Peter Merholz, an information architect, who blogs on peterme.com, talks about document genres, Genres Hamper Mobile Internet. “Document genres are about how form and content come together to address a purpose.”
Merholz takes content-related attributes, such as portability, interactivity, multimedia, and responsiveness, and rates how well each type of content works when output to various devices. He rates phones (voice), paper, PC, PDA, and mobile phone (screen). He takes it further and gives examples of two tasks, choosing a house to visit with the purpose of purchasing it and applying for a mortgage, and rates each attribute on a scale of low to high in task importance. In the first task, PCs are best, as their attributes match best with the “high” needs in that task. Paper scores best for applying for a mortgage: “The chart suggests why applying for mortgages is still largely rooted in the world of paper — the crucial elements of comfort/trust and solidity of record.” One person who commented on the posting suggested adding “situational interaction” to the list.
