I work in a field that thinks of itself as new. There are constantly debates going on about what we call ourselves, the people who try to make cyberspace easy to use, a good experience, a positive interaction. I rarely follow these debates as they are inherently navel gazing and I am fairly loathe to that kind of behavior.

Well, this thread seemed interesting. I don’t know why it was different. It seemed like there was real thought going into the dialogue. People were saying things that made you think they had gotten beyond their job insecurity and looked into the real question. Once that was done, you could have an honest discussion.

One of the honest things that was said was that none of us is really an expert. We are all exploring together and we have to bring whatever gifts to it we have to bring. What ever way you have of understanding the world could help another person or group of people understand it as well. Some people call it working in infospace, all of the information, so much information. We need signs to navigate this vast array of space that is hard to visualize but makes so many things so instant.

So most of the time I just think of my profession as first doing no harm, but once in awhile you get the chance to really help. That’s a good day.

I was inspired while thinking about this and meditating on the discussion of my peers by a quote by a man who wrote a booked called information architects and that is what i am.