2CO COmmunicating COmplexity 2013 Conference Proceedings

The convergence between factors such as a growing accessibility to new tools, channels, and approaches towards communication, and their encounter with the increasing levels of specialization and complexity characteristic of our society, unveils new and stimulating scenarios for the communication design community. In such constantly evolving general framework the dissemination of technical, scientific, social and environmental content, tends to shift from the more traditional and consolidated channels to new communication environments. This new information 'space' is populated by networks of discrete units of information: concise communicative elements that combine graphics, typography, illustration, animation and narrative in new informative formats, giving shape to a sophisticated ecosystem, where a variety of hybrid informative units collaborate and complement each other. This emerging scenario, which takes full advantage of the emerging patterns of social networking, has not only rapidly transformed the way we inform, forcing well established actors in the traditional information arena to change their approach to communication: this new way to promote ideas, projects and values, has opened to new players unexpected opportunities to make their voice heard. Within this new communication landscape, new forms of 'visual explanations' of complexity respond the a growing demand of direct participation, and of the idea of networked communities based on the sharing of information. Being capable of balancing the transmission of complex contents while engaging the public's attention and curiosity, these new ways to inform and communicate have become the field of study and of professional activity of a vast international community of designers, scholars, professionals, that confront themselves with exciting interdisciplinary challenges.