What do you think?
Rate this book
Ambient Findability: What We Find Changes Who We Become
How do you find your way in an age of information overload? How can you filter streams of complex information to pull out only what you want? Why does it matter how information is structured when Google seems to magically bring up the right answer to your questions? What does it mean to be findable in this day and age? This eye-opening new book examines the convergence of information and connectivity. Written by Peter Morville, author of the groundbreaking "Information Architecture for the World Wide Web," the book defines our current age as a state of unlimited findability. In other words, anyone can find anything at any time. Complete navigability.Morville discusses the Internet, GIS, and other network technologies that are coming together to make unlimited findability possible. He explores how the melding of these innovations impacts society, since Web access is now a standard requirement for successful people and businesses. But before he does that, Morville looks back at the history of wayfinding and human evolution, suggesting that our fear of being lost has driven us to create maps, charts, and now, the mobile Internet.The book's central thesis is that information literacy, information architecture, and usability are all critical components of this new world order. Hand in hand with that is the contention that only by planning and designing the best possible software, devices, and Internet, will we be able to maintain this connectivity in the future. Morville's book is highlighted with full color illustrations and rich examples that bring his prose to life."Ambient Findability" doesn't preach or pretend to know all the answers. Instead, it presents research, stories, and examples in support of its novel ideas. Are we truly at a critical point in our evolution where the quality of our digital networks will dictate how we behave as a species? Is findability indeed the primary key to a successful global marketplace in the 21st century and beyond. Peter Morville takes you on a thought-provoking tour of these memes and more -- ideas that will not only fascinate but will stir your creativity in practical ways that you can apply to your work immediately."A lively, enjoyable and informative tour of a topic that's only going to become more important."--David Weinberger, Author, "Small Pieces Loosely Joined" and "The Cluetrain Manifesto""I envy the young scholar who finds this inventive book, by whatever strange means are necessary. The future isn't just unwritten--it's unsearched."--Bruce Sterling, Writer, Futurist, and Co-Founder, The Electronic Frontier Foundation"Search engine marketing is the hottest thing in Internet business, and deservedly so. Ambient Findability puts SEM into a broader context and provides deeper insights into human behavior. This book will help you grow your online business in a world where being found is not at all certain."--Jakob Nielsen, Ph.D., Author, "Designing Web Usability: The Practice of Simplicity""Information that's hard to find will remain information that's hardly found--from one of the fathers of the discipline of information architecture, and one of its most experienced practitioners, come penetrating observations on why findability is elusive and how the act of seeking changes us."--Steve Papa, Founder and Chairman, Endeca"Whether it's a fact or a figure, a person or a place, Peter Morville knows how to make it findable. Morville explores the possibilities of a world where everything can always be found--and the challenges in getting there--in this wide-ranging, thought-provoking book."--Jesse James Garrett, Author, "The Elements of User Experience""It is easy to assume that current searching of the World Wide Web is the last word in finding and using information. Peter Morville shows us that search
183 pages, ebook
First published January 1, 2005
61 people are currently reading
1061 people want to read
About the author
Peter Morville
10 books189 followersPeter Morville is a pioneer of the fields of information architecture and user experience. He's been helping people to plan since 1994. Clients include AT&T, Cisco, eBay, Harvard, IBM, Macy's, the Library of Congress, and the National Cancer Institute. He has delivered keynotes and workshops in North America, South America, Europe, Asia, and Australia. His work has been covered by Business Week, The Economist, NPR, and The Wall Street Journal. Peter lives in Ann Arbor, Michigan with his wife, two daughters, and a dog named Knowsy.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 94 reviews
September 29, 2011
Ambient Findability by Peter Morville is often used as a textbook in the reference course I took. The professor I took it from didn't include the book but the title and the fact that it was published by O'Reilly Media piqued my interest enough to want to read it as the class was starting up.
Although the description mentions information overload, the book isn't really about that. It's about how information and people hook up. There is the information that one seeks and that which falls into one's lap.
Morville begins his book by wondering how the reader has come across his book. He goes on to wonder if anyone will find his book.
Much of the book is a discussion on techniques of cataloguing information so it can be found again. It isn't though an SEO recipe book. Instead it is a call for professionalism, consistency and intelligence behind how information is gathered, sorted and marked for retrieval.
I read a library book via interlibrary loan. Someday I would like my own copy.
Although the description mentions information overload, the book isn't really about that. It's about how information and people hook up. There is the information that one seeks and that which falls into one's lap.
Morville begins his book by wondering how the reader has come across his book. He goes on to wonder if anyone will find his book.
Much of the book is a discussion on techniques of cataloguing information so it can be found again. It isn't though an SEO recipe book. Instead it is a call for professionalism, consistency and intelligence behind how information is gathered, sorted and marked for retrieval.
I read a library book via interlibrary loan. Someday I would like my own copy.
December 31, 2014
really enjoyed what i got through before having this due back at the library. while i was pretty skeptical about picking up a tech book nearly a decade old, ambient findability is a creative nonfiction about information, wayfinding, mapping, storage & retrieval (and probably lots more i didn't get to). was delighted to find out the author is also a librarian.
November 14, 2008
i once made a joke to my friend that this book was about finding tangerine dream records when browsing through a record store. if that was the case, i'm not sure if that would increase or decrease the amount of stars. i guess it depends on which era
November 23, 2021
There have been times when I saw down with a topic and I just couldn’t get the words and the ideas to align. There were other times when the idea was so powerful that the words seemed insufficient. This is the case with Ambient Findability. Peter Morville is speaking of the changes in thinking that are happening all around us and how we acquire information. There’s research to support the fundamental premise that we acquire much of what we know based on passive and indirect access to information. In other words, we’re not looking and we don’t know what we’d be looking for even if we were. Marcia Brown believes that 80% of the information we learn is gathered this way.
Click here to read the full review
Click here to read the full review
April 12, 2012
This book reads as an overview of most popsci/popphil books from the past twenty years and in many ways it is exactly that. There is some stuff about findability and some vision about the future it heralds, but it looks like Morville bites off more than he can chew.
I don't really know who this book is written for. The engaged professional will not read anything new and it is too wildly disparate and biased (but not nearly opinionated enough) to serve as an introductory text.
March 17, 2014
Ambient Findability is an interesting and thought provoking read, the book dedicates itself towards the questions of how we can design into: a fast emerging world where we can find anyone or anything from anywhere at anytime.
I use the phrase "design into" intentionally. The world for which Ambient Findability primarily concerns itself with has not yes been created, but to ensure the world exists we must begin designing into our products and services the constructs for such a solution.
Morville's book is a foundational look at how we find. The hope is that by exploring the way in which we find and our biases for how we both process information and find information-- I found a lot of synergy with the research conducted in: Keeping Found Things Found.
If you're in the middle of a meaty complex project of information architecture and trying to figure out how to find a more robust solution, this book is not for you. However if you are at the beginning or heading into this project, this book will put the work ahead in perspective and give you a framework for thinking about where the opportunities lie ahead.
Though it's nearly a decade old, this book still has value.
I use the phrase "design into" intentionally. The world for which Ambient Findability primarily concerns itself with has not yes been created, but to ensure the world exists we must begin designing into our products and services the constructs for such a solution.
Morville's book is a foundational look at how we find. The hope is that by exploring the way in which we find and our biases for how we both process information and find information-- I found a lot of synergy with the research conducted in: Keeping Found Things Found.
If you're in the middle of a meaty complex project of information architecture and trying to figure out how to find a more robust solution, this book is not for you. However if you are at the beginning or heading into this project, this book will put the work ahead in perspective and give you a framework for thinking about where the opportunities lie ahead.
Though it's nearly a decade old, this book still has value.
April 27, 2019
Did not finish this book. Maybe the description was erroneous, maybe I misunderstood, but I though this would tell me about the web and content. About how to organize content or at least what principles people use for information foraging. Instead I got a generic about the state of the art of technology in regards to findability. Mismatch. Might read for other purpose another day.
March 2, 2011
Read this for grad school. Actually, much better than I expected. It was written long enough ago that all the discussions about social networking don't yet mention Facebook. Makes me realize how fast things advance in the technology world.
October 13, 2017
Morville is a good writer, with interesting analogies, but I felt some of the chapters were not relevant to the focus of the book and sometimes the topics got off track.
September 29, 2020
Required reading for school. Overall, this book has some good concepts. However, it is sadly out of date. I'm really surprised it's still included in the curriculum. Search engines and the way we interact with the web is so different from when this book first came out. The book mentions that Netflix is still mailing DVDs. There's a wary example of a GPS wrist device for children, which reminded me how everyone has those on their wrist's now with an Apple watch. It also has a lot of the "sky is falling" rhetoric that I remember from around 2005 when I went through undergrad. I would like a new edition of this book to see how the author's ideas play in 2020.
March 4, 2019
Desperately in need to a second edition, too much of this dated, with unfamiliar jargon that clearly never caught on. Doesn’t help that so many pop-cultural science and pop-tech writers have heavily mined (ie. ripped this off) in the years since it was written. I can see why it was highly influential at the time though. Was an assigned text for my library degree, makes me think the syllabus needs updating.
February 26, 2017
As far as assigned reading for my MILS goes this book was well written, entertaining and engaging. It was written in 2005 and could badly use some updating but I found many of the author's points have held up through and maybe even become better enforced through the changing technologies. I wonder what he would have to say about facebook... ugh.
November 15, 2020
To be fair, I‘d give it 2.5 stars.
It‘s not bad but seems to be not that relevant.
Also, don‘t get fooled by the blurb‘s questions along the lines of „How do people find ...?“ or „how is information structured?“ because you won‘t find real answers in this book. At least not in a technical sense, the book provides some vague ideas at the very best.
It‘s not bad but seems to be not that relevant.
Also, don‘t get fooled by the blurb‘s questions along the lines of „How do people find ...?“ or „how is information structured?“ because you won‘t find real answers in this book. At least not in a technical sense, the book provides some vague ideas at the very best.
January 23, 2024
The most important variable governing the use of information is accessibility. Add to that Mooer’s law and you get an intriguing and concrete slim volume that is still useful and an informational “gut punch” almost 20 years after publication.
November 25, 2024
The title and blurb set very high expectations that the book did not live up to for me, it has lot of great info, some of it is shadowed by the age of the book, tech moves so fast that many references here got obsolete. But the theme and general ideas are good and well explained.
October 26, 2017
amazing book
Amazing book that opens window to a much larger faculty. I came looking for something interesting I think I am going to dwell on this for years to come now..
Amazing book that opens window to a much larger faculty. I came looking for something interesting I think I am going to dwell on this for years to come now..
December 9, 2018
thought provoking informational book. I would recommend this to middle school readers and would find a spot for it on my classroom bookshelf
April 11, 2019
Отлично!
Книга особенно хорошо читается в 2019 году. Основная часть идей автора хорошо прошли проверку временем. Некоторые ошибки в предсказаниях неизбежны и не кажутся глупостью.
Книга особенно хорошо читается в 2019 году. Основная часть идей автора хорошо прошли проверку временем. Некоторые ошибки в предсказаниях неизбежны и не кажутся глупостью.
February 16, 2022
阳志平和少楠推荐了，信息时代的一把钥匙。终于读完了，3个小时。留了一大堆标注，脑中杂乱的吸收了很多离散的观点。还得读���书并不是how层面的书，只是帮我理解了互联网这个世界，尤其是从信息的角度。
February 13, 2016
How do you find your way in an age of information overload? How can you filter streams of complex information to pull out only what you want? Why does it matter how information is structured when Google seems to magically bring up the right answer to your questions? What does it mean to be "findable" in this day and age? This eye-opening new book examines the convergence of information and connectivity. Written by Peter Morville, author of the groundbreaking Information Architecture for the World Wide Web, the book defines our current age as a state of unlimited findability. In other words, anyone can find anything at any time. Complete navigability.
Morville discusses the Internet, GIS, and other network technologies that are coming together to make unlimited findability possible. He explores how the melding of these innovations impacts society, since Web access is now a standard requirement for successful people and businesses. But before he does that, Morville looks back at the history of wayfinding and human evolution, suggesting that our fear of being lost has driven us to create maps, charts, and now, the mobile Internet.
The book's central thesis is that information literacy, information architecture, and usability are all critical components of this new world order. Hand in hand with that is the contention that only by planning and designing the best possible software, devices, and Internet, will we be able to maintain this connectivity in the future. Morville's book is highlighted with full color illustrations and rich examples that bring his prose to life.
Ambient Findability doesn't preach or pretend to know all the answers. Instead, it presents research, stories, and examples in support of its novel ideas. Are we truly at a critical point in our evolution where the quality of our digital networks will dictate how we behave as a species? Is findability indeed the primary key to a successful global marketplace in the 21st century and beyond. Peter Morville takes you on a thought-provoking tour of these memes and more -- ideas that will not only fascinate but will stir your creativity in practical ways that you can apply to your work immediately.
Morville discusses the Internet, GIS, and other network technologies that are coming together to make unlimited findability possible. He explores how the melding of these innovations impacts society, since Web access is now a standard requirement for successful people and businesses. But before he does that, Morville looks back at the history of wayfinding and human evolution, suggesting that our fear of being lost has driven us to create maps, charts, and now, the mobile Internet.
The book's central thesis is that information literacy, information architecture, and usability are all critical components of this new world order. Hand in hand with that is the contention that only by planning and designing the best possible software, devices, and Internet, will we be able to maintain this connectivity in the future. Morville's book is highlighted with full color illustrations and rich examples that bring his prose to life.
Ambient Findability doesn't preach or pretend to know all the answers. Instead, it presents research, stories, and examples in support of its novel ideas. Are we truly at a critical point in our evolution where the quality of our digital networks will dictate how we behave as a species? Is findability indeed the primary key to a successful global marketplace in the 21st century and beyond. Peter Morville takes you on a thought-provoking tour of these memes and more -- ideas that will not only fascinate but will stir your creativity in practical ways that you can apply to your work immediately.
March 31, 2013
Fascinating pot pourri of thoughts, facts and sources all focused on the topic of 'Ambient Findability', that is, the ubiquity of information that digital media now makes accessible to us all. Of course, the information may be out there and accessible, but human irrationality and bias makes us all too flawed in the way we select and interpret what we find and use. Peter Morville (author) has sourced some great quotes, including this one on the subject of bias from Herbert Simon: 'A man does not live for months or years in a particular position in an organization, ..... without the most profound effects upon what he knows, believes, attends to, hopes, wishes, emphasizes, fears, and proposes'. It's an eclectic collection of thoughts, drawing on history, technology, architecture, economics, psychology, AI, cartography and more. It teases out connections between them to show how the web has changed how we think and live our lives. There are many terms that are new to me, like Intertwingularity (the way in which everything is connected, made manifest by things like hypertext), Wayfinding (as in compass, maps, chronometers, landmarks, edges, nodes, all now made newly accessible through the web), Noosphere (the sphere of human thought. Quoting Wikipedia, the noosphere is the third in a succession of phases of development of the Earth, after the geosphere (inanimate matter) and the biosphere (biological life)), Boundary Objects (ideas and things that 'are shared but understood differently by multiple communities), and so on. It's fascinating stuff and the kind of book that one can keep returning to and getting a dose of excitement each time you rediscover long forgotten insights.
October 14, 2013
This is a really interesting book that I really wanted to like more than I did. It's got a lot of great ideas, but it often dissolves into word-collage raves about the glowing future that technology will bring us... from the lens of 2005. Maybe it can't help being dated, but then there's the part where the author gushes about the possibility of his Treo (PDA/Smartphone) merging someday with his GPS unit so he could have ONE device that does BOTH THINGS.
Overall, the book is both thought-collecting (great quotes and pointers to other people's ideas) and thought-provoking (it made me think). But the sheer rambulosity and the ecstatic spirals of futurism left my brain feeling scrambled. I'm hard-put to articulate more than this as the main thesis: "Being able to find things is important, and the future will make this even easier than it already is."
As another reviewer commented, the illustrations in this book seem to be randomly thrown in, with no judgment call about whether they inform the reader or not. For example, Figure 6-3 is a painting of the Tower of Babel... because this phrase occurs in a nearby paragraph. Figure 7-9 is a snapshot of the Declaration of Independence, referenced as follows:
"Fifty years before co-authoring and signing the Declaration of Independence, shown in Figure 7-9, young Benjamin [Franklin] created 'social libraries' to promote the free sharing of books and the pursuit of knowledge through study and vigorous debate."
Overall, the book is both thought-collecting (great quotes and pointers to other people's ideas) and thought-provoking (it made me think). But the sheer rambulosity and the ecstatic spirals of futurism left my brain feeling scrambled. I'm hard-put to articulate more than this as the main thesis: "Being able to find things is important, and the future will make this even easier than it already is."
As another reviewer commented, the illustrations in this book seem to be randomly thrown in, with no judgment call about whether they inform the reader or not. For example, Figure 6-3 is a painting of the Tower of Babel... because this phrase occurs in a nearby paragraph. Figure 7-9 is a snapshot of the Declaration of Independence, referenced as follows:
"Fifty years before co-authoring and signing the Declaration of Independence, shown in Figure 7-9, young Benjamin [Franklin] created 'social libraries' to promote the free sharing of books and the pursuit of knowledge through study and vigorous debate."
October 10, 2007
This book is kind of a "state of the field" summary for information search and discovery, a hot topic these days. It covers the concepts of search and discovery, and findability, as well as the technologies that are currently developing and show promise (though it was published in 2005, so it's a bit out of date already). There is some discussion of how to make things findable, the relevance to libraries and information-based institutions, and what knowledge might look like in another few years. I was entertained by a thread arguing against Clay Shirky's blog posts on several matters -- my disagreement with Clay on a recent analysis of Second Life made me appreciate it even more. However, I disagreed with the author a bit on Web 2.0 -- he quoted a number of sources for his view that the 2.0/3.0 distinction was meaningless. I've been using Web 2.0 to mean the personalized, interactive web that we're seeing now, and Web 3D to represent the next step of immersive technology, and I don't think there's anything fuzzy about either of those. Overall, though, I liked the book a lot, and appreciated his copious footnoting and discussion of sources, as well his ability to bring it all together in a relatively small space.
September 9, 2012
So I'm coming back to UX as a topic, post-degree, for personal reasons. (Frankly I enjoyed this more than any other study area!)
This is a recommended text from my main study text, and on completion it's easy to see why - Morville has an easy to understand writing style, full of analogies to make his subject clearer, rather than threatening you with complexity.
There are some signs that this book is becoming a little dated, at least in the edition I've read, with regular references to the Treo as a current PDA, iPhone is a little in it's future just yet, and I'm sure Apple's impact would warrant it's own chapter in any revision.
That said this is a book about connections, integration, and reflection on good design coming from thought rather than mindless process and conformity to standards. There is depth of research evident on every page; it will take me a month just to work my way through the reference material he quotes, and some of the input he draws upon comes from some surprising sources.
A great book for UX designers, whether web or app-based, to read and reflect on, but also it's well written enough to interest the layman or general technologist.
January 1, 2022
I feel so seen! This book is not for everyone, but it was exactly right for me. I’m so glad this was assigned to me in my current MLIS course, because I (ironically) never would have found it on my own.
The book is all about how we find things. On the web. In libraries. In life. It dives into the history of search; the connecting theories and values of findability; and how libraries, web developers, and content creators can all learn from each other. In addition to loving books and libraries, I started my MLIS journey because I think there’s a lot content marketing professionals and web managers can learn from how libraries organize materials. This is the first book I’ve read that spoke to all these areas and made connections between them. It was a fascinating read and also really affirming to know these connections do truly exist.
Highly recommend to anyone interested in how people find things, especially if you’ve got a foot in the web, tech, or library worlds. If that’s you, you will like this book.
The book is all about how we find things. On the web. In libraries. In life. It dives into the history of search; the connecting theories and values of findability; and how libraries, web developers, and content creators can all learn from each other. In addition to loving books and libraries, I started my MLIS journey because I think there’s a lot content marketing professionals and web managers can learn from how libraries organize materials. This is the first book I’ve read that spoke to all these areas and made connections between them. It was a fascinating read and also really affirming to know these connections do truly exist.
Highly recommend to anyone interested in how people find things, especially if you’ve got a foot in the web, tech, or library worlds. If that’s you, you will like this book.
May 16, 2011
A coworker loaned this book to me, but I don't think enough time has elapsed since graduation (almost ten years ago!) for me to be able to enjoy an academic book. I wanted it to be practical and applicable, or I wanted to read about research presented in layman's terms. Instead, this felt very conceptual and theoretical and historical.
The last three chapters were ok, but I still don't feel like I learned much. For most of the book I felt like I'd walked into the room in the middle of a conversation among professionals who'd been having a decade-long discussion that they pick up again whenever they meet. I think I am the wrong audience for this book. I'd like to know more about information architecture, but this clearly is not the place for me to start.
The last three chapters were ok, but I still don't feel like I learned much. For most of the book I felt like I'd walked into the room in the middle of a conversation among professionals who'd been having a decade-long discussion that they pick up again whenever they meet. I think I am the wrong audience for this book. I'd like to know more about information architecture, but this clearly is not the place for me to start.
December 26, 2019
This book has been a classic in the field of UX and, in general, this author has done so, so much to advance the field, I can't even. He's a winner. However, the book is pretty dated now. That's not the fault of the author; it's just that the field is changing so fast, and change is accelerating. If you are new to UX, this book is good background, presenting important concepts. If you're already really experienced, I might go for something more recent. If so, I suggest you stick with O'Reilly: you sort of can't go wrong.
I'm not assigning stars, because if it were 10 years ago, it's def a 5. Now, though, it's either a 3 or a 4 (again, no fault of the author--life moves on), depending on, well, you.
I'm not assigning stars, because if it were 10 years ago, it's def a 5. Now, though, it's either a 3 or a 4 (again, no fault of the author--life moves on), depending on, well, you.
December 9, 2016
Ugh. I was given this book by a colleague who was very excited about it. I on the other hand found it a chore to finish it. The concepts and ideas were certainly interesting - to a point - but at most times it read like the equivalent of visiting some Future land exhibit of the past. It was interesting (again, only to a point) to see where the author thought computing would take us in the future. Also, I found most of the examples and pictures to really distract from the theory and despite the book being beautifully printed in full color these pictures often did little to enhance the message. Rather, since most of them were dated examples they actually detracted from the overall understanding.
September 9, 2007
I enjoyed this quick tour of information and how we find and use it. I appreciated the balanced view Morville presents. On the one hand, there is optimism, because so much information is so accessible to so many people. On the other hand, there is a thoughtful acknowledgment of the "dark side:" information overload, possible threats to privacy, and our proneness to the fast food mentality in how we consume information.
I read this for a class, so I might have more to say after I get the chance to discuss it with colleagues.
(One very technical complaint unrelated to content: the binding completely fell apart while I was reading, and the book is now in five pieces!)
I read this for a class, so I might have more to say after I get the chance to discuss it with colleagues.
(One very technical complaint unrelated to content: the binding completely fell apart while I was reading, and the book is now in five pieces!)
Displaying 1 - 30 of 94 reviews