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Published by MacroVU Press in support of the Visual Language Project at Stanford University, which is directed by Robert E. Horn.
The UPDATE summarizes the research and applications of visual language and information design.

In this issue
1. News - Our Project Director Given Lifetime Achievement Award By ACM SIG
2. News - Harvard Business School Communication Newsletter Weighs In On Great Clip Art Battle
3. Conference - Horn to Speak in March at STUDIO 2001 (Seattle)
4. Research - Are Animated Diagrams Always Better Than Static Ones?
5. Big Ideas - Strassman Keynotes InfoProducer Conference on Information Economics
6. New Hardware - Graphic Printer For The Blind
7. Book Review - Graphic Journalism In Bosnia

1. NEWS -- OUR PROJECT DIRECTOR GIVEN LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD BY ACM
Robert E. Horn, director of the visual language project, will receive the prestigious Diana award from the Association of Computing Machinery Special Interest Group on Computer Documentation (ACM SIGDOC) in October . The award letter says, "The award is given to an institution or organization that has made an outstanding life-time contribution to the field of user documentation. The contributions that singled Information Mapping, Inc., out for this award are numerous. The company represents one of the few entrepreneurial extensions of basic research that has thriving practical implications for the field and, most recently, your research on visual design has established itself as an intrinsic part of the lore and practice of professional documentation developers today."

The award will be presented at the annual conference of SIGDOC being held in Santa Fe, NM, from October 21st to 24th, 2001

MORE INFO ON THE SIGDOC CONFERENCE:
http://mulford.cs.ucr.edu/stilley/sigdoc2001

2. NEWS -- HARVARD BUSINESS SCHOOL NEWSLETTER WEIGHS IN ON GREAT CLIP ART BATTLE
In our last issue we announced a white paper, "The Great Clip Art Battle," written by our project director. Writer John Clayton quoted our paper extensively in an article for the Harvard Management Communication Newsletter ("Tools, techniques, and ideas for the articulate executive") in December. Our paper noted that good clip art is essential to visual language's growth and development. To use visual language fluently, assumes the user has to be able to have clip art available quickly, conveniently, and inexpensively. Clayton's article noted that we are closer than ever to this goal.

Our project's book, "Visual Language: Global Communication for the 21st Century" has fueled this battle because it uses almost 3,000 pieces of clip art, with an average of 10 graphic clip art elements per double page spread.

The white paper called the "Great Clip Art Battle". TO SEE A COPY: (html)

MORE ON THE HARVARD MANAGEMENT COMMUNICATION NEWSLETTER:
http://www.hbsp.hardard.edu

3. CONFERENCE -- HORN TO SPEAK IN MARCH AT STUDIO 2001 (SEATTLE)
The Studio 2001 conference will of interest to many readers of this newsletter (MARCH 6-8, 2001 --Seattle). This will be a chance for people to meet our project director, Robert E. Horn, who will be speaking on "Visual Language: Global Communication for the 21st Century."

CONTACT:
http://www.influent.com or 1-888-333-9088

4. RESEARCH - ARE ANIMATED DIAGRAMS ALWAYS BETTER THAN STATIC ONES?
Not automatically, says Australian professor and researcher, Ric Lowe (Curtin Univ. of Technology, Perth). He presented one of the more important pieces of research at the Expert Conference on Manual Design at Malardalen University, Sweden late last year. His research questioned such usual assumptions that animated diagrams require (1) less effort (2) less reliance on auxiliary symbols so the display can be simpler, (3) less "working out" because information is presented explicitly rather than implicitly as in static diagrams and (4) less human processing capacity.

He found that (1) relevant information must still be extracted and building up mental models of causation in the mind of the user is still necessary, (2) some information is more noticeable, and hence some critical information is not paid attention to perhaps because of the motion (3) what you see first is not necessarily the most relevant, thus animations can delude.

In short, animated diagrams are not a "magic solution" and must be carefully tested to avoid serious problems.

CONTACT: r.lowe@educ.curtin.edu.au

5. BIG IDEAS - STRASSMAN KEYNOTES INFOPRODUCER CONFERENCE ON INFORMATION ECONOMICS
Economist Paul Strassman, former Chief Information Officer at Xerox and the Pentagon, told participants that the total cost of a document to create, store, and use is an important way to estimate cost corporate communication. The heaviest cost is in the use, which he calculated at $135 per page some years ago. The biggest portion of use costs is in the readers' salaries (which is where the connection with visual language occurs.) Strassman was the keynoter at the InfoProducer Conference sponsored by Information Mapping, Inc. and Influent Technologies in December. We recommend a deep reflection on his ideas of information economics. His book Politics of Information Management is now out of print, but many new and updated articles on the topics from his book are available (see "publications" below).

CONTACT: http://www.strassman.com
PUBLICATIONS: publisher@infoeconomics.com

6. NEW HARDWARE - GRAPHIC PRINTER FOR THE BLIND
One of the most difficult questions to answer about visual language displayed on a computer screen has been, "What will the blind do when visual and verbal elements are as tightly integrated as you recommend?" There hasn't been a good answer -- until now. John Gardner, a blind physicist at Oregon State University, has invented a printer that works with standard computers and punches out drawings that are displayed on computer screens. It is an important new technology that will help visuallly-impaired readers study and work in the new visual world. The "Tiger Printer" can produce a combination of Braille and tactile graphics from most Microsoft Windows applications.

MORE INFORMATION: gardnerj@usc.orst.edu

7. BOOK REVIEW - GRAPHIC JOURNALISM IN BOSNIA
Visual language is branching out in many directions. One of the extraordinary new manifestations is Joe Sacco's new book "Safe Area Gorazde: The War in Eastern Bosnia, 1992-95." (ISBN: 1-56097-392-7) It is a hard-cover book by a graphic journalist whose last book won a National Book Award in 1996. It presents in somber detail the horrors and ordinary difficulties of the residents of a Bosnian town during the war. Anyone interested in how the comic book format is emerging as graphic journalism should look at this book.

CONTACT: Fantagraphic Books, 7563 Lake City Way NE, Seattle, WA 98115
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The VISUAL LANGUAGE UPDATE is free.
Feature articles in international journals, such as "New Scientist", have focused attention on our visual language project. As a result, we've been asked a lot of questions about this new field, so we've launched this newsletter. Our goal is to keep you up-to-date on developments in the field of visual language and visual information design. We will summarize the projects we're working on, both research and applications. We'll review important books and articles in the field and present brief critiques of important issues in the field. We thank our publisher, MacroVU Press for its support of this newsletter.
---Bob Horn, Project Director
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The VISUAL LANGUAGE UPDATE is free.

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To read previous issues of this newsletter, go to http://www.stanford.edu/~rhorn

Editor and Publisher: Robert E. Horn, visiting scholar, Stanford University

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Entire contents copyright 2000 R. E. Horn. The Visual Language Project at Stanford University