INTERACTIVE DESIGN - Definition

Interactive Design is in essence designing something that can be interacted with or changed by a wide variety of users. It is a brand of design that has been around for centuries and can apply to many different fields, not just electronic ones. One of the earliest examples of an interactive design is puzzles. For example the Tangram is a type of puzzle that has been around for centuries and consists of seven simple geometric shapes that can be moved around and manipulated to form thousands of different patterns or designs.

Speaking in a more modern sense, Interactive Designs are much more commonly electronic and web based, very similar to Web 2.0. Interactive Designs on the web are essentially websites that people from all over the world are able to interact with and often modify to suit themselves rather than simply viewing the sites as an external entity.

INTERACTIVE DESIGN - Examples

Much like the examples of Web 2.0 sites the most common forms of websites designed from an Interactive standpoint are Blogs and Social Networking websites. Other types of Electronic Interactive Designs are also computer games, which can not only be online games where the user is interacting with other users, but also console based games where the user can either interact with the computer individually or in a multi player format. One of the best and most popular forms of a web based interactive game is World Of Warcraft, an RPG used by millions of people world wide in which people can directly interact with eachother via their Avatars.