Several folks have emailed me about this, but I just got my hands on a copy of the I.D. Magazine 2005 Design Annual last night; Behavior’s design for Vote: The Machinery of Democracy was lucky enough to receive a Design Distinction award. I had actually heard about this a little while back, though I wasn’t even sure what “Design Distinction” might mean. Now that I have the annual in front of me, it’s turns out to be something like a runner-up position, just a step above ‘honorable mentions.’ We’re in good company, too — the Museum of Modern Art’s gorgeous Tall Buildings, designed by the sharp minds at For Office Use Only, also received a commendation, which is very flattering.

Representin’

Awkwardly, though, the I.D. Magazine production staff inadvertently chose to print an image of our design in transition; that is, in the midst of animating from one content section to another. If you look at the page, all that’s displayed on the screen are the basic color blocks of the layout — not quite the best representation of the piece. Whoops! Oh well. All I can do is have a sense humor about it, because it’s terrific just to have been recognized.

Flashy

As an aside: one thing I noticed among the winners in the Interactive judging for this year’s design annual is the preponderance of Macromedia Flash-driven designs. By my quick count, about twelve of the fifteen winners are rendered principally with Flash, and none of them with Web standards-based tools as the primary authoring method — including our own Vote design, admittedly. I have nothing against Flash as a medium for producing award-winning design, but hopefully next year there will be some consideration paid to other methods for crafting smart online experiences, too.