Digital domains : the understanding and making of a "place" in cyberspace

Abstract

The information age has provided exciting challenges for designers and users to interact and work in virtual environments. This has resulted in new interpretations to the representation of places as they begin to develop, interact and communicate their ideas in this medium. Can designers shape the many sites that are beginning to form and can the sites serve as places for interaction/communication linked only through this virtual world? How can designers react to such a landscape? Can we begin to create this environment so that an effective communication between the environment and user can take place How should this environment be represented to the user? Finally, can we begin to "experience" the virtual artifact in a way that is flexible enough in its representation to allow for simultaneous communication of the physical space and the perceptual representation of that place. These will be some of the main issues addressed in the thesis. My investigation seeks to develop a virtual interface for communication of an architectural artifact, that designers can use as a representation to assist them in contextualizing their understanding of that place and to facilitate an environment that aids in communicating within a virtual setting? The artifact created are the virtual design spaces here at MIT and the site for the project will be the World Wide Web. The thesis addresses three main issues. The first will discuss navigating through the artifact. The second issue will endeavor to coalesce the fragmented views of representation though a simulation. The third will explore supplementing current representations into a experiential model to better understand the spaces and the ideas that generated them.