Philip van Allen

Philip van Allen Writing and Publications

The New Ecology of Things

A transmedia publication that explores design and education issues in ubiquitous, networked objects & spaces. This publication includes a book, poster, mobile phone content and a website that themselves are a kind of new ecology of things with essays, images, vidoe, reader feedback, and interactive experiences. (2007-2008)

website: http://newecologyofthings.net
book: The New Ecology of Things (NET)

Productive Interaction

An essay that proposes a new design paradigm for interactive design called productive interaction. This approach views the user as an active participant in the creation of new meaning for themselves through their interactions. Productive Interaction is an alternative to  ”experience design,” which this essay characterizes as valuable but flawed because it puts the designer in the position of designing the experience rather than the user. (2004)

website: http://productiveinteraction.com/
PDF of essay: Productive Interaction

Thinking About Interaction Design for Online News Delivery

An article that applies the ideas of Productive Interaction to the news publications. (USC Annenberg – Online Journalism Review 2004)

website: http://ojr.org/ojr/technology/1088538463.php

Designing the future: writing, design and research on NOT-linear interaction

“How can designers make more meaningful, rich and user enabling interactive systems? What are the best principles, affordances and techniques of interactive design, what are some examples, and how should designers approach this challenge?”

Essay at the ACM website: http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?doid=1013115.1013182

Dimensional Story Space

An article I wrote in 1992 for a group called Interactive Expression. Several of us in the Los Angeles area working at Philips and other “multimedia” companies in the early days got together to discuss the potentials for this new medium. This article outlines the limitations and potentials for interactive stories.

website: http://people.artcenter.edu/%7Evanallen/idesign1/2004fa/story_space.html