URID.org

After sleeping on it...

Well, the shock has begun to sink in, and after some thinking, some amusing distractions (i.e., The Daily Show), and singing along — loudly — to Wilco I’m feeling a good deal better about what John accurately describes as a Brave New World.

A few random thoughts:

• Many of us have often joked that URID sounded either like the name of a disease or a Balkan nation (as in URIDstan). Well, in keeping with the nation metaphor, I think it’s appropriate to think of URID’s future as a loose confederation of states that will continue to work closely together to achieve common goals.

• In many ways, URID.org becomes more important in this brave new world. Because we will be decentralized, there is an even greater need for a single place where we can exchange and archive information.

• For me, at least, the key to making peace with this new world is to continue to see myself as a usability professional who will be able to make a greater impact by working from a position that gives me greater control over the product development lifecycle. I think a big part of my reaction yesterday was in thinking that this identity as an expert was going to disappear and that we would just be assimilated into the product management machine. I now realize that this doesn’t have to happen.

A final comment. When I was talking to Gerette last night about the fact that one of the goals of these changes was to bring a more user-centered design perspective to the product/project management process, she said “It’s like Usability Eye for the Project Guys”. I laughed, but she said — quite accurately it turns out — “I guarantee you’ll be using that line at some point tomorrow.”

Welcome to URID.org!

Well, this is the first post on URID.org, so I suppose I ought to say something important to mark this event :)

To me, URID.org is all about enhanced communication and improved efficiency. By using this tool for our intra-URID conversations, we keep everything in one place, searchable by date, category, and person. It becomes an extension of all our thinking, discussing, and planning - the URID archives. And by adding Twiki to the mix, we gain a document repository with full version control. The possibilities are really limitless.

I strongly encourage any and all feedback about how to improve URID.org to better meet our needs. Just post these suggestions on URID.org (in the URID.org category, natch). Movable Type (the tool used to manage URID.org) is very customizable, so if there’s something you’d like to see, let me know and I’ll look into whether it’s possible via a plugin, a script, or some other bit of code created by one of the members of the Movable Type development community. In addition, there are other new features that I’ve already got planned and I’ll announce those on URID.org as they are added.

Welcome, and enjoy the ride.