Talia Madani “Spraying Stripes,” 2008.

I’m just starting to dive into some interactive Web design stuff at The New School and I’m really excited.  I’ve decided I want to off-set my theory classes with a fair amount of production this time around, specifically interactive design and software coding classes.  They’re great skills to learn, looks great on a resume and more than anything I think it will really give me a better understanding of how the Internet works and where it will be going.

I’ve included a couple great sites to look at on designing the interactive space:

1) http://www.lab404.com/330/ This is an online syllabus/guide for a class called “Internet-Based Art and Design” at The University of North Carolina at Asheville. The site is a rich despository for all things interactive design.  Hyperlinks show examples of the history of networking, differences between types of interactivity as well as a number of art projects currently being undertaken entirely online.  It’s a holistic attempt to investigate the specific capabilities and possibilities of interactive art.  I really suggest taking a look around the site and checking out some links.  A great way to kill some time and you might just find something you never thought about before.

2)  http://www.lasvegassun.com/history/ It’s a shame the newspaper business is going through such a massive contraction right now.  Some have cited the fact that newspapers have contribuited to their own undoing by giving away so much premium content for free.  And some of the content can be quite impressive, especially when a newspaper has some talented interactive people working on the site.  The Las Vegas Sun did an interactive story on the history of the Las Vegas strip and it was done in a way that truly utilizes online design and thinking.  This is a great example of a traditional media company branching out and using all possible media to tell a compelling story.  The evolution of technology will continue to give birth to new ideas and new ways of understanding, the problem so many media companies face is that they act like they are inherently in a diametric opposition to this concept.  Is it a TV station or a news provider?  Is it a newspaper or a content distribuiter?  I think for the Las Vegas Sun, as well as The New York Times, Washington Post and other innovative newspaper Web sites, it’s about giving the consumer the best possible experience across platforms and living their legacy brand online in new ways.  In the past this story would have been a simple text timeline.  This piece is a great example of using the interactive space for visually compelling, more graphically sophisticated ways of understanding the world around us.  Even if that world is Vegas…