Productivity and Creative Experiences
Productivity is another spectrum that can coincide with other interactivity spectrums. Creative experiences allow a user, creator, or participant to make, do, or share something themselves. Some experiences can be used more productively than others (such as entertainment), and productivity is traditionally of more concern in business products than entertainment products--but being creative and producing something are typically more interesting, entertaining, and fulfilling activities. Creation tools are important components for creating meaningful, compelling, and useful experiences. Creative products and experiences require that others participate by creating or manipulating instead of merely watching and consuming.
Co-creative (a term coined by Abbe Don) technologies are those that offer assistance in the creation process. People are naturally creative and are almost always more interested in experiences that allow them to create instead of merely participate. While many situations can create anxiety if people are not accustomed to performing with the tools or techniques, if this anxiety can be lessened (either through the careful design of the experience or offered assistance), people express their creativity. This can take the form of recommendations, guidelines, advice, or actually performing operations for users.
Another attribute of these experiences
is the capability of adding content or tools to a predefined
set, resulting in a "living" product, toolset, or database.
Few products are designed to grow or become more valuable over
time with participation from the audience. Yet, products that
help users structure their experiences and share their knowledge
are inherently more valuable than those which do not.
beginning
Copyright 1994 Nathan Shedroff
Abbe Don is another prominent interface designer who specializes in interfaces for personal narratives.