The Architecture of Interaction site was created by a group of five artists and theorists (Anna Best, Yvonne Dröge Wendel, Nikolaus Gansterer, Lino Hellings, Mine Kaylan and Klaas Kuitenbrouwer) who have set out to develop a common language to talk about and compare the processes, meanings and effects of interactive work. What’s interesting is that this group came together around interactive practice which was really based not on technology or human computer interface but rather people + people, people + object, people + environment… you get the point. The notes on their discussions are valuable insights gathered from people who obviously have a lot of experience in the painful failures, hiccups, wobbly successes and also spot-on perfection of designing for people to participate. We were lucky enough to attend the talks at Chisenhale Gallery, London in 2004.

They’ve developed a tidy and useful list of considerations around the practice of interaction design:
Others / Intentions / Timeframes / Traces / Arenas / Sensitivities / Models

From discussions on the intricacies of orchestrating environments for people to interact with, their notes around the ‘intentions’ of participatory work, and what roles ‘others’ play are particularly interesting. You can check out the list of others here and intentions here. One favourite type of ‘others’ they’ve identified – errorists. If you’ve had experience with planning participation, you’ve most certainly come across an errorist. All of this is published in a slim and handy book by the same name, which you can purchase from their site.