This paper addresses the initial experiences of a UKbased software development company while introducing the three elements of the ?Informative Workspace?: open-plan working areas, extreme feedback devices and big visible charts / information radiators. Our experiences leave us convinced that visibility is vital, but a key element to successfully enabling an informative workspace was arguably missing in our case: control and ownership of the environment. In our case, the open plan work area contributed to the lack of ownership over the space, and lack of clarity led to a failure of an index card tracking system.