Summary: To cap off IAS17, Dan considers the larger context of IA and our community and asks: is it dishonest to call ourselves information architects?

To cap off IAS17, Dan Klyn gives the closing plenary address. He questions whether — in our quest to make better online experiences — we’ve lost sight of what’s true. He also reflects on his research over the 8 years, seeing that progress in the field of information architecture requires a shift in emphasis.

Dan wonders: Is it dishonest to call ourselves information architects?

IAS17 Closing Plenary Address

Delivered on March 26, 2017 in Vancouver, BC, Canada. Dan is currently serving as the president of the IA Institute’s Board of Directors.

Allow me to begin with some thank-yous.

Thank you Susan Mercer, Dave Cooksey and Marianne Sweeney for the countless hours of hard work you put in so that the rest of us could enjoy this event together. I consider it an honor for you to have entrusted me with the task of closing it down for you.

Thank you to Peter Morville, for taking me on as a mentee 17 years ago, and for providing a model of what it looks like to be a professional information architect that I could learn from and follow. I got an email from him this morning wishing me luck with this speech, and he suggested that if all else fails, to consider taking my pants off.

Thanks and praise are also due to ASIS&T for its steadfast support of this community through eighteen IA Summits, and especially for having had the wisdom to select Vancouver as the host city for 2017. As a Michigander, I’ve been a visitor in Canada probably a hundred times, and this was the first out of 199 border crossings that caused me to feel ashamed of where I’m from.

So it’s good to have had some time away from all of that, and to have been welcomed so warmly in this breathtakingly beautiful place.”

Read the rest on Medium:

medium.com/@danklyn/2017-information-architecture-summit-closing-plenary-address-efb0e0e21d2c