first time - many questions

I'm new to this blogging thing and i thought it would be interesting to get like minded people involved in discussions about what i call "information design." Now i know there are other sites, blogs, etc., but i hope that i will be coming from a different perspective.

First, i'm not sure if information design or plain language or anything else for that matter, is the right title.

Most of us are doing the same thing, that is, trying to get information to end users in a way that it is easily understood and acted upon. But, we come from all different walks of life, experiences, backgrounds, etc and although we agree on the end result, we disagree on how to get there.

There are writers (plain language experts), graphic designers (those more visual), user experience experts, software developers, psycologists, sociologists, usability experts, etc. the list is long and, to me, confusing. Some of us work online (user interface), some with paper documents (me), some in small formats (PDAs,) etc, yet somehow we are all trying to do the same thing.

Many people i meet think that what they do is the solution. I disagree. My premise is that in order to deliver information clearly and effectively, all of our expertise needs to come together.

I often tell plain language experts that if they show me a document where the language is terrible, i will make it seem to the reader that they understand it because of the way i organize the information within the document. On the other hand, it you give me the same document written in very clear plain language, i will make it so it will be totally unreadable.

My point is that it all has to work together. My hope is that with this blog, contributions from others and a meeting of the minds, we can create a unifed powerful industry working together.

i hope that this blog will set up a dialogue among the many different practitioners.

Let me hear from you.