Exactly how and when did this happen? I just got off the phone with another in a long list of clients who used the word "bucket" several times during a conversation about information architecture. In olden times we used words like "categories" or "sections" but these new kids are dropping their own slang as if creating a website is the new rap-battle.
Neither of the established books on the subject of information architecture—Don't Make Me Think! or the Polar Bear Book—have an indexed reference for the word "bucket". Does the word really work that much better than long established terms? No. The preferred word, "category", is used to described "things having shared characteristics" while "bucket" is a "container". One implies the relationship of things while the other is an object you put things in with absolutely no relationship implied.
From what I can tell this has happened as the result of more and more clients taking on the role of information architect. In the last two years almost half of our clients have come to us finished site map in hand and eager to drop the B-bomb. I don't believe that's the result of failure on the part of web designers and developers but the client believing that they know what works for them. A few months ago we pushed back on sitemap generated by a client. Before coming to us they formed an ad hoc group and met for six weeks to re-categorize their existing site into a new, mythical world of Bucketopia.
In these situations the client is rarely considering the user or goals and objectives for their online presence. Rather these groups often use this exercise to help make sense of their own internal world which doesn't translate into a great experience for the user (We got one site map that was drawn up according to the companies organization chart once and that was such a happy-fun project). It's not that I don't think clients are capable of crafting a proper sitemap. We have had several clients come to us with some really great information architecture—wireframes and all—but anytime I hear the word "bucket" it's like the someone just handed me a piece of wrinkled, tattered paper marked with a black spot.
Using the word "bucket" in web development is the equivalent of using the words "things" or "stuff" in conversation. In both cases details are hit-and-run over by the practice of subtle oversimplification. The result is an experience that lacks eloquence, education, and energy.
Rather than let "buckets" become or own "axe" we ought to push back in these circumstances and do our best to help the client understand why their own internal review and lingo doesn't always craft a better experience. If they want to form in-house tickle-clubs and create their own linguistics so be it, but let them do those things and stuff like that for their accounting or human relations, not web development.
Lastly, a highly accurate representation of the bucket/client relationship.
Join the fray by reading through and commenting at the end.
You know, this reminds me of a selfhelp book my mom read to me about 'love buckets'. The entire analogy was crap.
Or how about "Pail"? I have this image of sitting on the sand at the beach (rather than in a sandbox in a backyard full of catpoop) with a pail and shovel.
*Queue smell of Hawaiian Tropic Oil*
Don't even get me started on the phrase "Type Treatment" or I'll bash some old Agency Salesman in the non-viking-helmet-wearing head.
Can we now set out to produce a blacklist of phrases that artists and directors in this industry should 'never' use? Then we'll know who's paying attention!
A bucket is where the odds and sods go, imo. But then again I'm 40 fawcking 5.
The phrase is, I think, being imported from business strategy/marketing/consulting types. My partner started saying it in business school, and all of her colleagues in corporate places use it in place of 'categories', 'typologies', and other potential words where the complexity might have to actually be explained or elaborated.
As these are the people to whom your clients are themselves accountable, it seems unlikely that your clients, and soon enough your colleagues, will be able to escape. Strategic de-coupling is in order - a different external face from your actual daily work life.
> You know, this reminds me of a selfhelp book my mom read to me about 'love buckets'. The entire analogy was crap
Sounds to me like Def Leppard needs to head back into the studio.
> A bucket is where the odds and sods go
Exactly! Leave it as is.
> The phrase is, I think, being imported from business strategy/marketing/consulting types.
Then I now have a new arch-nemesis. Next person I see wearing blue shirt/black slacks, talking into a Blackberry and sipping Odwalla is going to get a cap in the ass.
> As these are the people to whom your clients are themselves accountable, it seems unlikely that your clients, and soon enough your colleagues, will be able to escape.
Soylent Green is people!
Well said. Can we also add "Band width" to the naughty B word list?
I like "silo". ;-]
Great point. Whenever I design something, I try to get the opinion of someone who has never seen it before. I might get the details right, but I may have lost the big picture, which can easily happen when you're very close to the subject matter. It's worth emphasizing to clients that part of the value in hiring skillful web designers is that they have the opportunity to interpret information from an outsider's perspective. It's a whole new level of empathy for the user.
At an old job, we had "A List of Corporate Buzzwords We Shall Avoid." Topping the charts were "leverage", "ping", and "boilerplate".
> These groups often use this exercise to help make sense
> of their own internal world which doesn't translate into
> a great experience for the user
I was shown a "one sheet" for a new site/service recently. My first question was, "Where are you going to hand this out? And why? It's an online service targeted at end users!"
My second comment was, "Are you trying to sell yourselves on how great this is? If I were your target user I wouldn't care about one thing you put on this sheet. This should tell me why I care."
ANYWAY, I'm curious if the real complaint is that people are trying to do information architecture (that's kinda part of your job) or if it's the fact that they're speaking like cavemen.
Also, can I join your "in-house tickle-club?"
I think the phrase "love buckets" may have made my day. Thanks, Luke!
> I'm curious if the real complaint is that people are trying to do information architecture (that's kinda part of your job) or if it's the fact that they're speaking like cavemen.
I mind when they hand me "finished" architecture that's not well thought out and then use caveman lingo to explain it all. I love clients who get involved and really put effort into it. It means that they are going to own the project once it launches instead of dying on the vine.
Bucket is business B.S. speak for anything that they don't know how to explain in more detail. Example: a corporation can't afford to buy you a $100 piece of software to get your job done right and quickly but they can afford to hire 3 new people to slowly grind away at it because the money is coming from a different 'bucket'.
Bucket, Dude, let's go bowling.
The dude abides.
I guess brevity isn't your thing.
Buckets, dude
I told those buckets down at the league office a thousand times that I don't roll on Shabbos!
Sure! Bucket! That's your answer! Tattoo it on your forehead! Your answer to everything!
Your "revolution" is over, Mr. Storey! Condolences! The bums lost!
You could not have hit the nail anymore square on the head.
Maybe I'm just speaking from experience, but this is often the plight for in-house designers. When a company operates so rigidly from the top down, you can literally be putting your job on the line if you try to battle direction delivered from up the chain. Being powerless is very frustrating when you, for example, have an executive write the final information architecture. Chances are that executive is focused keeping mangers pleased and completely oblivious to the fact that the user even exists. End result: a website that mirrors internal structure and a confusing user experience.
Again, just speaking from experience.
Bucket = site section
Scoop = contact form
Pale = div
Water funnel = online marketing
Sandbox = focus group
Sprinkler = all that taggy stuff with the left and right arrows
Main Jib = masthead
Da Grabber = footer
Poop Deck = FLASHY front page
Word Doc crap = content
The Skin = color palette
Watering Can = opt in/out email forms
I have no idea where clients got the notion to use this from, but internally at my company Business Intelligence routinely refers to different types of information as buckets. I think this terminology is from the language of the software / management tools they use to track our business information.
the most important thing is to ensure you have a viable pipeline into the bucket.
I see the same thing with all this Web 2.0 mumbo jumbo. Hip and rising UI people coming off as if they're defining all these new and amazing interaction patterns when you can find it all the same stuff, with the hard-core studies to back it all up, in the HCI books of yesteryear.
Well I must admit to being cripplingly confused by the wave of new jargon rolling off the tongues of the sad lot what be passing for marketing executrons these days. I'm kind of surprised that you haven't pulled some wildly inapplicable terms out of your own butt and waved them under the noses of these yobos because I'm fairly certain they wouldn't know the difference.... I mean, who's bloody well leading this web design world anyway... you or them?
I rather like Ray's suggestions, but would suggest that you keep your lingo to true buckets and pails, and if we're going that far, why no make 'em brewer's implements that range in size (so that you can gauge how big a bucket your client needs)...... so, as the galaxy's premiere web designing space pirate and creator of the rPhone, I hereby give you these terms... I hope you've the brass monkeys to use 'em next time you're up to your stern in market gack!
The barrel
Half a barrel
The gallon
Half-a-gallon
Quart-pot
Pint-pot
Half-a-pint
Gill-pot
Half-a-gill
Quarter-gill
Nipperkin
and a round bowl
Yarrr, matey.
And anyway, it's "boo-KAY." ;-)
I remember a guy saying "bucket" in 2001 and it took me by surprise back then. Granted he was a marketing type and the first thing that came to mind was "some tech guy probably dumbed it down for him." (Sorry marketing types... that's what came to mind!)
We use "bucket" with a number of our clients because, unfortunately/sadly, so many of them don't understand "category."
"I don't get what you mean by 'grouping into categories?'"
"You know? Like, different buckets of similar information." Then buckets is used from there on.
How could anyone not understand the concept of categories? We all had to learn the Dewey Decimal System which is a great example of how categories are used to classify what content belongs where.
Perpetuating the bucket analogy only dumbs down the process of creating good sites but I understand your plight. Might I also recommend adding Crayons and Playdoh to your client meetings.
Mmmmm, play-doh®.
Categories? Buckets? I like cards.
Avoid all this, and just ask the users.
I don't understand the elitism.
I use terminology that gets the salient point across, and sometimes (oftentimes) "bucket" works. It's a direct metaphor to a real-world object that works almost 100% effectively in getting immediate comprehension.
"Category" is not an appropriate substitute. The laws of software development don't govern whether an object can exist simultaneously in more than one category. I've personally built several web applications where items could belong to several categories at the same time; buckets, however, are governed by the laws of physics, and by all tangible means (quantum physics notwithstanding), items are generally acknowledged to only occupy one bucket at a time. The context around a bucket (especially related to this physical constraint) carries more information to the user than your somehow superior "category" or "section". It's a healthy and appropriate analogy for many use cases, including:
- queuing systems where "buckets" have capacities, and items progress through them as capacity allows
- categorical arrangements with a one-bucket per item constraint
Again, I don't get the elitism. Use whatever words you want. I just don't see any reason to demean professionals who've learned to effectively communicate via conceptual analogies.
Speaking of play doh and crayons, our marketing dept got a new vp a couple of years ago and not only did she introduce the bucket term to us, she also commandeered a corner office and turned it into a sort of brain storming room complete with play doh, crayons, toys, and candy. My 3 year old would love it, but I don't quite see how that helps me build web sites (which is how my 3 year old describes my job).
However, some of the back-end IT folks I work with are worse when it comes to making up words. One tries to make every noun a verb and uses terms like "delta" conversationally. So instead of saying something like, "Ask Julie to see if she'll have enough time to make that change," she'll instead say "Ask Julie if she's calendered properly to see if she has enough bandwidth to make that delta."
WTF?
> The laws of software development don't govern whether an object can exist simultaneously in more than one category.
Who's talking about software development? I'm talking about categorizing content. And where do you get that anyone is being elitist?
> ...she also commandeered a corner office and turned it into a sort of brain storming room complete with play doh, crayons, toys, and candy.
That's one person who is in need of a career change.
> Ask Julie if she's calendered properly to see if she has enough bandwidth to make that delta.
Does he dictate memos via walkie-talkie?
This is hilarious, I've got a client right now that is all about the "buckets." It was the first time I've ever heard the term and when asked to describe what they mean by "bucket" they literally could not muster up any other words besides "you know, it's just like a bucket... for putting things in."
Remember the concept of "bins" from professional video editing software? Anyone?
Point 1.
Categories or sections are not so hard to explain, that we might consider ourselves elitist for even considering them. These are not industry-specific terms. They are common speech, and they are already in widespread use. Their application in technology and the arts is largely the same as in everyday life.
I will make the argument that a section really is a section, and a category really is a category, just like in real life, whereas a bucket is a new paradigm being used in the attempt to oversimplify.
Point 2.
Education is a key part of my business. My customers hire me for my expertise, and explaining/demonstrating the application of such things is not just part of the job, it's part of the basis for the ongoing professional relationship.
I'm not suggesting that we continually correct our customers, or some other idiotic approach. What I am saying is that if you establish respect early on, and make education a cornerstone without being a condescending asshat, the entire issue is moot. Clients are equally empowered when they have clarity on what a section is as opposed to what a bucket allegedly is.
Point 3.
There is a slippery slope as well: When people start using their own made-up terminology, you get ajax. Ajax this, ajax that. It doesn't matter if it's not asynchronous-javascript-and-xml at all. If it's a behavior or anything even remotely dynamic, it's ajax. CSS rollovers become ajax. Status messages that are completely static across page loads become ajax.
Ajax was not even made up: it is a real term for a real mechanism and still, it has been abused. So can buckets be abused. You do not want everything to be buckets.
I'm not even convinced that a single paradigm is justified to be called a bucket, and we certainly do not need another semantic war in this business.
(Sorry if my comment is long and seemingly matter-of-fact; I've tried to be concise. I've also had a couple days to think about it and my thoughts are equally in response to many of the previous comments.)
If you are in need of shoveling crap you gets a bucket and a poop scooper....
p.s. bucketopia.com is not taken ;-)
I am now craving KFC for some reason?
Wow, I thought this "bucket" thing was some kind of local phenomena, I had no idea it was so widespread. I cringe every time I hear it. Thanks for the great post.
Joshua Works has a good question. If used as a specific metaphor, what's the problem?
Well, to me the problem is that such terms are, in the real world, usually used as shorthand for "I don't really know how to organize this stuff, but someone will figure it out for me". Joshua may have a specific meaning for it in his work context (mutually-exclusive categories), but in my experience most people don't have such a well-defined reason for using the word. As Greg says, it's like using the term "stuff", or "whatachmacallit".
If everyone on your team understands that, for your project, "bucket" or "silo" means "mutually exclusive content areas", then go for it. But if you're just using "bucket" to mean "some kinda organizing system", then it's a sign that you need to do more thinking. This is what Greg was ultimately talking about.
Reminds me of how bloggers just somehow picked a term like "colophon" out of old English to represent the "About this site" page when "About" works just as well. Even better actually since it's widely accepted that no one outside of web 2.0 geeks knows what the hell "colophon" means.
Such is what happens when a certain group of people decide arbitrarily on a term without consulting the rest of us, whether it is the best solution or not.
A colophon should describe how the site is made, not really what it's about. Original book colophons described what typefaces the books were set in, and sometimes the paper stock and printing method, etc.
Truth be told, I'm going to resort to just about any metaphor I can possibly find when I'm struggling to get a design/infrastructure concept across to the 80+ year old CEO who insists on guiding his company's site design (my current project).
However, I've found that the classic organizational flowchart method remains the best technical/visual descriptor of a website's design than any sort of trendy catchphrases (like buckets). But, if people insist on describing organization in terms of real world props, I'd suggest that you look no farther than the simple file folder on your computer screen. Even the dunderheads employing you to untangle their web design for them must have a passing understanding of organizing folders and files on their computer.
And yeah... there exists a smidge of elitism in any profession and sure, the mockery of the bucket metaphor has been a bit sophomoric (I certainly tried in my first comment), but remember: there's a strong human desire to standardize around common, industry-wide schemes. Why muddy the water with terminology from video editing software like Final Cut Pro? (an example of where "bins" are used)
Still, we have to face the fact that there will always be people from other philosophical camps who will insist upon using different sets of jargon and different metaphors than we do.
At the end of the day the Client is likely to remain as baffled and confused as they were when you first began the project.... regardless of whether you gave them categories, buckets, bins or candlelight freaking dinners.
The bucket has been an issue in the information management world for a few years now. The idea is that if you apply the proper metadata you can warehouse information in one large repository instead of having to sort into sub-repositories.
For the bucket/silo to work there needs to be a set taxonomy in place, and a file name structure that is easy for the end user to use. Unfortunately the end user will always want to the established file name structure of "bob's letter" and "jane's spreadsheet".
The bucket system can work if it follows a functional classification scheme, where information is sorted by context rather than by content.
The bucket is a prime example of why the IT people, information managers and designers need to be at the same table.
When I first read your post, I was immediately reminded of my college discrete math course, which was the last time I'd heard anyone discuss buckets. Google pointed me to this wikipedia page, which I guess is sort of relevant: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bucket_sort
It may not be the best analogy, but it's at least peripherally related to categorization.
The term "bucket" is used a great deal at MS (particularly in reference to their CMS application). Makes you wonder...
> The bucket is a prime example of why the IT people, information managers and designers need to be at the same table.
It's Peace in the Middle East 2.0.
> Google pointed me to this wikipedia page, which I guess is sort of relevant...
That's a stretch. What's next? Chaos Theory for wireframes? "Bucket sort" is about as relavent to information archicture as a 1938 Buick and/or Tom Cruise.
It's pronounced "Bu-Kay". It's the proper French pronunciation.
Watch out for that tree Richard...
I loved the photo link at the end.
Buckets?
What I love is I've had a few people who try to talk to em as if they are designers, and they try to make themselves sound like they know waht theyar e talking about but I understand NOTHING theya re saying.
update: on Domain Name: bucketopia.com
Created on: 2007-09-29 13:27:04
LOL!
more buckets for dumb stuf!
Mind the pedestrians Richard!
when i was young i used to collect crabs in buckets. then when i was older i was reminded of this fond childhood memory by Kos' song "Put the Crab in the Bucket". and now bucket is working it's way into the www lingo generator. i say, "only fear the bucket when it is you they want to put inside the bucket." and you can quote me if you like.
Just flipped on C-Span to see John Waggonner, Business Reporter for USA Today on Washington Journal. In response to a question about safe investing, he began using buckets. "You may want to put your money in a number of different buckets..."
It's one of those things that once you're aware of, you just can't stop noticing. Reminds me of the "asshole collar".
More and more I am convinced that each day we creep closer and closer to the reality of Idiocracy. Maybe Iceland can save us from ourselves.
I actually hear developers use the term "buckets" a lot, so perhaps clients are picking up on this from coders. Next thing you know clients will be using the term "hax0r" in their emails.
"So we'd like this to POP more. Maybe you can get a hax0r to make it fly around the page?"