Assignment #5: Ethnography

Ethnography is an aspect of social science not many of us are exposed to in our careers.  Computer Scientists and Engineers often focus on their skills, abilities, and knowledge throughout their education and hardly give thought to the consumer or customer they will eventually serve.  I enjoyed reading about ethnography and some specific historical advances in ethnography for many reasons.  First, I was happy to continue my education from this summer when I took a cultural anthropology class and learned about ethnography and its uses across the world.  Second, I think it is a valuable field to be aware of when moving into industry in order to bring a sense of awareness of the outside world to the workplace culture of computer engineering.

As most people,  I think, I thought the article on Coming of Age in Samoa was an interesting read.  I wasn't too keen on Mead's observations, but I thought the knowledge that can be gained from such an ethnography can be valuable.  I think what stood out the most was her ruff with Freeman.  The differences in how they saw the data and how they approached says a lot more about American culture than it does the culture of adolescents in Samoa.  I definitely don't completely understand all of it, but I think it shows how uncomfortable American's are with sex and how trapped they sometimes feel about it.

I enjoyed reading these articles and I'm excited about our mini-ethnography project.

Book Reading #1: The Design of Everyday Things

The Design of Everyday Things by Donald Norman was certainly an entertaining book to read and one that I was skeptical at first was relevant to my education or this class, but I find that it is very applicable tomy studies. Norman presents some rash observations about the devices and objects that surround our everyday lives, and I found it entertaining to read about them and understand what he was referring to, even 30 years later. It was amusing to see complaints about light switches that he expressed and still today they seem unusable when there is a need for a row of 6 or more. (As a side note, why not just create a box that extends from the wall a little bit at a slant. If the bottom was pulled out an inch and the top flush to the wall, then you could place the switches mapped like the room and it would be obvious which switches go to which lights). Some parts of the book seemed hard to get through because he was reiterating his point multiple times, maybe out of frustration. Others because he was talking to psychologists over designers. In my opinion, he should have written two separate books, one for psychologists to understand and debate and the other for designers, explaining things to consider within the design process.

Norman's use of everyday items and tasks to make his points was brilliant. Many of his chosen devices are timeless and will always be a part of our lives. Others, such as the telephone, have developed a lot since he wrote the book and will continue to develop past the point of his ideas in the future.

Chapter 1

Norman has a knack for pointing out bad design and identifying why these designs are so unusable. As I was reading, I constantly was looking around at the items that surrounded me, trying to find an example of bad design. Norman makes you think, and he forced me to recall a few "embarrasing moments" where I had a run-in with a poorly designed item. I can remember one time trying to get out of my car and finding that the key was stuck in the ignition. Ten minutes later I realized that the car wasn't in park. It is fairly obvious that the car needs to be in park for you to remove the key, but the car made no indication to help me out.

Chapter 2

I've never really enjoyed psychology or thought it was a valid science because I consider it to be more of a guessing game that changes with time.  Generalizing the actions of people seems to impose a certain limitation on their abilities.  But Norman covers a different aspect of psychology.  He seems to review a basic psychology of thought that is not only applicable to humans, but anything that gives the appearance of thinking (like a robot or program).  We all go through a process to make an action and he clearly explains the process we go about.  This will be helpful because I think it will be important to always consider each step as I design something someone will use.

Chapter 3

Many people do not think about where information they use throughout the day comes from. Norman outlines the different types of information we use and where it comes from. After reading the chapter, I found myself anaylzing different actions of mine throughout the day, including using a door handle.  I constantly wondered whether the information I needed to perform these tasks came from my head or the world.  Where was I recalling the required information from.  I appreciated Norman's detail in this chapter when he was discussing the capacity of the human brain because I believe it will greatly help in my future as a Computer Engineer.

Chapter 4

This was certainly an interesting chapter to read because of the number of examples provided.  I enjoyed learning about the different constraints that our environment (cultural, logical, etc) places on us in our capacity to perform certain actions.  It was interesting to see how people understand the world around them because of different experiences or cultures that they live in.  This will certainly be useful when creating products for people to use.  I know this chapter helped me understand what I can expect people to know and understand instinctively.  This will not only help me not exceed those bounds, but also use them to make products and services better.

Chapter 5

Chapter 5 was probably my least favorite.  This chapter seemed mostly geared towards psychologists, but I was glad to see that he made some good design recommendations at the end.  I think Norman also made a good point that error should be expected and that no amount of "reading or help" materials will prevent people from doing something they shouldn't.  This provides a valuable lesson that designers should always assume the user will attempt to do exactly what they shouldn't and adding physical constratins or forcing functions can keep people from ruining the device.

Chapter 6

A long chapter, but definitely an interesting one.  At times it seemed too loaded of different information that was unrelated but I was still able to gain a good bit of knowledge.  I enjoyed Norman's explanation of the design process towards the beginning of the chapter.  He talked about how products that have a high turnover rate rarely consider the user in their new designs.  I would hope that my design team would always base new products off the old one while condiering the users' comments.

Good Design

Picture 1: My waterbottle

In the figure, you can see the spout for my Camelbak water bottle.  The spout sports some pretty good design that was easily implemented.  It does take some knowledge to be stored in the head, but I can't really think of another way for it to work.  The spout only allows water through with a change in pressure (sucking or squeezing the bottle) but still has a stop to keep water from transferring.  The good design aspect can be seen in the small black "lip" that lines up with the white piece.  When they line up, water can flow freely.  When they do not line up, there is an interrupt in the visual and tangible flow that indicates no water can flow.  This is helpful because it can be seen from a ways away (or felt in the dark) that it is either open or closed.

Picture 2: Pedestrian Cross Request

In the picture you can see a picture of a button used to cross the street.  The pedestrian can walk up to the intersection and press the button so the computer system controlling the light knows they are there.  This button indicates a great aspect of feedback.  When the button is pressed, a light in the middle lights up and a loud "beep" indicates that the button has been pressed.  Pushing the button multiple times will not affect the functionality which is desireable in such a context.  No human user can break the system by doing anything with the button.  Also, the button just affords a push.  The shiny metal protruding from a pole begs for a push and makes it clear how to interact with it.

Picture 3: Slanted parking spaces

Slanted parking spaces provide a great design for many reasons.  First, they save space and allow more cars to park by making the rows narrower.  Second, when designed correctly, they clearly indicate which direction cars should drive in each row.  This, however, poses a problem, because it does require some knowledge in the head.  However, it can be fairly easy to assume that knowledge by looking at the spaces.

Picture 4: My watch

This is my watch to the right which I consider to be a fairly good design.  Norman complained about his watch and its lack of thought with double-use buttons, but it seems after some time, Timex has perfected their watches.  With a need to hold any button for a permanent change in functionality or time difference, they have protected certain functions of the watch.

Picture 5: Nintendo64

Everyone from my generation has experience the Nintendo64 and loved every moment of it.  From its simplistic usage to straightforward setup, it certainly is an example of good design and mapping.  There are only two buttons on the top, both clearly explained, and a large hole on top, just the right size for a cartridge.  No matter how or when the cartridge was inserted, the game would work and nothing would break.  It was the perfect console for gamers and children alike.

Bad Design

Picture 1: My bathroom faucet

The faucet shown is from my bathroom at home.  It clearly indicates which one is hot and cold with colors, but it does not clearly indicate which way to turn them.  Most people understand the direction you should turn the knobs to have them open or close, but witch the possiblity of an exception it is hard to instinctively know how to interact with the sink.

Picture 2: My living-room light

As you can see from the picture, the light switch for our living room light is inconveniently placed.  The picture is taken from the kitchen and it would make a lot of sense to have the light switch there, where someone may be exiting the kitchen.  Instead it is by the back door, away from the other two "main" entrances to the living room.

Picture 3: My car's accessory compartment

The picture here shows my accessory compartment in my car.  A simple box that hold things should be better designed because I honestly think a mechanical engineer just wanted to have fun with the button here.  The button to the left opens and closes the compartment mechanically, but when the compartment is open, it seems that it should be closed by pulling it closed.  The feedback provided by the button also gives no indication that it should also be used to close it.  Many times I find myself manually closing the compartment.

Picture 4: My Mini-fridge

As you can see in this picture of my mini-fridge, you cannot distinguish which side to open the refrigerator from.  There is no visible handle or finger hold.  Just above the door is a place to insert your fingers to pull the door open, but it is placed on both sides, making it still impossible to distinguish sides.  The mapping is truly horrible on this device.

Picture 5: My Receiver Remote

The problem with this remote is simple, but annoying.  The remote was created for the audio/video receiver and can be used as such, but the power button doesn't always turn off the receiver the first time.  Most of the time it is necessary to push the "receiver" button first before pressing the power button.  It took me months to figure this out, during which time I would have to turn the receiver on and off manually.

Paper Reading #7: The Chinese Room

The Chinese Room was certainly an interesting theory to read about and brings to mind a lot of thoughts about robots, the future of artificial intelligence, and what has already been theorized by scientists, lay-people, and the culture itself.  As I was reading, I was intrigued, not solely by the topic discussed, but the motivation behind Searle's conclusions.  Do we as humans fear our own capability to create something as smart or smarter than ourselves?  Do we not find pride and worth in having children—those we desire to be actually be smarter than ourselves?  Perhaps its because we inherently know that our children are created by God and these robots by ourselves?  We are scared of creating something so knowledgable because of our imperfections and mistakes.

Then there are the rebuttals and arguments against the theory.  These are attempts to refute Searle's conclusions, many of which I agree with and many which are hard to understand.  Perhaps many of the arguments are posed by those who desire a strong AI.  I hope for a stronger AI, but I highly doubt any level of "understanding" will be reached in the future.

This brings me to my largest complaint about the paper.  Many of his key words that Searle uses throughout his paper are left vague or completely undefined.  What is understanding?  What is a mind? These are questions that he leaves unanswered, and they are unfortunately key to making his point.

Paper Reading #6: It's Complicated

It's Complicated: How Romantic Partners Use Facebook

CHI 2012, May 5-10, Austin, Texas, USA

Authors:
Xuan Zhao — She is a PhD student at Cornell University working in the Collaboration Technology Laboratory.  Xuan is mainly interested in CHI because of her background in psychological needs of users and organizations that technology can provide.
Victoria Schwanda Sosik — She is also a PhD student at Cornell but works in the ReImagination Laboratory under Dr. Cosley.  She loves technology and studying the way people can use technology to better their physical and psychological needs.
Dr. Dan Cosley — A professor at Cornell interested also in how people interact with computers, especially with how they use their memory.  He, with a team, has come up with a project called Pensieve that helps peole remember things from the past using their Facebook, Twitter, and Picasa.

Summary

This group studied Facebook and the effect it has on its romantic users.  Much of their research found out a lot about how digital communication can affect romantic relationships.  Their research culminated by finding that digital communication, specifically public ones like Facebook, cause internal and external tensions to arise at the same time.  People find it confusing to figure out what to share on Facebook and what not to.

Related Work

1. Crossing boundaries: Identity management and student/faculty relationships on the Facebook
2. Identity construction on Facebook: Digital empowerment in anchored relationships
3. " I'll poke you. You'll poke me!" Self-disclosure, social attraction, predictability and trust as important predictors of Facebook relationships
4. The benefits of Facebook “friends:” Social capital and college students' use of online social network sites
5. The development of romantic relationships in adolescence
6. I'll see you on “Facebook”: The effects of computer-mediated teacher self-disclosure on student motivation, affective learning, and classroom climate
7. More information than you ever wanted: does Facebook bring out the green-eyed monster of jealousy?
8. Trust and privacy concern within social networking sites: A comparison of Facebook and MySpace
9. Online and offline social networks: Use of social networking sites by emerging adults
10. College students' social networking experiences on Facebook

This work is not really novel at all.  Many different types of research have been made on relationships and technology's influence over them.  This research seems very trivial and hardly an advancement on past research.

Evaluation

Their data was all completely qualitative, gathered from subjects who subjectively answer questions and recorded their Facebook doings.  They collected these opinions from the users point of view and analyzed them to find a common trend among relationships.

Discussion

I enjoyed reading the article because I feel it is very applicable to the college circles I'm a part of.

Paper Reading #4: Intimacy in LDRs over video chat

Intimacy in Long-Distance Relationships over Video Chat

CHI 2012, May 5-10, Austin, Texas, USA

Dr. Carman Neustaedter	Dr. Saul Greenberg
A professor at the School of Interactive Arts and Technology at Simon Fraser University. He enjoys puzzles (mostly mind puzzles) even to the point where he placed a puzzle in his 411 page dissertation.	A professor of Computer Science at the University of Calgary. Saul enjoys outdoor activities such as mountain biking and hiking.

Summary

The authors of this paper did a thorough analysis of Long-Distance Relationships (LDRs) and how video chat (or Skype) is effective in communication.  After interviewing twenty-four individuals about their LDR, they concluded that the majority of the time couples spend on video chat is considered simulated cohabitation.  Couples will simply "be" on Skype and work on their own work or do their own liesure.  This simulates an environment that seems like they are just hanging out after work "at home."

Related Work

1. Time spent together and relationship quality: Long-distance relationships as a test case
2. Relating at a distance: Negotiating being together and being apart in long-distance relationships
3. Trust without touch: jumpstarting long-distance trust with initial social activities
4. Media use in long‐distance friendships
5. Sensation: a Presence Enabler for Long-Distance Relationships using Skype and Visual Presence Representation
6. Time and Space on Skype: Families Experience Togetherness While Apart
7. Physical Intimacy and Equity in the Maintenance of College Students' Romantic Relationships
8. Willing to Learn: A Look at Romantic Relationships while Abroad
9. Online communities: Networks that nurture long-distance relationships and local ties
10. Would you do it again? Relationship skills gained in a long-distance relationship

Based on the related work that I found, the work done here isn't exactly novel, but does come to some new conclusions.  I enjoyed reading the work and think that there is a lot of uses for their research.

Evaluation

All of their data was strictly qualitative but somewhere between objective and subjective.  They interviewed a bunch of people and gathered the information to analyze it.  Although the interviewees probably told the truth and gave facts, they may have been slightly skewed with subjectivism.  It is hard to say whether their data was objective or subjective.  The conclusions they made, however, were objectively based on the data collected.

Discussion

I hope this research is used in the future to develop better or more useful forms of communicating (or at least allowing options for LDRs).  So much of a LDR is hanging out and I think that the future will hold new technologies that bring this capability to life.  This was not mentioned, but I think one idea would be watching movies together (somehow keeping the video synced so they can see each other's reactions).

Paper Reading #3: Characterizing Web Use on Smartphones

Characterizing Web Use on Smartphones

CHI 2012, May 5-10, 2012, Austin, Texas, USA

Session: Me & My Mobile

Authors (all from Rice University)

• Department of Psychology
• Chad C. Tossell
• A PhD student under Philip Kortum
• Philip Kortum
• A professor at Rice University
• Philip mainly focuses on device usability in the computer and electrical engineering world with a background in mobile and web devices.
• Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
• Ahmad Rahmati
• A PhD student for Computer Engineering who works with Dr. Zhong.
• Clayton Shepard
• A third year PhD student from New Mexico who loves a good beer on his off time (I think Clayton and I would get along well).
• He specializes in mobile systems (another reason I think we would get along well!).
• Lin Zhong
• The leader of the Efficient Computing Group at Rice University which leads research of making computers and web-based interfaces efficient and usable.

Summary

This research group sought after information regarding web usage on smartphones for the average person.  They recruited 24 people who promised to use the iPhone given to them as their only smartphone for a whole year.  This iPhone logged all internet usage from browser-based access, to email, to native applications downloaded from the Apple AppStore including amount of time spent on sessions and location where the session was accessed.  Upon the returning of the smartphones, they found interesting data that complemented previous data from PC usage.  They noted that much of the internet usage on the iPhone was short and direct (very little 'browsing' in the literal sense).  This is complementary to the PC because much PC internet use is for browsing or spending large amounts of time.  The iPhone was used much more often than a PC but for smaller chunks of time.  They also noted a difference between browser use and NIA (native internet application).

Removed (native applications)		Kept (native internet applications)
SMS	Voice Phone	Email	Maps
Non-Web Games	Camera	Facebook	Weather
Settings	iPod	Web Games	News
Table 1: Some NIAs and categories of NIAs analyzed along with several that were removed.

When analyzing the NIA data, they were able to divide the users into two major sub-groups.  The first group they labeled "Pioneers" as the people who seemed to use their web browser for all of their web access.  For example, instead of using the Mail application, they would use their email's web-service in the Safari browser to read and write emails.  The second group was labeled as "Natives" who used NIAs much more often than their browser, unless they were searching Google for something.  They made a several other less significant claims regarding the study.

Figure 1 (Tossell et al)

On an interesting note, Figure 1 shows a graph of use over time of the browser versus the NIA suggesting that initially the browser was used until NIAs were found for the tasks which the user needed to perform.

Related Work

1. Informal learning with PDAs and smartphones
2. User Experience Analysis of Smartphone Web Surfing in UMTS Networks
3. Exploring Cross-Device Web Use on PCs and Mobile Devices
4. Universities and Libraries Move to the Mobile Web.
5. The future of the mobile web
6. Smartphones vs. laptops: comparing web browsing behavior and the implications for caching
7. Web services on embedded devices
8. Tales of 34 iPhone Users: How they change and why they are different
9. Mobile application development: web vs. native
10. Web services on mobile devices-implementation and experience

There was a large amount of related work to this topic, but nothing done on such a specific topic as how people use their iPhones.  There has been a lot of talk about the difference between PC work and mobile device browsing, but not much discussion over the different ways users accessed the web.

Evaluation

The authors used plenty of quantitative and objective data to make their claims, but some subjectivity was exercised in the gathering of that data.  After a year of collecting data over what websites were accessed, where they were accessed from, and how they were accessed (as well as how much time was spent on the internet) it would be hard for them to make any of that data subjective or qualitative.  All of the data collected was qualitative except the actual web addresses they were collecting and sorting into different categories.

Discussion

I enjoyed reading about this research as it interests me how the world of the web is evolving and being used differently by different people.  I think it is fairly novel for the types of claims they were able to make with the data and I fully support their suggested functionalities for future smartphones to accomodate different users.  

Paper Reading #2: Timid Encounters

'Timid Encounters': A Case Study in the Use of Proximity-Based Mobile Technologies

CHI 2012, May 5-10, 2012, Austin, Texas, USA
Session: Me & My Mobile

	[no picture locatable]
Christian Licoppe	Yoriko Inada
Professor of Social Science at the Paris Institute of Technology Mostly does work on social interactions through media and mobile devices.	No information found. Associated with the Paris Institute of Technology, Department of Economics and Social Sciences.

Summary

Figure 1: a meeting between players demonstrating unusual interactions (Licoppe et al).

Licoppe and Inada constructed a study on proximity-based mobile encounters, specifically in Japan with the game called "Dragon Quest 9."  They studied the effects of a gaming environment on public social interactions that somewhat requires more interaction than normal in a public setting.  E. Goffman coined the term 'civil inattention' to describe public social interactions as "an exchange of gaze to manage the embodied encounter that acknowledges the mutual proximity but evades any further involvement and singularization of the encounter and its participant" (Licoppe, 2761).  Basically, current public interactions between strangers merit a mutually understanding gaze that requires no action beyond the simple recognition of proximity.  When a new ecology (that of a social game) is added to the mix, how to people act?  They study this 'hybrid ecology' of a mix between typical public social interactions and that of acquiring a sense of singularity about a person to gather information about these new games that require physical proximity.  Their study reveals a unique form of interaction they call a 'timid encounter,' the most popular form of encounter for strangers in the game.  It involves arriving at a preset location at a preset time, but not directly interacting with the other players and instead staying far enough away to keep to oneself.  The hybrid ecology seems to yield a hybrid interaction.

Related Work

• Extending cyberspace: location based games using cellular phones, Rashid et al.
• Pirates: proximity-triggered interaction in a multi-player game, Falk et al.

There seems to be little or no directly related work, but much has been researched regarding proximity-based games and how to make them fun and useable.  This new research by Licoppe and Inada should further discussion on exactly how to implement proximity-based games and what kinds of functionality to provide to the players.

Evaluation 

Licoppe and Inada seemed to be fairly thorough and objective with their research, but provided much qualitative data and no quantitative data.  They researched small numbers of groups in France and Japan (only two in Japan) and they only visited them each about three times.  Much of their conclusions and understanding of situations came from interviews with some players as well as observations of the meetings and conversations on online forums.  They based a lot of their understanding on previous social understandings regarding public interactions.

Discussion

I think the research is fairly novel and useful but could go more in-depth and cover more ground.  With the limited amount of research done, it seems near impossible to draw definite conclusions, but then again it is only the beginning of future research.  As noted in the article, too, the research seems location-based as it is very specific to Japanese interactions.  The French interactions came to the same conclusions most of the time, but there were large difference. Licoppe and Inada's research will hopefully pave the way to providing robust proximity-based games which seem to become more and more popular as mobile devices reach more people and become more capable of handling such complicated game-play.