WIAD 2014, “Make the World a Better Place through IA”
World Information Architecture Day is a one-day annual conference hosted by the Information Architecture Institute and held in dozens of cities across the world. For newbies in design, UX and IA trying to explain it on its easiest form Information Architectures are structures that we use to make sure that the information people need is easy to find and to understand. So when you use a website, a mobile application or go into a store and you can find what you need and everything makes sense, that means the information architecture is doing its job.
So WIAD`s focus on building local communities aiming a better understanding of Information Architecture starts back at 2012 and until today each year all IA communities around the world shares a common day and a common theme.
2014, the first year that Greece and Syros shared ideas, thoughts and solutions about IA was the year that all of us had to “Make the World a Better Place through IA” witch was this wears theme.
Ad Axem was the organizer company hosting this global event for Greece and Syros and this is where the best part begins! The choice to run World IA Day Greece in a world-class venue on a tiny, beautiful island has attracted interest from a global audience, who has already pre-booked a large chunk of the venue seating, while thousands of others will be following the proceedings through our live streaming.
Meanwhile WIAD is and always will be free of charge for audience. So getting people and materials from the United States and all over Europe to Syros was a logistical challenge, involving many hidden costs. Travel and accommodation sponsors are sometimes willing and able to cover these costs by providing flight and room product. In the current climate, most of these sponsors were unwilling or unable to do so, citing financial limitations or requirements we could not fulfill – such as who should speak at the event and where the event should be relocated to (Athens rather than Syros). And that was the time when we took the big dissension to organize a crowd founding campaign on indiegogo. And we made it.
To explore 2014 theme, we invited software, graphic, product, sound, stage designers and technologists that are re-defining the way people experience a typical day at the office, a visit to the museum, a stroll in the park, a game, a concert or dance performance.
Guests for WIAD Greece 2014 were Andreas Kioroglou from Matadog Design speaking about «Designing experiences for kids», Panagiotis Kovanis from Mindworks with «The collective interface», Jannis Anastasakis from JAM pedals with « Do not reinvent the wheel, make the best wheel on the market », Koven J. Smith from Kinetic Museums with “Next week’s curator”, Vladimir Jankovic from Nordeus with “Top eleven Achievments”, Andreas Triantafillidis from Thinking – Vivl.io with “Reading Experience: from print to digital”, Themis Chapsis from OgilvyOne Worldwide with “Educated and inspired by real life”, Vangelis Bibakis from Ad Axem – Demian Labs with “UX deathmatch”and at last Eleni Vakondiou and Periklis Therrios from Xylo eyewear with a Q&A on “The effort visualized”
While on the highlights of the day also included the «lightning talks » of students and young designers, the student’s exhibition and of course the closing ux concert experience the audience was completely satisfied having a lot of food for thoughts and we decided to renew our appointment for next year!
