The Calm Before the Storm
Web Clipping
lightspark.com
Perspectives, methods, case studies, and interviews about information architecture and content operations for the modern web.
Web Clipping
lightspark.com
Web Clipping
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Conference Themes
Summary of the top themes and insights from the 2026 GraphCon conference in Seattle.
Book Note
A non-academic introduction to SHACL with rich examples and real-world real world case studies.

Case Study
A cross-platform workflow integration that streamlined content review processes and improved transparency for healthcare point-of-care resources.

Conference Themes
Conference and courtyard themes from Sanity’s first “Everything*[NYC]” developer conference.

Perspective
Structuring and connecting content for the next generation of AI-integrated CMS.

Perspective
Designing and building systems for planning, creating, publishing, and managing content.
Book Note
Well designed authoring experiences make doing the right things easy and doing the wrong things hard.

Method
A comparison of manual, NLP, and LLM-based tagging methods and key takeaways for effective tagging approaches.

Method
Instructions, templates, and scripts for migrating a taxonomy from a spreadsheet into the Taxonomy Manager tool on Sanity CMS.

Method
A purpose-driven process for selecting terms, creating structure, and vetting design approaches on small and large scale taxonomy projects.

Method
An example workflow for coordinating LLMs and text analytics to generate topic tags for an article collection.

Conference Themes
Summary of the top themes and insights from the 2024 Taxonomy Boot Camp conference in Washington DC.

Method
“Deskilling” is a method for framing language models in predictable structures in order to achieve consistent outcomes for well-defined tasks.

Case Study
I helped Elemeno Health design, develop, and release a structured content authoring solution that helps their content work harder and last longer.

Conference Themes
Summary of the top themes and insights from the 2022 Taxonomy Boot Camp conference in Washington DC

Perspective
Structured content treats information as a set of ideas, concepts, and facts to communicate.

Method
Learn to define the information structures and meaning that help structured content reach further and last longer.

Method
An approachable, scalable technique for solving well-defined communication and discovery problems.

Method
Focus on communicating effectively to users, however they choose to access content.

Method
A comprehensive guide to self-hosting Sanity Studio on DreamHost with GitHub Actions for continuous integration.

Case Study
I helped the World Health Organization Department of Control of Neglected Tropical Diseases assess and revise their sub-site information architecture.

Method
Improve the quality of your card sorting results with client collaboration.

Case Study
A content strategy and information architecture approach for integrating health and wellness content.

Case Study
A comprehensive research-backed approach to usability, accessibility, and performance improvement.

Perspective
A deep dive into delivering effective IA and staying focused on the right problems.

Method
Get started with web writing with this intro, template, and set of examples.

Method
Learn how to extract keywords from unstructured user feedback with Natural Language Processing (NLP).

Perspective
Find the right IA for your role with this quick roundup of the different ways IAs staff projects.

Perspective
Information architects work collaboratively to build information environments that support defined user and business goals.

Perspective
Not sure your project needs an IA? Here are some leading indicators for when you should include an IA on your design team.

Perspective
Information Architecture is the process and the product of designing shared information environments to achieve specific goals.

Perspective
Learn how to keep your content whole across contexts with linked data.

Method
Learn to ensure the integrity of content across channels with structured content and linked data.

Perspective
Learn about the complimentary roles site maps and content models play in Content Strategy and IA projects.

Case Study
Global navigation and home page redesign for a pediatric research hospital.

Case Study
A taxonomy and navigation redesign that helped Shoreline realign their Program pages with site user expectations.

Perspective
Gain a better understanding of why users behave the (sometimes bizarre) ways they do with these foundational cognitive science texts.
Book Note
Learning to read creates physical changes in the brain that directly affect how we think.

Perspective
To communicate effectively across digital contexts, we need to understand the way we make meaning as thinking animals.

Perspective
The rise of adaptive, flexible content means designers now have more reasons than ever to better understand code.

Perspective
Designing systems is hard, but information architecture gives us the tools to do so consistently and predictably.
For fifteen years and counting clients have trusted me to help them untangle prickly information architecture and content design problems.
If you’re struggling to create, structure, distribute, and manage content that communicates clearly online, I can help.
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