The rest of that question is, clearly, “to me” because it might not be useful to you at all (DIM stands for “Dynamic Information Map.”) But here’s why I think it’s important to me. (I actually did some searching around movement and information transfer to see if there was something other than personal experience I could point to and could only find this reference from 2004. But then I’m not an expert in information management.)

Because when I think of a topic I am interested in, such as the recent Gulf oil spill, I start with the central idea and then attach information to it as I remember it or think of something I am interested in or add more information about it to my memory. Then, whenever after I go back to that topic, I enter the map I have of that topic that I have built and work with it as I review what I know and add to it and explore the connections between various bits of information and I’ve forgotten things and so on.

Furthermore I don’t have a fixed structure to the map. The map is defined solely by the relationships between the information ideas and there associated details in it. There is no need for a fixed structure. I have an inexhaustible supply of 3D space in my mind and can move everything and anything around as I need. In fact, trying to remember a fixed structure would be to try and remember more information than I need. All I need are the relationships. Of course I’m not actually building an image of a 3D map. What I am describing is really a process which goes on behind the scenes which I’m translating for the purposes of thinking about it.

So this is why I think the movement of the dynamic information map works for me. It works smoothly alongside the way I think. There is no need to have a fixed structure to the map because the relationships are all I need and if there are two many pieces of information attached to any other I just sub-divide the map. Presenting me with a fixed structure to the map only adds to the information I have to remember. It’s unnecessary. Now, of course, this may not be the way you think. When you do think spatially without recourse to paper and pen you may build an internal map that is static and is drawn on an internal sheet of paper which you bring out and look at. And that would be fine. It just doesn’t work that way for me.

So, as it turns out,  Cloud-based dynamic information mapping information services reflect for me much more accurately what goes on in my mind when I think about different individual topics — which is how I organize the information I think about; my subject thinking uses a topic-based approach.

By the way, here’s a link to a DIM I’ve put together for the Gulf oil spill 2010.

Up next: dynamic information mapping and the news.