IxDG: Finding a Home in the UX Community -Build it and they will come; And they did!
David Heller
Interaction Design Group (IxDG)
IntraLinks, Inc.
104 S. Portland Ave.
Apt. 4A
Brooklyn, NY 11217
dave@synapticburn.com
ABSTRACT

For most of the last 2 years, IxDG has basically existed at
two levels: First, as an online community, where a similar,
yet slightly different conversation was going on; second, aseries of face-to-face gatherings around the world: London,
New York, Pune (India), San Francisco Bay Area and Los
Angeles. Other communities have said that they would liketo plan an event: Boston, Vienna, Bangalore, Mumbai, St.
Louis, Seattle, and Washington, D.C.

For close to 2 years now I have been part of an exciting
project—to create a new community and organization
dedicated to the advancement of Interaction Design (IxD).
It has been both a fun and frustrating road. We have had
mostly successes, but there is an environment out there
today in the UX community that makes it difficult for thiscommunity to grow freely.
I’d like to take the opportunity of the consortium to discuss
what it has been like to take on this initiative and how wehave been thinking about how to make this project more
successfully. Finally, how can a more organized UX
community can help facilitate this, instead of fighting what
is probably the inevitable.

The first project of the new steering committee andworkgroup was to create a definition of what is IxD. The
key part of this conversation was that the steeringcommittee at that time and many of the people who were
working on this first initiative were and are committed totalking about the discipline of interaction design and notpeople who hold the title of interaction design (or any othertitle for that matter.) This focus is at the core of our strategy
and a strict guideline to reflect off of as we moved forwardwith other initiatives and strategy.

BACKGROUND

In 2003 a “call to arms” was made by two people over theInternet—Bruce “Tog” Tognazzini 1 and Challis Hodge 2—
to form an organization dedicated to the promotion, andadvancement of Interaction Design (IxD) and to benefit thecareers of those who practice it. That call led to an e-maillist hosted by Challis where some 200-300 design
practitioners, researchers, students and teachers came
together in short of a month.

A next core part of the creation of the group was thesteering committee focused on creating value for its
constituency. We were in no position to charge formembership and create services that would make a US$50
expense worthwhile, but we knew we had to do something.
We created 3 initiatives and a few taskforces that would
help support those initiatives. The initiatives are Career
Development, Education, and Tools & Resources. Because
we are a purely volunteer based organization these have notcome to fruition (hopefully by the end of this month theResource Library, a main effort of the Tools & Resources
Initiative will go live.)

After further time it was clear that this list needed more ofan organizing bodny and Challis invited people to join asteering committee and 3 people heeded that call—including myself. This steering committee took it uponitself to represent this community, and asked for volunteers
to help create some initiatives. The very first initiative wasdefining the discipline and creating a mission statement.
Both are available on http://ixdg.org/ 3.

Another defining element of IxDG’s community is that wehave a very active international “membership”. This might
be coincidental, but the steering committee from the firstday set out to create a home that worked against its UScentric realities. We recently produced our first translated
version of our website: German.

When we first started to organize, there were manyorganizational reactions from abject horror to fullembracing, but none that really wanted to consider the needfor a new home for the interaction design practitioner assomething separate from what already existed. Most
embracing was in the offer for us as IxDG to join theexisting entity.

This spring the IxDG is going to be having a small retreat todetermine its final strategy and tactics for achieving thatstrategy. The goal of this meeting is to make some final
decisions towards formalizing the IxDG community into a1

functioning organization. The form of that organization isnot finalized and will be in large effort the point of theretreat to determine:•Are we an independent organization?

•Do we take up the offer of 1 or 2 existingorganizations to find/make a home within theirorganizational structure.

•What type of membership will we have?

•What are our immediate offerings for thatmembership? For the IxD community?

Yes, “If you build it they will come, but it helps A LOT
when the person getting the word out is famous in the fieldand puts out an amazing call to action, not just once, butnow twice. (See the May/June issue of Interactions.)
REFERENCES

1. Bruce “Tog” Tognazzini, It’s Time To Get Respect
http://www.asktog.com/columns/057ItsTimeWeGotRes
pect.html

Creating another group in the UX community? Are
we yet another faction? Is there anything wrong
with factions?

•Can/will a single practioners/human find a homein just one organization?

•What is a home for a practitioner?

Why UXnet’s success is important to the successof IxDG, and why IxDG’s formation during thesame period of UXnet is not a coincidence?

Final reference to title:

To this particular audience, I would like to offer this story,and address some of the experiences we have faced in thelast 2 years.

What is it about existing organizations that evennecessitate this?

•I’m sure there are more questions, and in fact I’m looking
forward to an opportunity to collaborating with peers sothat as I go into the retreat for IxDG I can reap theexperiences and knowledge of the attendees to theconsortium.

THE PRESENTATION•

What does it mean to not only create anorganization, but create a community where there
wasn’t one already naturally?

My goal here is not to present final answers, but rather
reflect the history of IxDG into the workshop as a dialog forthinking about the future of User Experience Design.

We have a tough road ahead of us. We have attempted tointerview people who have been a part of doing this work in
the past and who are doing the work currently to find out
what challenges and what opportunities they were able toovercome or take advantage of. We have learned a lot.

••

2. Challis Hodge, A New Home For Interaction Designers
http://www.challishodge.com/2003_08_01_uxblog_arch
ive.html
3. Interaction Design Group (IxDG)
http://ixdg.org - core web site
http://discuss.ixdg.org/ - discussion list site2