The flavours of Information Architecture

Patrick Kennedy, Senior Consultant in “Step Two Designs” based on Australia, mentions in his paper “The many faces of Information Architecture” eight different areas Information Architecture is involved in, which have slightly little differences. These eight areas according to the diagram underneath are a) Information Management (IM), b) Human Computer Interaction (HCI), c) Interaction Design (IxD), d) Usability Engineering (UE), e) Information Design (ID), f) User Experience (UX), g) Information Architecture (IA) and h) Experience Design (XD). People working in these sectors, (me included!) often find it hard to say where are the boundaries between them. By placing them in a circle and moving counter-clockwise from Information Management (IM) to Human Computer Interaction (HCI) is usually the chronological path a project takes.