by concepts derived from tools: buttons performed actions on data. These metaphors inspire separate but complementary models of the Web. But the Web in 2008 has some entirely new qualities: more than ever it’s an ecology of separate but highly interconnected services. Its fiercely competitive, rapid development means differentiating innovations are quickly copied and spread. Attention from users is scarce. The fittest websites survive. In this world, what metaphors can be most successfully wielded? Matt takes as a starting point interaction and product design, with ideas from cybernetics and Getting Things Done. He offers as a metapho