Cost, Perceived Cost Affecting Usage Behaviour

The humble Biro is one of those ubiquitous products that is by and large ok to forget to return, or to put it another way - steal. Which helps explain why this Salt Lake City café has adapted the default design to extend their claim of ownership. But why is this product socially acceptable to steal? Even in a city where faith and responsibllity is pushed to the fore?

For those wanting background research my colleague Jan Blom has written extensively on what motivates people to personalise objects e.g. here he's also got good material in the pipeline which I'll link to in due course.

For a start the pen is mass produced, ubiquitous, changes hands as part of a task process (signing a credit card slip), and typically can be replaced for very low cost. Last week I chatted with guys from our LA design studio (cheers RN, AG & DB) and have since been mulling over the extent to which the in-store sticker cost is associated with the perceived value of the product.

Lets take a real world example from the advertising in the photo below- is it really possible for a Wal-Mart to make a profit or at least break even on a Motorola c139 mobile phone at less than $15? This isn't just about loss-leading. Despite its tangible presence the product in this advertisement isn’t the phone - the product is connectivity, and that’s where for Tracfone and by association for Wal-Mart where the promise of future profits lie. Of course this is nothing new - operators the world over take a hit on the device and make it back over the course of the contract with devices that best support services offering up the largest sticker subsidy.

But the gulf between sticker cost and actual cost hides something deeper than a lighter wallet. Like the humble biro it changes our perception of what it means to 'own' a product and may well have significant impact on the speed at which the product ends up reaching the end of its life as a functional object, of being discarded. With an estimated 1.2 billion mobile phones being sold next year this is a non-trivial matter. Transparency plays an important role in helping individuals understand their environmental impact (which is why I like the Kill a Watt that came in the TED gift bag). To what extent could or should the price of objects be transparent?

Writing from Tokyo | March 15, 2007 | Permalink

Authoritative Reference Points

Time is everywhere, and its confusing.

It's strapped to my wrist, displayed in my rental car (though thankfully I don't have to deal with this) broadcast on the radio, there were two bedside alarms in the hotel, on my sat-nav, mobile phone, digital camera and laptop. Which is not inherently a problem except that many of these sources synchronise automatically, and to do this successfully it needs to know both where I am and what the local time is. And that today the US government has switched to day light saving hours, bless them so one of these is in doubt. And I don't know which time source I can trust.

In a world where current time information is ubitquitous the wrist watch has largely lost its relevance as a time keeping device (though don't expect it to disappear - it still has value). And no device has yet stepped up and completely filled its role as a time source you can always trust on. Yeah I know, you can get your mobile phone to automatically synchronise the current time with the network. When's the last time you really trusted the network? The network operator?

Right now I've either missed my flight, or got another hour to kill.

Writing from Monterey | March 12, 2007 | Permalink

When you Delegate Positive Experiences

During yesterday's TED talk I proposed that from a design perspective a potential solution to pretty much every design problem is delegation - getting other people or technology to complete those parts of a task or activity that the user is unable to complete themselves. With the exception for things like bodily functions e.g. going to the toilet or entertainment - you wouldn't pay someone to go to the cinema and enjoy a film on your behalf. (Yes, just because its a potential solution doesn't make it a worthwhile goal to aim for).

Except that at some point - when we are better able to understand and map sensorial experiences and have a better understanding of how the brain processes these you may well be able to delegate entertainment experiences to other people, to be enjoyed at your leisure at a later time and date. In essense - time, location and body-shifting experiences. Movie buffs amongst you will already be tutting about Strange Days, and so you should.

Experience shifting raises all sorts of interesting questions about empathic design, where from an physiological-emotional perspective experience designers will literally be able put themselves in someone elses shoes. What are the characteristics of the people whose experiences will define, well, the essense of the experience we wish to design for, to communicate? It can be anything from designing an out of the box experience to learning, knowing what it feels like to walk in a Sao Paulo subway station (above), the touch a razor from a Chinese back street barber (below) and yes, will encompass sexual encounters. In this world DRM boils down to removing experiences from human memory and the inevitable badly written DRM leaves its host as a vegetable.

A new profession will arise - people whose job it is to experience stuff, and who will be judged on their ability to capture the subtlties of any difference process, task or context. With a distinction between raw experiences and those enhanced though stimulants, or post production. And yes, Gonzo?

Anyone feel like writing a job spec for this job from the future? Thoughts in the comments please.

Writing from Monterey | March 10, 2007 | Comments (1) | Permalink

Ideo Presentation Download

Yesterday's presentation at Ideo Palo Alto entitled Always On - An Introduction to the Design Research for Everyware can now be downloaded from here [Powerpoint, PDF 2MB]. It highlights the challenge of designing for everyware and that, if we are serious about minimising negative externalities, our ultimate need to understand the relationship between everyone and everything. In essense our challenge is to understand the sum of all human experiences - which is clearly impossible. The PowerPoint includes slide notes, which I'll expand on at some point.

Thanks to Jane Fulton Suri for the invite, and the lunch-time audience for, well, engaging between mouthfulls.

And the snowglobed city? The San Francisco view from my capsule hotel.

Writing from San Francisco | March 6, 2007 | Permalink

The Selfish Toothbrush

The electric toothbrush is a selfish object. Not in terms of the power it consumes - a viable enough argument, but in the level of engagement it requires during use.

For many people mornings are about completing a number of time-pressured tasks before walking out the door - ablutions, sustenance, getting dressed, and caring for appearance to present ourselves in public. In between all of this we somehow find time to catch up on the latest news, make packed lunches, and look after dependents whether kids, pets, plants or (occassionally) spouses. And at some point most people brush their teeth.

With so many things to do its not surprising that we multi-task - newspapers browsed whilst downing coffee, listening to the radio whilst getting dressed, interrupting tooth brushing to complete two handed tasks like opening the sock drawer or place objects into bags. Which is why the electric toothbrush is a selfish object - it demands to be held the whole time it is used and the alternative that works with regular tooth brushes - to be clasped in the mouth for those moments when you need both hands is not an option. Why? The device is too heavy, and more importantly it continues to vibrate making the mouth-clasp a thoroughly unpleasant experience. (Yes it can be temporarily placed on flat surfaces but it leaves nasty hard to remove toothpaste marks). At what point does the electric toothbrush becomes light enough to be clasped in the mouth polite enough to turn off the vibrator for that moment? At what point does it really fit into the flow of the morning? And in our sunny, shiny future perfect at what point does the act of brushing teeth become redundant? Replaced, for example by super efficient armies of Colgate branded bacteria scrubbing your teeth on your behalf? Pop a pill when you walk out the door, arrive at work feeling minty fresh.

A convoluted link, but a link never the less - I've been using the N800 for the past week - and it seems destined to fill a small but friendly role the the home. But as with the toothbrush its a selfish device that requires two handed engagement to be able to appreciate what it has to offer, which is fine in a number of contexts just not during the morning multi-task.

There’s another much talked-about selfish object on the horizon - the iPhone. How well will it fare as a two- handed device in what is more many people a one-handed multi-tasking world?

Writing from Tokyo | February 26, 2007 | Permalink

Cost Optimisation

When the plane touches down theres usually one or two travellers who take off the battery cover, pop out the SIM card and replace it with a SIM from the local carrier. In wealthier markets to what extent will reductions in roaming charges reduce the practice of SIM card swapping? For more price sensitive consumers - whether students in Helsinki or increasingly the bulk of consumers in emerging markets what cost differential is sufficient to maintain multiple SIM cards?

Photo from a study in Brazil last year.

Writing from Tokyo | February 13, 2007 | Permalink

Keyholes as Entry Point to Nodes in the System

But what functionality does the key hole represent? And what is the cost of finding out?

The way in which an object is inserted into another object affecting the way that the data on that object is treated by the device it is inserted into. Simple example? Your home computer has 2 USB slots - attaching your digital camera cable to the 'secure' slot automatically carries out a sequence of tasks such as copying and encrypting the data before wiping the memory card. Yes, potentially it severely limits the host device functionality - in what contexts is this beneficial?

Need more options? The ways in which memory cards (yeah, gosh, keys) are inserted into their host affecting what happens next. Variables? Whether the memory card is squeezed, rammed, pinched, stroked, caressed, or even held during insertion and copying process. Beyond the obvious what effect for memory card coitus interruptus? Hmm, definitely time to head out.

Last thought for the day: to what extent do memory cards remain embedded in one device or 'migrate' between devices? Between owners?

Ta Ben for the loan of the finger.

Writing from Geneva | February 10, 2007 | Permalink

LIFT Presentation Download

The slides to today's LIFT presentation on Literacy, Communication & Design can be found here [6MB PowerPoint] with a related essay here. The presentation was long on highlighting issued raised by the design research and short on showing solutions that have been proven to work beyond what is currently possible with well designed simple mobile phones. I can understand this probably disappointed a number of the audience, but ask yourself why. I'm not yet convinced that the obvious solutions - spoken menus and more comprehensive use of icons particularly work and the complexity and subtlety of the design solutions don't translate well to this presentation format in the time available.

A summary? Illiterate consumers are in many ways lead users for the rest of us.

The MotoFone mentioned in the question and answer session can be found here, and related Nokia products here and here. Related research can be downloaded from here.

And the photos? The first two were used in the presentation - field research in Delhi from 2006, snow falling on Helsinki from earlier this year and a presenter on the podium from an earlier session.

Writing from Geneva | February 9, 2007 | Comments (0) | Permalink

Infrastructure, Discoverability & Speed of Adoption

At what point does infrastructure become, well, infrastructure - the stuff you can rely on being out there?

Would you buy an electric driven vehicle when there are only a few public recharging points scattered around your regular stomping ground? To what extent do technologies such as personal access to accurate location positioning and real-time status updates mitigate the need for blanket coverage of infrastructure such as this Elektrobay charging poing in London's Covent Garden? (This charging point is aimed at council workers not the general public so the argument is moot in this exact context).

Knowing a charging point's location, availability, quality and cost can go some way to support early adopters. Being able to reserve it ahead of time takes some risk out of the process - though it could introduce a hedge market for access to that particular power stand. Value added? Self driving vehicles that hook themselves up to the nearest power source will remove the end user hassle of having to remember (in the same way that in the domestic context keeping personal devices charged and otherwise maintained is something that can be delegated to autonamous machines).

And yes you could argue that to maintain a higher degree of consumer environmental awareness you don't want to make the re-charging process seamless. Will we see the fuel equivilent of warning signs on cigarette packets?

Writing from London | February 5, 2007 | Permalink

The Legality of Supporting Recognised Usage Behaviours

Power cord for a mobile phone re-routed around the gear stick. The conflict between designing for known usage patterns and supporting what is increasingly becoming an illegal activity - calling without using a headset whilst driving.

A journey to Geneva somewhat marred by the vehicle having a fuel leak.

Writing from La Praz | January 30, 2007 | Permalink

Separation of Church & State, What You Carry

Religious slogan adorns the wall of an Iranian sports hall - a common enough sight in a city adorned with revolutionary murals. Thoughts for today: the cultural differences in separation between church and state. Does the relatively high level of physical religious presence encourage or discourage the carrying of religious artifacts amongst mobile essentials? And for mobile phone manurfacturers does it encourage or discourage the religous customisation such as ringtones or wallpapers?

And the photos in the sport hall? Your's truly partaking in a 5-aside footy game between conducting contextual interviews in Tehran late last year. Yup, that phone is not a phone, its a stop-watch.

Writing from Tokyo | January 18, 2007 | Permalink

Hear My Tunes

Writing from Darjeeling | December 28, 2006 | Permalink

Shared Phone Practices

What happens when people share an object that is inherently designed for personal use?

A Nokia Research team set out explore this topic during a July 2006 field study in Uganda with a brief to understand how people share mobile phones. The research builds on prior research from India, China, Nepal and Mongolia and Indonesia.

An longish essay on Shared Phone Use can be found here, and a presentation co-authored with colleague Indri Tulusan entitled Shared Phone Practices: Exploratory Field Research from Uganda and Beyond can be downloaded from research dot nokia dot com here [7MB, PowerPoint]. A full list of related research can be downloaded from here , and you can sign up to be notified of new downloads by email info @ janchipchase.com with the word subscribe in the subject line.

The research team identified 6 shared use practices: an informal service called Sente that essentially enables a mobile phone owner to function as an ATM machine; mediated communication that neatly side-steps issues of technological and textual literacy; the ever popular practice of making missed calls; the pooling of resources to buy the lowest denominations of pre-paid airtime and extend the access days for the phone that is topped up; the use of community address books to reduce errors and (supposedly) encourage phone kiosk customer loyalty; and finally Step Messaging - the delivery of text and spoken messages on foot.

Whilst the baseline benefits of sole ownership and use of a mobile phone are personal, convenient, synchronous and asynchronous communication, the personal and convenient aspects of mobile phone ownership are compromised by sharing. This support the notion that phone sharing (as it is defined at the beginning of the essay) is seen as more of a transition to sole ownership than a naturally stable state.

For many poorer consumers in emerging markets other people's perception that you are connected is the status symbol, a sign that you have arrived and in some senses are worth connecting to. When most of the members of a person's peer group , or society are connected the focus of status shifts to the brand and model of device. phone ownership is not the same as use - if there are cheaper ways to communicate these will be used.

We are increasingly coming across what have termed unlikely consumers, where feature rich and once premium devices in the hands of the very poor and the myriad of ways the devices get there we have dubbed sideways adoption. Today the front-line of telecommunications innovation is in connecting the unconnected, and its a matter of time before today's unlikely consumers become tomorrow's innovators.

Heading to Sikkim early tomorrow for altitude + fresh mountains air, will return in the new year. Oh, and whilst no-one got it totally correct there is a winner for the blinged nano - will be shipped in January.

Writing from Darjeeling | December 21, 2006 | Comments (1) | Permalink

Contextual Advertising

Advertising for train pass (Suica) equipped mobile phones advertised at the point of their intended use - the ticket barrier.

Writing from Tokyo | December 4, 2006 | Comments (4) | Permalink

Anytime, Anyplace, Anywhere (in Tokyo)

Shibuya Station morning commuters walk past a sign advertising Mobile TV. 10 things you didn't know about mobile TV here.

Cultural practices and the the likelyhood of technology adoption.

Writing from Tokyo | | Comments (3) | Permalink

Personal Cultural Radar

A lamp shade made from dozens of internal rubber sheaths of Tenga's - a Japanese single use penis pump.

For those of you who like to know how things work - a cross section diagram of a Tenga can be viewed here and its possible to contrast the internal differences between each of the designs that they make. The product packaging, its relative simplicity, and the rich sensory nature of its human interface when in use make it an interesting case study for user experience designers.

The lamp shade formed part of the Peace Needs a New Logo event in Aoyama and an element of its appeal (or otherwise) as an artifact is in understanding its origins. In practical terms it means having dismantled a penis pump which in turn implies having purchased and used one, or at least having spoken with someone who has. And whilst there are contextual, individual and cultural differences to what you discuss with whom, the obscurity of its origins, its display in a public space, and the very personal nature of a Tenga's use make this lamp shade a conversational bonding experience waiting to happen. As such it reminds me of the shift that is well underway in how we process the cultural references around us and how future changes in technology will in turn create new shifts in this landscape.

Today's mobile phone already combines the ability to process audio, visual and other sensor captured information. It is in essense an early form of a cultural radar - in tune with your personal preferences and the values you prescribe to. The quality of those carried sensors, the sensors in the world around us, the extent to which interaction is automated will only grow over time - leading to new ways of understanding our context. If you value the perspective and critical eye of WallPaper*, the New York Times or even Future Perfect then you'll simply sign up to their subscription service to apply their filter to your literal view of the world.

Given that part of the enjoyment of an object or service is in the process of discovery, in knowing and understanding obscure references, how does the designer/artist/creator remain two steps ahead when the links between things are inherently that much clearer?

As a valued reader kindly pointed out earlier this year Future Perfect is not half the site of Grant McCracken's This Blog Sits at The Intersection of Anthropoogy and Economics. When it comes to writing about culture I couldn't agree more. And finally credit where credit is due, during my travels to and from the mountains this week I finally managed to spend time on Adam Greenfield's Everywhere well worth a read if you want a more systematic approach to understanding the ubitquitous world.

Writing from Tokyo | December 3, 2006 | Permalink

QR Bar Code Meta Data

QR bar codes (photo below) embedded into the mosaic of the station posters (above) - each 'tile' is a separate bar code. Snap a photo of the bar code with an appropriate camera phone to follow the link. From Shibuya station.

Writing from Tokyo | December 1, 2006 | Comments (1) | Permalink

Large Buttons, Gesture Input

Spent the last couple of weeks observing an elderly relative first puchase then use a digital camera for the first time. What stood out? The touch screen on the Sony T50. Why? Human motor skills depreciate over time and the soft keys are larger and less fiddly than anything than can be squeezed on the physical form factor.

But the bonus? The speed at which a (relative) novice learnt and understood gesture based interaction - sliding her finger left and right, to navigate photos.

Writing from Tokyo | | Comments (0) | Permalink

Mobile TV, Personal Experiences

Learn ten things you didn't know about Mobile TV in this essay.

A summary? Its all about a personal experiences; home use is surprisingly popular; watching is a small part of the whole; up to 4 people can view a mobile TV at the same time but the act of sharing changes what it means to be a phone; why accessories are a struggle; design content for changing user postures; immersion is possible but is it desireable?; interactive experiences require interaction which is difficult if the user is not holding the device; everything you wanted to know about very personal media consumption but were afraid to ask; and finally what, how and why people watch in secret.

You can download a new presentation on Mobile TV entitled Mobile TV, Personal Experiences here [4MB PowerPoint].

Want more? A paper co-authored with my colleagues Cui Yanqing and Younghee Jung (pictured in Seoul above) entitled Personal Television: A Qualitative Study of Mobile TV Users in South Korea can be downloaded here [0.2 MB PDF]. And the previously published presentation entitled An Anatomy of Mobile TV Use Cases can be downloaded from here [7MB, PowerPoint]

Related research as always, here.

Writing from Tokyo | November 20, 2006 | Permalink

Bacterial Paranoia And Device Handling

What are the cultural differences in attitudes towards cleanliness?

Some cultures have an inherently high awareness (or paranoia depending on your perspective) of bacteria and its perceived consequences. These photos are taken in carrier shops in Seoul, South Korea - where you can irradiate, air-brush, wipe and scent your phone.

How might this affect device usage? For starters: the extent to which devices are shared; where objects are placed when not used; the likelihood that a protective cover will be placed over a phone - all of which affect device interaction.

Related: cleaning swab for telephone in a Seattle hotel room.

Writing from Tokyo | | Permalink

Personal TV

A mobile phone user sits alone watching live baseball whilst sitting in Komazawa Koen, Tokyo.

One of the surprising findings of a recent research study we did in South Korea was the extent to which Mobile TV was used in the home. Given the competition in the home from large screens, good audio, high definition and known content why would anyone watch mobile TV in the home space?

Its turns out that people really value control over the watching experience. No need to negociate with other family members over control of the remote or control of the sofa. Curled up in bed with a hot cup of cocoa. Of course. Want to multi-task whilst you're instant messaging/downloading/doing homework? Why Not? Extrapolate this contol over the experience to contexts in and outside the home. The key benefit from Mobile TV is not mobility- very few people will watch whilst actively on the move - its that the experience is personal. Its time to start thinking about Personal TV.

Picked up in a recently published summary of Mobile TV research published by Dr Shani Orgad. Plus a few slides from the South Korea study can be downloaded from here with a full paper due once a suitable venue to publish is found.

In the big scheme of things does a more personal experience for you imply a more impersonal experience for the rest of us? Are your personal experiences socially connecting? Or do they cut you off from everyone except your media?

Writing from Heidelberg | November 13, 2006 | Permalink

Trust in What You Give

At any time the average urban Iranian is within a few meters of a collection box like the one pictured - the larger model can be found at regular intervals on most pavements and its smaller cousin (photo below) is frequently found on shop walls. A snap assumption would be that their frequency is indicative of the nature of giving in Iranian society, but is it really so? Does the tangible reminder to give translate into actual giving?

It's partly an issue of trust - to what extent do you trust that the money that is placed in the collection box ends up in the hands of those for whom it is intended? Street crime is an issue in Tehran - I’d guess from the way people behave, carry and interact with the objects they carry it is similar to London in its intensity. To a thief the charity box represents an-hoc 24 hour loose change machine - to be carried off, forced open or, given the volume of keys that must be out there, simply unlocked.

And supposing you trust that the money is affectively collected by the, um, money collector, do you trust that it is put to good use? How transparent is the collection, distribution and application of those monies?

Fast forward to our naturally future perfect, where you carry the real time means to browse, preview, pay, track, and in the case of digital goods and services, receive and store what you buy i.e. through a personal mobile device. What new ways of charity giving does this enable? What is the personal mobile device equivalent of putting a few pennies in a collection box? A pre-loaded Give Now application - simply select a charity an amount and press send where the results are billed to your account? Or donations triggered by the tasks you complete - every time game played results in a 10 cent donation. Even matched funding according to how much you spend on your phone bill, assuming of course calls are not already free by then.

But as with the collection boxes on the streets of Tehran, how sure are you that your digital donation is actually being put to good use? Whom do you trust to administer the money collection service? A Vodafone, MTN or Cingular? A Motorola, Samsung or Nokia? An HSBC or CitiBank? Or a charity branded application or service?

And given that donations can be tracked to what extent do you, or for that matter the charity, want to highlight exactly when and how the money is spent?

Writing from Tokyo | November 6, 2006 | Permalink

Opportunity to Give

As collection boxes become part of the urban landscape, how to ensure that customers continue to give? And the same question when giving is digitized?

Photo from newspaper kiosk in Tehran.

Writing from Tokyo | | Comments (0) | Permalink

Features That Help Owners Make the Sale

Menu items on a japanese Sony Ericsson phone converted on the fly into a comic strip - each speech bubble represents a function. Navigating left or right trigger a new comic strip layout. Highly creative but also a jarring transition as soon as you skip to any other part of the phone's standard menus driven interface.

The extent to which this kind of software interface feature helps raise awareness of the product - the 'hey check this out' part of hanging out with friends. The extent to which device owners actually uses this feature once bought - or whether they revert to the (arguably more) usable menu driven interface for day to day usage. The extent to which use after purchase is irrelevant i.e. the feature has served its function.

It's owner? David Williams of Asentio Design Shanghai.

Writing from Daikanyama, back of | November 5, 2006 | Permalink

ID Cards and the market for Fake ID Cards

Take a journey through a Chinese urban landscape and you'll soon come across stenciled advertisements for fake IDs - one phone call, meet up, hand over some yuan and you can obtain a work live/permit for a different city. In China there are restrictions on where you can live/work and although its possible to get away with it, having the necessary permit brings a degree of flexibility. Jump over the ocean to the US where college students are frequently carded - producing a photo ID, typically a driver's license to get served in bars or enter nightclubs. It's not surprising that in the US fake IDs abound, or at least that they did when I was underage and hitching my way across Texas.

What has this got to do with Iran? Iranians carry a National ID card and from experience where there are originals there are invariably fakes. Or are there? Buying a train, bus or plane ticket requires the ID card but the activities where fake IDs are most likely to be used in other cultures - drinking alcohol and entering night clubs don't apply to Iran. Underground events or private pool parties aren't the sort of places where a card with a photo is any more likely to get you in and buying alcohol is strictly an under the counter affair.

What mainstream activities enabled by being able to prove you are a different age, person or even gender? Are these 'benefits' sufficient to trigger the mainstream use of fake ID cards?

And what does this have to do with the photos above? Actually... nothing, they're just details from one of dozens of revolution related murals that have been painted on the sides of Terhan tenements. These remind me of the 'men ...rituals... touch...' by Barbara Kruger.

Writing from Tokyo | November 1, 2006 | Comments (0) | Permalink

Abstract Commodities: Money, Identity

The shared understanding and agreement of value that enables markets to form and transactions to take place. Current Iranian Rials, Shah era Rials and US Dollar bank notes for sale in the photo above, and SIM card + phone numbers below.

SIM cards are still scarse in Iran - ordering one takes months unless you're willing to pay to jump the queue. Numbers starting with a 1 - the first SIM cards to be issued by the government/operator, command a higher price than more recent issues. Abstract values indeed.

Shipping out in a few minutes. Cheers to the local crew for making it happen so smoothly: Mahsa, Saeed, Mohy, Nigar and Azadeh.

Writing from Tehran | | Comments (0) | Permalink

Literal Translation, In the Name of God

Only a few days of the study left and a still a need to cover a lot a ground in different parts of the city - in Terhan if you want to beat the traffic you either take a motorbike or the metro and since I need to document above ground it's a bike + driver. Lunch is spent sipping a decent coffee - Raees Cafe on Jam St. trying to making calls whilst admiring the advertisement for the Jeff Koons Illy collection. Its too much to hope to see any Koons + Cicciolina products on the shelves here.

For one call the automated operator voice kicks in - Bismillah hir hahram ibrahim... which is then followed by a literal translation in English "In the name of god. This is the International Iranian Switching Center. The number you have dialed does not exist on this network."

One for you l10n people out there.

Writing from Tehran | October 29, 2006 | Permalink

Wayfinding Redundancy I

An arrow pointing the way to Mecca on the ceiling of a Tehran hotel room - a simple enough task for a GPS enabled mobile device. Given the relative predictability of everyday life, and the multitude of actual and relative directional cues - in what contexts is a Muslim really unlikely to know the direction of Mecca? What other more emotional needs could a digital direction finder meet?

Writing from Tehran | | Permalink

Value Added Services

Ringtone, wallpaper, application and anti-virus services of Cairo's thriving mobile phone market in Abdul Aziz Street. Most of the people in this photo are either buying or selling a mobile phone, or phone related services.

Popularity of file transfers mechanisms: copying to memory card, Bluetooth and in last place infra red.

Writing from Cairo | October 14, 2006 | Permalink

Anatomy of Mobile TV Use Cases

The slides for yesterday's presentation on An Anatomy of Mobile TV Use Cases at the Annenberg Center for Communication can now be downloaded from here [7MB].

The presentation draws on a 2005 qualitative study into commercial S-DMB Mobile TV in Seoul, South Korea by Younghee Jung, Cui Yanqing and myself. These slides concentrate on only one aspect of the study - the three main use cases that were documented and explored - evening commuting, macro breaks and home use. Actually we uncovered a compelling fourth use case, but we'll wait until a full research paper is published before revealing what it is.

A summary? Researchers and designers often talk about use cases but to what extent do the details of the experience need to be communicated to the project team (and in what formats) in order for these scenarios to be useful? What are the elements of the experience that can make or break whether new services move beyond early adopters? The devil is in the details.

Thanks to Mizuto Ito for hosting and to HyeRyoung Ok for carrying the discussion.

Writing from Los Angeles | September 22, 2006 | Comments (1) | Permalink

Literacy, Communication, Design Presentation

>

The slides from last week's UIAH presentation on designing for illterate users can now be downloaded from here [6MB]. The presentation draws a lot of its material from this essay on research into illiterate communication practices that weve been doing.

A synopsis? Don't frame the question by 'designing for illiterate people', think about the skills that are necessary to use the core features on a device - something which we term device competency. Consider the different types of literacy that users do have. To what extent do risks & consequences affect device exploration? Why iconic support and voice prompts can be part of a solution but are far from being the solution - instead look to a range of solutions on the device, on the network, and in user's ecosytem. The eco-system can be anything from (task or device) literacy classes to posters on walls. Last but certainly not least that it is better to solve the problem (illiteracy), than design work-around solutions for dealing with the problem (illiterate users stumped by text driven device interfaces).

Why should you be interested designing for illterate people? For selfish reasons of course - illiterate people make excellent lead users - solutions that meets their needs may well point the way to ease of use for the rest of us. I'm sure you can think of other reasons too.

The download is a somewhat condensed version of the original presentation. One slide I removed plays the devil's advocate - that textual literacy is itself a work-around for other forms of communication. At what point does human kind evolve to the point where literacy as we know it becomes redundant? A topic for another day perhaps.

Thank-you to Teemu Leinonen and Andrea Botero Cabrera for hosting the session, Media Lab students for posing questions worth answering and a lively discussion and of course to the extensive team of colleagues who made it all happen (slide 2 of the presentation since you ask).

Related illteracy research here, related presentations here. To be sent notification of new Future Perfect publications, presentations and presentation downloads send an email to info @ janchipchase dot com with the word 'subscribe' in the subject line.

Writing from Tokyo | September 20, 2006 | Permalink

Swimming Not Drowning

Playing timezone yo-yo and heading stateside today.

For those of you that prefer a tangible presence - I'll be presenting some research we did last year on Mobile TV Usage in South Korea. Design teams often uitlize use cases as a way to focus the direction of a design - this presentation will focus on the details of three use cases from the Mobile TV field study considering the elements that can make or break technology adoption in the real world.

Where? A double bill with HyeRyoung Ok on the 21st September 2006 at the Annenberg Center for Communication hosted by Mizuto Ito and on the 26th September Hillsboro, Oregon hosted by Wendy March of Intel's People & Practices Group.

And on the 25th September the Waving Not Drowning workshop at the EPIC conference will cover processes to make effective use of lots of photo data in field work. Sounds exciting doesn't it? It's basically about following a few simple rules so that you can concentrate on more interesting things - such as the content of the photos. The workshop will not be buzzword complient so feel free not to drop by if thats your thing.

Writing from Tokyo | | Permalink

The Order in Which Services Are Cut

Four phone booths, one of which was optimised for wheelchair access.

The order in which services roled out. The order in which services are rolled back.

Writing from Helsinki | September 16, 2006 | Comments (0) | Permalink

Clearing Hotel Security

The ASEM summit that is being held in Helsinki and today's hotel check-in is somewhat different to the usual. The SAS Royal is hosting the Malaysian and Singapore delegations and the lobby has been retrofitted to include an airport style security procedure - pass all bags and metal objects through the x-ray machine and walk through the screening gate. (A friend staying in a hotel with Chinese delegation later mentions a perimeter around the hotel and guards on floors - I'm experiencing security-lite). After 20 hours on the road anything that gets between me and a shower/bed/privacy is simply a nuisance so and since the security screening appears to be optional and dependent on being pulled aside I take the opportunity to waltz by and check-in. So far so good.

Except that 2 hours later trying to catch up on sleep and there is a knock at the door. The Helsinki police, the hotel manager are there - my bags need to be repacked and pass through the x-ray machine. Oh, and you'll need to leave the room to accompany the bags. Given that I'm naked and wrapped in a duvet it seems reasonable to want to get dressed - which is fine as long as the officer is present. His definition of privacy involves him turning around whilst I try to pull on my clothes in a haze of being woken from sleep + jetlag. As we exit the room 3 members of the Helsinki bomb squad accompanied by a sniffer dog walk in. Mental check of objects I've come in contact with in the last 24 hours.

Today's travel clothes include a pair of reverse-pocketed snopants which I manage to put on back to front. I and the security detail notice this as I walk through the hotel lobby and I figure somewhere a fashion diety is smiling to herself. Down here my luggage is scanned. Up there a sniffer dog sniffs. And eventually my police escort gets the radio all-clear and I'm allowed back in my room.

Last year we spent some time researching what people lose and the steps they take to recover those objects. There are a range of situations where the owner of the lost-object doesn't want to be associated with either the object or the context in which it was left. What kind of objects? Use your imagination and you'll be pretty close.

Most people carry objects (and data) that they consider to be private and it's reasonable to assume that people who check into hotels will be carrying more private objects than the average person walking on the street. Except that the x-ray machine and increased frequency of bag checks mean that the objects are less likely to remain private. Beyond the more obvious security controlled items like knives and, um, baby milk what new categories of objects will be left at home because they are less likely to remain private? To what extent does this challenge our notions of privacy?

A gentle start to the working week.

Writing from Helsinki | September 10, 2006 | Permalink

Whose Finger on the Trigger?

This photo shows the futsal pitch next to Shibuya crossing - its nice enough but it's far from unique. Probably 10s of thousands of photos have been taken looking at the same view all shot within 1 meter of where this was taken. How are your memories of experiences shaped by other people's recordings of pretty much the same thing?

If you've ever gazed down onto that pitch you've probably either spent time in the spot where this photo was taken or one floor directly above. The hotel top floor has the best elevated view but is on route to a restaurant with a constant stream of people coming and going, and pretty bad reflectivity. The floor where this photos was taken is not open to the public but once the photographer is past the admittedly lax hotel security it offers an unhurried view, time and space to document.

How does what you decide to capture change when you have real time access to the 1,000+ geotagged photos (a small selection of Future Perfect geo-tagged photos here) taken from the same space? With sufficient processing power its possible to extrapolate views of how somewhere, something or someone will look like in the future - in essense creating a mock-up of what photos will be taken after you were there. How does it change your sense of what is original? The value you put on what was created? Or the details in the creation process? And seen from the opposite side - how does the subject of what is being documented change in response to access to photos of itself?

How long before we have sufficient creative commons content to auto-generate static movies? A Year in the Life of the Eiffel Tower is now streaming from server near you.

Writing from Tokyo | September 5, 2006 | Permalink

I Was Here, But These Are Your Experiences

Two personal experiences - a Harajuku schoolgirl-uniform-wearing-death-metal-band above, yesterday's pingmag festival in Yoyogi park below. Everyone shapes their own recollection of events not least by deciding what to capture. Apart from the picture taker, who wants to extenuate postive and/or negative aspects of these experiences? And to what end? So many people took photos of these same events. To what extent are these their and not my experiences?

Writing from Tokyo | September 4, 2006 | Permalink

To Have You To Hand

Mobile phone in female jean back pocket. Given that back trouser pockets are often perceived as a carrying 'problem area' for women and the fact that she is also carrying a handbag why is it carried there? How does the role of the phone strap change when it becomes the main part of the 'phone' that is visible when carried?

The extent to which the position of carried objects changes according to: perceived necessity and a desire to keep it within hand reach reach; and (the lack of) alternative carrying positions; convenience after finishing other activities e.g. putting the phone in the pocket is a one-handed action after a call but opening the handbag is a two-handed action. The degree to which object's move around the body and from the body to other carried objects such as bags, resting on nearby surfaces, handed around with friends or simply left charging. From a rather lively friday night out in Tokyo.

Why is where-stuff-is-carried interesting? More about Center of Gravity here.

Writing from Tokyo | | Permalink

Customisation, Consequences of Lack of

Belonging to a house maid, Chengdu.

Writing from Tokyo | September 1, 2006 | Permalink

The Very Definition of Local

When personal communication devices were less common arriving visitors to Nagano's Kouri Station would hunt down the nearest phone booth and could rote dial a taxi. The sign provided all the necessary information - since call to a local number were made from a local device. Mobility changes what we consider to be local - and in this instance for a mobile phone to connect to this number requires knowledge of the local prefix.

Incidentally, the addtional complexity and rules for dialling non-local numbers can be a barrier for low-literacy mobile phone users.

Writing from Nagano | August 28, 2006 | Permalink

Free, For Granted

Things that in a particular culture or context can be taken from granted will be provided for free.

Why interesting to designers' of mobile devices? If its common knowledge that its provided then you don't have to buy it (or carry the means to buy) and you don't have to carry it.

Writing from Nagano | | Permalink

Communication, Literacy, Design

Remote communication requires a means of identifying whom to contact. How do people who can't read and write manage their contact information?

This is just one of the many questions I'll be asking at a presentation on Literacy, Communication, Design to the University of Art and Design Helsinki on the evening of the 14th September. It's hosted by Teemu Leinonen and Andrea Botero Cabrera and is open to the public. It will draw on three years of research by colleagues at the Nokia Mobile HCI Group into low literacy communication practices, a journey that took us from urban and rural India to Nepal, China, Uganda and beyond.

Related research can be found here and as usual when its all done and dusted links to the slides will be posted to here.

Writing from Tokyo | August 25, 2006 | Permalink

To Mail You Is To Like You (A Little)

Visitors whose only interest is in downloading presentations can now subscribe the Future Perfect mailing list. You'll receive email notification when new material is ready for downloading. And that's it.

To sign up simply send an email to info @ janchipchase dot com with the word 'subscribe' in the subject line.

Why bother? Why indeed.

Writing from Tokyo | | Permalink

Personal Preferences

A mobile phone strap enables its owner to project personal preferences, affections (similar or identical straps are frequently bought by friends and couples) and lifestyle aspirations in a way that is both socially acceptable and often subtle. (OK, in the case of Japanese teenage girls it's often not so subtle).

Why is it that straps are far more likely to be found on the phones of Asian consumers than elsewhere in the world

Writing from Shibuya | August 23, 2006 | Comments (1) | Permalink

Advertising in 2012

Lines leading up an Akihabara staircase to a maid cafe above, and through a São Paulo station below.

What do the properties of the line tell you about what to expect at the destination? Or whether there is a destination? What if these lines were ethereal? A digital flow made visible by your personal communication device, like having a radio tuned to static, walking into a signal and following. What would the flow communicate to encourage you to seek out its destination?

Writing from Tokyo | August 22, 2006 | Comments (3) | Permalink

Form, Carrying Style

It's more common (though still relatively rare) to see it clipped to front right trouser pocket on teen boys: the device remains in close proximity; can be felt relatively easily - which is good for noticing incoming vibra communications; and provides an opportunity to show off both the device and customisation of the device.

The costume? Akihabara on a Sunday.

Writing from Akihabara | August 20, 2006 | Comments (0) | Permalink

The Art of Thinking Ahead

Noticed after conducting an ad-hoc interview in Lwamagwa with a rural Ugandan policeman.

The reason for the interview was that the spot just above the police station entrance was one of the only places in the village that had regular cellular reception (basically line of sight through a dip in the landscape to a base station). Move the phone a foot either way and the reception was lost. Making and receiving calls required dextrous use of his head set.

Related: Village Phone extended antennas.

Writing from Tokyo | August 18, 2006 | Permalink

You'll Like This. Or Not.

Visitors to Pretoria Airport are greeted by signs pointing them to turn on their mobile phone's Bluetooth connectivity. Accepting the connection results in an animated GIF being sent to the phone - with special offers on duty free products.

In our (naturally wonderful) wireless world the process of discovery, knowing what services are currently available in proximity is far from painless. Whilst I rarely buy duty free I suspect that most people would find the 'special offer' underwhelming given the steps required to receive (even if connectivity was switched on) and the risks associated with accepting gifts from strangers.

Purveyors of location based services may be interested in the 2003 NTT DoCoMo's comprehensive R-Click trial in Tokyo's Roppongi Hills. By signing up to R-Click and completing a profile of interests participants were offered three services: location based advertising according to personal preferences (Koko Dake Click); information based on what was shown on LCD displays (Mite Toru Click) for example a url related to the advertising that was displayed when you were present is sent to your i-Mode equipped phone; and finally a services that monitored where the participant was going and tried to predict what offers or items of interest they would want mailed to their phone (Buratto). In other words the system tracks your every move (not dis-similar to CCTV) except that this information can be cross checked with your profile, your mobile phone, and to the profile that the system builds around your behaviours. To be fair R-Click was a trial and trials are there to, well, try out stuff. And yes, its opt-in. But the approach in the R-Click trial, in particular the Buratto service highlights a fundamental assumption about privacy, or lack of - you are there to be tracked, sold to, and you pay for the priviledge because i-mode is a pay-per-packet service.

How well did the Roppongi Hill R-click service work? From my own experience, even with my profile of interests and knowing where I was heading it was unable to provide relevant recommendations and in many ways it highlighted the challenge of providing the right person with the right information at the right time. Getting it even marginally wrong results in an unwanted intrusion.

Would I accept future special offers at Pretoria Airport? Only out of boredom. But Airports are far from boring - there are simply too many interesting people to observe.

Bootnote: Can you build a service based on killing boredom? Undoubtedly.Who is motivated by what reasons to create boredom scenarios? Cue delayed flights, trains, busses...

Writing from Tokyo | August 17, 2006 | Permalink

Security Concerned

A metro-using Paulista shields his back pack by wearing a coat.

Given all the security and theft stories both prior to and on arrival in Brazil this kind of most-obviously concerned-with-theft wearing style was rare. From our various studies on where people carry stuff (not that we did any formal research in Brazil, but drawing on data from 8 other cultures) people concerned with theft tend to carry bags and objects of value e.g. mobile phones or wallets hidden, within easy reach of hands, in lines of sight and/or in tactile contact to the body. Given that a back pack worn normally is mostly out of sight and out of reach the number spotted being worn on the Sao Paulo metro was surprising.

For every context a series of trade-offs.

Writing from Tokyo | August 2, 2006 | Permalink

Forms of Identity

Shacks on a Kyotera market street have the owners mobile phone number or name and phone number scrawled above the door. Here there are no signs for street names, no building numbers.

When a phone number and not say, a postal address is the primary means of remote idenification what does it mean to lose a SIM card? For your phone battery to run out? To have no phone credit? To lend your phone to someone else? Or as in the photo above, for the phone number to change? Why do the Kyotera dwellers not include instant messenger contact names, fax numbers or email addresses? Or for that matter ID card numbers or car licence plates? What is it that makes a phone number suitable for writing above the door?

Consider all this in the context of the other objects that are owned and used. How does mobile phone ownership affect status within the community? Are some phone numbers more or less desireable than others? And bearing all this in mind how important is it to have just the right phone model?

Writing from Tokyo | July 31, 2006 | Permalink

Mobility Is Relative II

A mobile and wireless phone kiosk in Kamapala draws its power from a car battery (in the red box, photo below). Despite its bicyclesque design they were not particularly mobile - one or more tyres were often flat and they remained tethered in one place for the duration of the day.

However this design does support fine tuning the position where the telephony service is offered compared to fixed infrastructure. In what situations is mobilty is a drawback? For example, if to operate a 'street tax' has to be paid to work a particular pitch (I've got no evidence of this actually happening but bear with me) it would be easier to move non-payers away. Also easier for others to enter the marketplace and offer a similar service in close proximity.

And the country names painted on the phones? Simply a way of identifying which is which.

Spent half a sweaty sunday on the back of a boda boda trying to track down the bicycle repair factory, only to find it shut. Fond memories.

Writing from Tokyo | July 28, 2006 | Permalink

Features That Make a Service

A photo processing shop owner leans into a photo booth to adjust a customer's poise before taking a ID card photo.

A photo booth without an in built camera seems counter-intuitive but that's simply a lack of imagination on our behalf. The physical presence of the booth signals to customers what service is on offer; it re-enforces the idea of a minimum level of quality (though naturally this will depend on the camera that is used to take the actual photo); the proprietor can easily upgrade the camera; and the camera can be used in other contexts not just for taking ID card photos.

In some ways this shop is ahead of its time - it enables a setting for customers to use their own widely available tools to create. There's no evidence that this happens here, but with the widespread adoption of personal content creation tools I consider it only a matter of time - todays high end cameras will be tomorrow's mass market both in terms of perception of image quality and after effects that are possible. Shop's like this will still perform a valuable role in the creation process - a providing a suitable ambience, backdrop, props, printing and naturally guideance on poise, but many consumers will choose to utilise their own tools.

A photo booth without an in-built camera. Whatever next?

Related research from Fujian Province, Lhasa and New Orleans.

Writing from Sé | July 23, 2006 | Permalink

Secondary Activities

The photo above was taken at a football match in the suburbs of Florianopolis - it captures the moment between a ball going in the back of the visiting side's net, and official confirmation of the score. If you look closely to will see two fans holding radios and another two with headsets running up to their ear (I don't know whether the headset was connected to a radio or a mobile phone - it wasn't the really the right context to ask). The stadium didn't have a score board - when the first goal went in the fans that were not jumping up and down in excitement were glued to the radio broadcast - the opposing team were naturally contesting the goal and its possible that it would be dis-allowed. In this stadium the live radio commentary provided the definitive version of what's going on down on the pitch.

Product and service designers like to think of their creations being the sole focus of the user's attention but the reality is that we increasingly live in a multi-tasking world. As devices become smaller there is more potential for them to be carried in a wider range of situations. Consider the difference between a device that requires two hands vs. one handed use vs. no handed use. The supporting role implies a degree of comfort with the object that is carried - it is considered sufficient to carry that device 'merely' to enhance the experience of other activities.

What level of interaction and sensory engagement does your service need to be understood or enjoyed? Why? How is designing for a supporting role different from designing for the primary activities? How to support switching between primary and non-primary tasks?

Writing from Florianopolis, Outskirts of | July 18, 2006 | Permalink

Cultures of Repair, Innovation

Update: a slightly more print friendly version of this post appears here and the slides of the presentation can be downloaded via here [4MB].

In an effort to understand the total user experience I've taken time out during recent field studies in emerging markets to explore local repair cultures. The journey has taken me to cities such as Chengdu, Delhi, Ulan Bataar, Ho Chi Minh and Lhasa with recent brief stopovers in Kampala and Soweto. They all contain clusters of shops and market stalls selling a mixture of used and new mobile phones, and whilst (in this instance) size does not necessarily matter, they often operate on a scale not seen in cities such as London or Tokyo. The mobile phone market around Chengdu's Tai Shen Lan Lu Market for example stretches across number of streets and shopping arcades and includes 100's of small shops and stalls. If you want a snapshot of urban mobile phone consumers in emerging markets this is a good place to start.

What sets these locations apart from cities in more 'emerged' markets? Aside from the scale of what's on sale there is a thriving market for device repair services ranging from swapping out components to re-soldering circuit boards to reflashing phones in a language of your choice , naturally. Repairs are often carried out with little more than a screwdriver, a toothbrush (for cleaning contact points) the right knowledge and a flat surface to work on. Repair manuals (which appear to be reverse engineered) are available, written in Hindi, English and Chinese and can even be subscribed to, but there is little evidence of them being actively used. Instead many of the repairers rely on informal social networks to share knowledge on common faults, and repair techniques. It's often easier to peer over the shoulder of a neighbour than open the manual itself. Delhi has the distinction of also offering a wide variety of mobile phone repair courses at training institutes such as Britco and Bridco turning out a steady flow of mobile phone repair engineers. To round off the ecosystem wholesalers' offer all the tools required to set up and run a repair business from individual components and circuit board schematics to screwdrivers and software installers.

How are mobile phone repair cultures different from the everyday repair shops for other mainstream electronics filled with televisions and video recorders? For a start consider the volumes of mobile phones in the marketplace compared to other electronics. Network effects soon kick in - it's easier to find a dead RAZR to cannabalise for spares than spares for a Sony DVD drive drive quite simply because there's more of them about. The physical size of the products to be repaired is also an factor - consider the space required to store and repair 200 mobile phones vs CRT televisions. As objects that many consider essential tools for everyday life mobile phones are carried, dropped, sat on, run over, submerged in a wide variety of situations leading to use cases outside the parameters of most phones. Finally, for many emerging market consumers the phone is considered an essential tool for conducting a successful business whether it's a boda-boda driver in Kampala (gentleman on moped in photo, below) or a midwife in Xiamen. If a person has the choice between repairing a television or a (shared) mobile phone which do you think he or she would choose first?

Each of the cities mentioned above offers more formal repair services, usually officially through customer care service centers, but the scale and sophistication of what is on offer informally is way beyond what many readers of Future Perfect will be familiar. And yes, many of the places mentioned already have networks to (from my observations) efficiently recycle, repair and re-use a wide variety objects including electronics . But in the spirit of the Future Perfect let's start with a very basic question - why do these informal repair cultures exist at all? What is so different between London and Lhasa or Helsinki and Ho Chi Minh?

The informal repair services that are offered are quite simply driven by necessity - highly price sensitive customers cannot afford to go through more expensive official customer care centers and even if they could their phones are unlikely to be covered by warrantee - having been bought through grey market channels, been sent as gifts from friends and relatives abroad, or were locally bought used, second or third+ ownership. In many cases these users cannot afford to be without their mobile phone, not in the social sense of being out of touch (which is valid enough), but in many instances because their livelihoods depend on it. On the supply side there is a ready pool of sufficiently skilled labour, ready access to tools, components and above all knowledge.

It's worth acknowledging that grey and black goods and services are also part of the mobile phone market ecosystem - whether it's passing faked goods off as originals or offering pirated software. Some markets also sell a wide variety of phones that copy the industrial designs of other products, examples are shown here and and example of how it can unfold here (these two links are unrelated). These are however, only a part of the whole market ecosystem and from my understanding are small in scale within the context of the physical markets' themselves, compared to the repair services on offer. And before you ask - no, I'm not arguing that piracy is a minor issue.

For consumers the informal repair culture is largely convenient, efficient, fast and cheap, reducing the total cost of ownership for people for whom a small drop in price may make the difference between having or not having a phone. The culture of repair also increases the lifetime of products lowering their environmental impact (though this could be offset by other factors such as inefficiency of using old batteries).

What can we learn from informal repair cultures? Aside from the benefits, what are the risks for consumers and for companies whose products are repaired, refurbished and resold? Given the benefit to (bottom of the pyramid) consumers are there elements of the repair ecosystem that can be exported to other cultures? Can the same skills be applied to other parts of the value chain? And, turning to my original interest in this topic and the work we do in the Mobile HCI Group, given the range of resources and skills available what would it take to turn cultures of repair into cultures of innovation?

I'm at Cape Town University today discussing qualitative research methods and Informal Repair Cultures. The slides of the presentation can be downloaded via here [4MB download] and related presentations here.

Writing from Cape Town | July 3, 2006 | Comments (4) | Permalink

Weapons of Choice

Writing from Kansensero | July 2, 2006 | Permalink

Lacking Power

Power cuts are a daily fact of life in Uganda so it's no surprise that power, or lack of power has affected the field study in subtle and not so subtle ways: power cuts during interviews; trying to gather data over the thumping soundtrack and fumes of a nearby generator; keeping laptops sufficiently charged - especially during the long hours of image batch processing; logging the different types of charging services offered by locals; and the strategies adopted by locals to make the most of what they have.

When the power is down guests can request the use of a back-up generator for10,000 Ugandan Shillings (1.5 Euro) per hour - enough for a small hotel. You'll be happy to know it can be charged to room service.

Thanks to our local guides here in Uganda - Julius, Rose, Tonny, Elizabeth and Titus - much appreciated.

Writing from Kampala | | Permalink

Rural Connectivity

Drive due south out of Kampala and in 70 kilometers or so you'll arrive at the town of Kyotera, our research base for the next few days. Continue straight on from there and you'll soon hit the Uganda - Tanzania border, head east and you're in rural backwaters, head west and you'll need a boat to take you across Lake Victoria. Kyotera is in a good location to research, well, whatever it is that we're here researching and the bonus is that our hotel can offer cold beer despite frequent power cuts.

This morning the research team rose sufficiently early to drive onto Kansensero - a fishing village on the edge of Lake Victoria. We time our departure to arrive with the boats ashore and the last of the catches being weighed and sold. The journey was pretty uneventful save for a herd of long horned bulls (yes they do have exceptionally long horns) and a quick stop at a village phone operator. Grameen Foundation USA is working in partnership with local micro-finance organisations, the regional carrier MTN and my employer to provide Village Phone kits - essentially an adapted mobile phone, an antenna with a long cable and a car battery to keep it charged. (Car batteries are a common source of power in rural Uganda). Through micro-finance lending the village phone operator can borrow enough money to buy the operator kit and for many it becomes a profitable business.

Driving along the back country roads of Rakai district there are two obvious ways to tell that Village Phone operator is offering connectivity: from a distance you can spot the antenna topped pole rising up to 4 times the height of other structures in the village (glimpsed through the tree foliage in the photo above); and on entering a village the yellow MTN sign advertising call rates looms into view. The affect of easier access to affordable connectivity on the prosperity of the village inhabitants is an worthy topic of research, but requires more time than we have today.

Kansensero has irregular GSM coverage and no mains electricity - power comes in the form of a generator or more commonly car batteries. It's interesting to understand the strategies residents adopt to make the most of what is available, but I'm also aware there are broader issues at play such as access to water (mostly it is delivered on bicycle in jerry cans) and basic healthcare. In many respects the frontier of the future perfect is not what's possible in Tokyo, Paris or London but in villages such as this - in providing access to base necessities. Time and again interview subjects bring up the topic of calling hosptials, midwives and sick relatives, or to report the death of a family member.

Despite the availability of fresh fish our local guide advises us to avoid the local menu - cholera is a factor and he can't vouch for the cooking conditions. So we pile in the car and drive up to a loading bay on the Kagera River and munch our way through a packet of digestives and segments of processed cheese. Our driver requests a photo of himself to show his family he has indeed been here on Uganda's southern border, and as I snap away one of our team conducts an ad-hoc interview. The interviewee, a policeman is chatty and his positive demeanour is set off by some pristine white rubber boots - more commonly found on the feet of local fishermen than on the police. He stands on a pile of wood, Kalashnikov in hand overseeing the unloading of a consignment of coffee beans from Tanzania and as the interview progresses we watch labourers lugging 60kg sacks to a nearby truck. This isn't an official border crossing and if tax is normally charged it's not being levied here.

Its hard to turn away from a border without crossing, but that's a journey for another day.

Writing from Kansensero, road to | June 28, 2006 | Permalink

Digital Fireflies

The entrance fee for Ghana vs. Brazil is 500 Ugandan Shillings (0.3 Euro), a sum that buys us squeezing space in a village hall that's packed to the rafters. The game has already started when we enter, and contrary to what you might have read in the European press the hall includes a local contingent rooting for Brazil rather than their West African neighbours. The heat in the hall is stifling - the windows are boarded up and taped over and there are a lot of bodies generating heat. The video projector cuts off half way through the second half, not as you might expect due to a power cut (the proceedings are running on a back-up generator) but because of a lost satellite signal. For a couple of minutes the audience watches a man with a controller navigate menus and channels, his efforts projected for all to see before he eventually locates another channel showing the game. With all the talk of niche programming what is the potential of usability studies as spectator sports? Thoughts a stadium full of people watching a cognitive walkthrough on a JumboTron before giving their verdict to the designer sitting in the center circle. Public adoration or shaming.

It was dusk when we walked in and by the time the game is finished its dark outside save for the stars and a few candle lit market stalls. This part of town does not appear to be on the mains. At the final whistle the inside of the hall turns pitch black - the organisers simply cut the power. For a few truly wonderful moments we sit watching human fireflies navigating and feeling their way out of the hall using only their mobile phone displays to guide their way.

The photo above? An overlay of repeated 2 second exposures.

Writing from Kyotera | June 27, 2006 | Permalink

How You Top Up

card credit Kampala mobile phone pre-pay task flow Uganda all tags...

Top up minutes for sale in Kampala.

Consumers here are highly sophisticated when it comes to optimising their use of communication channels - anything that drives down the cost of communication has a good chance of success.

The degree of sophistication is a double edged sword. On the one hand it implies user effort to stay abreast of the alternatives and introduces additional steps to the communication process - you don't just call but factor in the cost of calling permutations before you decide to call. On the other hand it reminds me how disinterested/lazy consumers are in less price sensitive markets.

Writing from Kampala | June 25, 2006 | Permalink

Tangible Reminders, Shortening The Path

bar code camera Daikanyama digital Japan mobile phone QR bar code service design tangible task flow Tokyo all tags...

Spent a few days this week working on a service concept with design team colleagues. This photo reminds me that having a compelling service is just the starting point. How long is the path to get to your service? How can you shorten the path by even one step? QR barcode from a shop around the back of Daikanyama.

Writing from Daikanyama, back of | June 4, 2006 | Permalink

Knowing Which Is Which

animal customisation Ginza Tokyo all tags...

The customisation of office-standardised devices by varying the length of strap.

Writing from Ginza, back of | May 30, 2006 | Permalink

Magnitude

alarm clock camera China Gulangyu Island mobile phone Xiamen all tags...

Its often quoted that a phone company is the worlds biggest camera manufacturer and music player manufacturer, the magnitude of things indeed, Charlie. With us from the moment we wake up to the moment we go to sleep and, from a lot of field research I can confidently say most places in between.

But who is the world's biggest alarm clock manufacturer?

Waved goodbye to a rain soaked Xiamen and Gulangyu today. Alas, no more peering off the service roof of tall buildings to scope a city, or hanging out with Chinese manual labourers on rain sodden bulding sites. But good to be home. One more field study in Tokyo then next stop Africa.

Writing from Xiamen | May 23, 2006 | Permalink

Learning From Retro

China fake grey illegal mobile phone repair retro Xiamen all tags...

A visit to Jiang Tou Market in Xiamen and 600 Yuan (60 Euro) buys you a new retro working English language GSM phone. Note the number of buttons compared to this lo-hi design. Starts with a HelloMoto screenshot and an extended and quite loud Chinese pop song.

Writing from Jiang Tou Market | May 22, 2006 | Permalink

Pay-As-You-Go

China cost Fujian Province pay task flow all tags...

Interesting to see mainstream PC software adopt the pay-as-you-go model.

What people are able and willing to pay for. Why does it not cost money every time you access your phone's address book? Or switch the phone on? Or for that matter to switch your phone off?

Writing from Fujian Province, Lost in | | Permalink

Flattery or Fakes?

China copy fake flattery Nokia Vertu Xiamen all tags...

A phone design modelled on a Vertu above, and a Nokia 3230 below. Possibly enough to fool someone from a distance if they were to glance at it, but not under closer examination. From the mobile phone market in Xiamen, more to follow if I get the chance.

What can be copied easily? Does the job of effectively copying become harder as devices become complicated?

Writing from Xiamen | May 17, 2006 | Comments (2) | Permalink

The Origins of History, The History of Origins

Chengdu China Delhi history India metadata perception privacy small business all tags...

The costs required to start a business. Mobile phone seller pitching his wears from a small suitcase. From Karol Bagh Market, Delhi (above), traders checking out a second hand phone for sale in Chengdu (below) and a razor seller in Xiamen (bottom).

If these businesses become successful is there a stage in their development where they try to hide their (informal, market) past? As the company grows and (perhaps) becomes more anonymous and impersonal will the company try to emphasize its humble origins? How was your opinion of companies like Amazon, HP, Apple affected by knowing their origins? How accurate does the history need to be, from whose perspective? In what industries will people be motivated to validate the story they are given?. And as more recording devices are available to record tomorrow's history today, how will this affect the ability of companies to shape their own history? Same questions for individuals..

Related stories here, here, here and here.

Writing from Xiamen | May 15, 2006 | Comments (4) | Permalink

Packaging

China fake markets packaging perception sex street Xiamen all tags...

The rich packaging experience of a suitcase 'sex shop' in a Xiamen street market. What does the style, perceived and actual costs of the design say about what's inside?

Related material here.

Writing from Xiamen | May 14, 2006 | Permalink

Number One Seller. Really

China mobile phone perception phone number popularity ranking Shanghai status all tags...

Phone numbers for sale at a kiosk - the numbers that have already been sold are struck through.

How does knowing what others have bought influence purchasing behaviour? How can this behaviour be manipulated by suggesting the popularity of certain items? Who would want to manipulate the data for what reasons?

Writing from Shanghai | April 27, 2006 | Permalink

Physical Personalisation

customisation Delhi downloads India Japan mobile phone NIFT personalisation physical presentations Tokyo university all tags...

What motivates people to customise their phones? Where are they customised? Why? And how can this influence the design of future devices?

The slides for a recent short presentation to NIFT Delhi is now online on research.nokia.com. Entitled Physical Personalisation of Phone Covers in Japan can be downloaded here [1 MB]. It's an example of quick-and-dirty research project (an afternoon collecting data by reviewing 6477 phone covers in a recycling plant) with a limited but interesting enough scope (document any physical customisation), that eventually led to researching a number of more meaty topics. It's also an example of something that would never make it to an academic conference, but has proved relevant in day to day work. There's a lesson there somewhere.

Captive audience here and related posts here.

Writing from Tokyo | April 24, 2006 | Permalink

Where Thin is Not In

bag carrying Delhi ergonomics form factor India interaction mobile phone pocket protection thickness all tags...

This small, simple and relatively elegant Sony Ericsson phone belonging to a tea-house owner in South Delhi. The product design team will have spent countless hours massaging the components into the smallest possible form factor, selecting materials for the optimal tactile experience, and making the detailing just right. The overall elegance and perceived thickness of the device may have been a factor in its purchasing decision but ultimately this consumer bought a thick plastic cover to protect it from dust and scratches (photo below).

The need and consequent practices of covering and protecting consumer products varies according to cultural practices, individual tastes, climate and contexts. Whether it's a plastic coated car seat in New Orleans, individually wrapped sweets in Japan (in part to cope with intense summer humidity), plastic sheets on a hospice bed, or covered calculators and phones in India. The advertisement for dust free switches in South Delhi (photo, below) is only enhanced by the extremely dusty shop backdrop.

Of these products mobile phones are somewhat unique in that they have to cope with conditions in a wide range of contexts - from when the owner gets up to when s/he goes to sleep and everything in between. Whilst women are most likely to be carrying phones in hand bags the desire to be contactable and to communicate often leads them to be carried in the hand for short periods of time. For men the situation is compounded by the extent to which the phone is carried in pockets - close to the skin and consequently exposed to more human moisture & sweat.

There is currently a lot of noise about who has the thinnest phone, and the thickness of the RAZR was undoubtedly a factor in its worldwide success. But as the adoption of mobile phones spread the reality for many of the world's population is that protection is paramount. My personal take on device thickness is that thin devices have their pros e.g. perceived elegance and cons e.g. an tendency to break more easily, but that things will only become genuinely interesting in this space as and when true flexibility is introduced.

The after market for protective phone covers in India is well developed and is quickly able to cater for new phone form factors, even down to coping with sliding mechanisms. How can mass market products be re-designed to cope with the need for greater protection? (the dust free keypad on the 1101 is a good example). And given that the two factors are often mutually exclusive, is it possible to design products that are able to offer increased protection when needed, but can shed their protective cladding when the need for elegance is paramount? Finally, when new materials and manufacturing techniques enable forms of protection that are not visible to the human eye how important will the design be to the perception of protection?

Writing from Tokyo | April 23, 2006 | Permalink

Content Middle Men

content Delhi DRM India mobile phone pirate service service design software street all tags...

In Delhi's Karol Bagh Market 100+ Rupees (2+ Euro) will buy you as much content as you can fit on a 512 MB memory card. Widely available digital contents includes the usual suspects: ring tones in various formats; wallpapers; themes; applications; games - including Series 60 ports of many popular Nintendo ES games; Hindi pop videos; and a couple of full length Hindi movies. Given that most of this content is available somewhere online, its interesting to note the presence of someone who takes the time to find and package the material for less networked (or less network-motivated) consumers.

Writing from Hawaii | April 16, 2006 | Permalink

What You Are Likely To Forget

Center of Gravity forgetting Hawaii Hilo key Point of Reflection all tags...

Sign to correct a common problem.

Got a few days R & R - the plan is to hit the trail for the next few days, assuming the weather lets up.

Writing from Hilo | April 12, 2006 | Permalink

It's Easy Getting Objects Carried

carrying Delhi free India loyalty metadata photo photographer privacy proximity studio wallet all tags...

Like many shops in Delhi the Rama Color photo studio in Bengali Market uses advertising handouts to get their logo carried and displayed by their customers. One side of the advertisement depicts a god and the other side a calendar. During wallet mapping studies I'm often surprised at the ease by which people accept objects which are then carried, at least until the next time the wallet is cleared out. One of the most prevalent of these objects in modern urban centers is the buy-10-get-one-free coffee 'loyalty' card, but in India if the religious depiction doesn't grab a person's attention then the calendar will. It's not even the functionality that draws people to take the object, but the perceived functionality - the fact that it might be useful and that it's, well, free.

At what point is it economically feasible for stores to give away, by today's standards, richer more complex objects? Electronic flyers for example. To be picked up in the first place one thing will remain the same - they object will have a perceived functionality. What will be different is that they can act independently - designed to take advantage of the proximity of being placed in someone's purse, pocket, handbag or wallet to collect and report proximity data. To some people the physical space of your wallet will be just another real-time commercial battleground. Knowing what you have in there and how frequently you use is valuable data - disabling the opponent in whatever way will be a bonus. Its tempting to use the word Trojan or parasite, but by being self-sustaining and self-maintaining a self-reporting free-bee is more accurate.

And in a world where this is widespread how will this affect what we decide to pick up?

Writing from Delhi, Outskirts of | April 9, 2006 | Permalink

How India Wakes Up

all tags...

What percentage of the world's population wakes up to a phone alarm clock?

The advertisement for a Nokia 1600 and 1110 phones above focuses on a single feature - a talking alarm and clock. Jaago India Jaago translates to 'wake up India'.

Writing from New Delhi | April 3, 2006 | Comments (0) | Permalink

Motivation to Protect

all tags...

High quality cover for mobile phone to protect against damage and to a lesser extent dust.

From most angles the phone's appearance is similar with and without this transparent cover with the exception shown above. Beyond reducing the risk damage what are the motivations to use covers? To what extent does this choice boil down to appearance now vs. appearance later?

Writing from South Delhi | April 2, 2006 | Permalink

Office Away From The Office

all tags...

My office for the next two weeks is a townhouse /guesthouse close to Delhi's CP. The house is owned by an English couple who now spend most of their time on an estate just outside Delhi, and its current occupants are the 5 members of our research team plus the Nepali housekeeper and her family. It is welcoming, comfortable and coincidentally very, very English (including little touches like afternoon tea).

It's 5am as I write this and the first strains of sun light are peeking through the expansive mosquito screen and beyond that the canopy of a tree on the front lawn of the house. My body clock is halfway between Tokyo and New Delhi which according to the Windows time zone application puts me somewhere near Krasnoyarsk. The fresh morning air drifts through the house accompanied by bird-song and the distant but frequent sound of trains shunting along to Old Delhi station.

So what are we doing here? The fixed part of the plan is to run a series of focus groups to understand the pros and cons of various concepts. As with a lot of these studies the contextual work that happens around the edges is expected to also yield rich data - observing and documenting the contexts in which the concepts will be used, contextual interviews, and exploring themes such as rituals, customisation, repair cultures, coping with dust and dirt as well as generally trying to understand what both unique and the same about the Indian (communications) context.

The guesthouse is a conducive space to running this kind of study: the expansive and airy lounge can comfortably cope with the team and our 5 assistants (and at night a mattress is rolled out in one corner's it becomes my bedroom). A researcher from Hyderabad is asleep in the master bedroom which is now doubling up as mission control and the mobile office is unpacked and the walls are starting to be covered with data, schedules, photos and sketches of new design iterations. Further along the corridor are the sleeping bodies of a Canadian concept designer living in Helsinki and a Chinese colleague from, um, China whilst the final member of the team - an Indian studying in Helsinki is housed in a room on the roof of this one story building. In a choice between a regular corporate hotel with all mod-cons and this guesthouse with shared living quarters I'd take this any day. There are numerous benefits from having the entire team stay in one space - the net result of which is that we live, eat and sleep the research topic for the duration of our stay (and having access to a housekeeper makes life easier too).

6:30, the newspapers have just landed on the path and the house begins to wake.

Writing from Connaught Place | March 30, 2006 | Comments (0) | Permalink

Custom

all tags...

Repeatedly self-customised phone by Fiza Khan a student at NIFT Delhi's Department of Fashion and Lifestyle Accessories.

To what extent does the customisation of a product or service facilitate or become a barrier to and ongoing customisation?

Writing from Haus Kaas | | Comments (0) | Permalink

Not in Here, But Out There

Delhi downloads exploratory field research India NIFT presentations all tags...

Thursday's presentation about field research to the Department of Fashion & Lifestyle Accessories at the New Delhi Institiute for Fashion Technology. Hosted by Associate Professor Bhawna Vij Katyal. Slides can be downloaded from here [3MB]. Update: link to the presentation now works

A summary?
Get out the lab.
Keep your eyes peeled.
Question eveything, including why you need to be out of the lab.
Stay warm.

Writing from Haus Kaas | March 29, 2006 | Comments (2) | Permalink

Secrets (But Not Lies)

all tags...

I know you have a secret.

But don't worry I won't tell, but I just wanted to let you know that I know. That's enough.

During in-depth interviews into what people carry a sub-theme that sometimes emerges is the issue of privacy and secrecy - the things people carry that they don't want to reveal to others. They can be physical objects but increasingly they come in the form of electronic data.

Why would anyone tell a researcher about the secret things they carry? In the street interview context participants consider themselves anonymous (and we preserve this anonymity); they may not think through the consequences of what they are saying - which might be fine for an investigative journalist but can put a corporate researcher on the spot; it may be that the reward for revealing this information now is greater that the perceived consequences of having revealed it to the wrong person later (we work hard not to put people in this situation but it has been done); sometimes people don't know what they've revealed or reveal by accident; but more often than not the risk of revealing information to me, that is someone who is 'neutral' and not an authority figure, is low.

There are different levels of privacy and secrecy - a medical condition may be considered secret from everyone including close family; but other things that are only secret within the work context. I expect to see more human behaviours shielding secrets from the sensors that surround us. A kind-of example of this arose in a study a couple of yeas ago. A participant knew that by default a particular communication channel was being recorded, and being about to do something that was not strictly adhering to the rules (but not necessarily breaking them either) pushed some of her communication through alternative channels. Which raises a number of questions on one side regarding legal obligations and on the other the obligation to say whether the alternatives themselves are being recorded.

How does all this affect how people carry what they carry? In subtle ways. Frequent use objects such as bicycle keys during a day shopping in town are more likely to be carried in a separate pocket to secret objects. Every time a person fishes into a pocket to take out the keys the [xx secret xx] object carried in the same pocket risks falling to the floor. Some of these issues map to the digital user interface realm: a device may contain personal information but supports tasks that involve shared use outside the immediate peer group. Watching a sports event on a Mobile Phone TV for example.

There are other ways to scope secret things that people carry. Our summer intern from last year carried out a series of interviews with organisations such as hotels, department stores and the police asking about: what people lose; with what frequency; how long it takes to discover they are lost; the triggers for losing; and the steps and barriers to recover the objects. Items turning up in lost and found included balistic weapons and large sums of money all of which require different levels of privacy and secrecy depending on the context in which they are carried. Mobile phones are relatively easy to recover because people tend to notice they are missing quite quickly, they can be called by the owner, and even if switched off they include a call log. However even if the ability to track down the owner is easy, recovery is not necessarily straight forward if people don't want to be identified with having been in a particular place and/or location at a particular time.

You look at a group of people and see a group of people. I look at the same thing and wonder what their secrets are and what I can do to keep their secrets well, secret.

And the photo above? Nothing to do with secrecy research - just a random shot taken in an elevator.

Writing from Tokyo | March 26, 2006 | Comments (2) | Permalink

Turns Towards

all tags...

About 7 minutes spent watching the body language of a telephone conversation on a Tokyo side-street. The conversationalist spent most of his time turned to the wall, or more accurately turned to the 'corner' afforded by the pipe and the wall (the lady looking up the street was not with him and quicky moved on). But why?

It's an extreme example of not wanting to disturb other people with details of the call. It is more usual to see Japanese people to move to take a call out of earshot and/or to cup the hand around the mouthpiece and speak quietly.

What devices are associated with carrying out what anti-social activities? Anti-social to whom and in what contexts? Mobile phone's and talking loudly, electric batons and torture. Does taking out an object imply intent to carry out a particular task? And how does the perception of devices/services and their associated tasks evolve as the majority of users switch from early adopters (with their inherent behaviours) to more mainstream users? How does this perception change as the range of features offered by that device changes? How would people react to a stun gun that is mostly used to kills bugs?

Can and should we create a feedback loop to help user's better understand the social reaction to utilizing technologies? Can we demystify technologies to lessen the social reaction in the first place?

Writing from Tokyo | | Comments (1) | Permalink

Unexpecting the Expected

all tags...

Close to midnight, after giving up on me being a customer, 3 rick-shaw drivers are fine to just hang out around Barkhor Square, Lhasa, chat about the day's events and and smoke heavy chinese cigarettes. Somewhere a phone rings and one driver unexpectedly pulls a Razr phone out of his trouser pocket and takes a call from his wife.

It was the middle of winter and there were relatively few passengers. The cost of this device related to his income? My perceived cost vs. his actual cost. A practical design choice in his line of work? Does it matter?

Writing from Tokyo | March 18, 2006 | Comments (0) | Permalink

Double Wrap

drugs Harajuku Japan police Range of Distribution Tokyo all tags...

The smallest example range of distribution of objects that I've come across during behavioural research was interviewing a vice-squad policeman in Berlin. He discussed drug dealers double-wrapping their product in clingfilm which was then carried in the mouth. At the point of sale one item is taken from the mouth and handed over. If the police tried to bust them they swallow the produce and since the drugs take time to clear the digestive tract it meant putting dealers behind bars at least overnight for what often amounted to a small bust.

The range of distribution more affected the consequence of discover by the wrong person (in this instance the police), rather than risk of theft per se.

Do I know the origin of the Double Wrap shop name (half way between Harajuku and Shibuya photo above)? I do not.

Writing from Tokyo | March 15, 2006 | Comments (1) | Permalink

Things That Are Spoken

all tags...

In China a number of VOIP phone, such as a phone in Beijing above, speak the cost of the call once the call is completed. Audio feedback in the context of the shop is a potentially useful feature in a number of ways: it projects to others the services that are available in store - enabling sales; the audio feedback provides an additional layer of transparency (yes - an oxymoron, indeed) since it is more difficult to inflate the cost of a call to a customer or between customers if the price is announced; the shop owner can attend to other things without having to keep an eye on the customer - the end of the call signals the need to collect payment (assuming the call is completed); and in places where illiteracy is an issue it supports users who are less equipped to comprehend the alternative visual feedback.

Examples of spoken features on mobile phones? The Nokia 1110 and 1600 targetted at emerging economies provide speaking alarm and clock functionality - the latter provided through a long key press on a dedicated button. Related research here and here.

There are of course potential drawbacks to providing audio feedback not least annoyance. But being the cultural tourist that I am, the sounds are part and parcel of being in China.

Writing from Tokyo | March 7, 2006 | Comments (2) | Permalink

Mobile Phone Kiosks

all tags...

This is technically a mobile phone. But if I'm completely accurately its actually a mobile phone kiosk - part of a service offered by local entrepreneurs in Ulan Bataar.

The first time I ventured onto the street of UB I encountered an individual on the street holding what appeared to be a white landline, shifting from foot to foot in the intense cold (similar to the three ladies in the photo below). My first hunch was that they were selling used phones. As the day wore on, and more sellers were encountered it became apparent that they weren't selling phones, but rather telephony.

A number of the so-called white phone sellers offer infrastructure akin to a traditional phone kiosk to support making a call - and this ranged from a wooden stand to hold the phone to a cushioned seat. Cigarettes and chewing tobacco were also for sale. To be frank it was a little unnerving, to see a white phone customer walking along the street with the white phone seller walking along side them holding the body of the phone, the cable dangling between them. Mobile, yet tethered to one another.

MobiTel, the primary mobile carrier in Mongolia rents wireless battery powered white phones for around 100,000 Tughriks (70 Euro) for 3 years. The seller of the service must make a 10,000 Tughrik deposit to be able to make and take domestic calls from the phone, and a 100,000 Tughrik deposit is required for international calls. The price of the service for consumers fluctuates according to where the phone is located - generally the more competition the cheaper the cost.

For me this is an interesting example of a largely public service (telephony) offered by private individuals. Unlike fixed line phones, of which there appeared to be few in UB, the seller of the service is able to relocate to where there is most demand for the service. As with many street vendors - the location of a pitch once obtained is closely guarded - so there is not true mobility in the sense that anyone can conduct business anywhere without concequences, but when there is an event for example a bout at the Wrestling Palace, then the more white phone sellers can gather to offer sufficient service to an increased number of punters. Just like any other vendor be it a hot-dog stand or to stay within the Mongolian context a Mongolia Booz seller.

The major benefits of mobile phones come from being tools that offer personal, convenient, synchronous and asynchronous communication (possibly also the time and location shifting of experiences but lets save that for another day). Fixed line phone kiosks offer a degree of privacy and typically more shelter and the white phone kiosk users forsake privacy for convenience.

As more services go mobile a new challenge arises - how to notify customers that a service is offered in a particular location?

Writing from Tokyo | March 4, 2006 | Comments (0) | Permalink

Public Charging Facilities

all tags...

Electricity sockets in Vancouver Airport targeted at laptop users but also widely used to charge mobile phones. Infrastructure extending the feasibility of power hungry tasks such as watching video.

More adhoc charging at Narita Airport, below.

Writing from Vancouver | March 3, 2006 | Comments (0) | Permalink

Activities That

all tags...

Activities that are either illegal or considered by many to be anti-social. What are the risks and concequences of discovery? What happens to the physical (or digital) objects once the activity is complete? How are they disposed of?

The day after tomorrow you are able to carry everything you've ever watched in your pocket. Is the digital equivalent to this simply deleting anti-social or illegal content? Or is there something more?

Writing from Seattle | | Comments (5) | Permalink

Physical Phone Books

all tags...

Will physical phone books still be with us in 5 years time?

Writing from Seattle | March 1, 2006 | Comments (2) | Permalink

Rights To Use Public Infrastructure

all tags...

Parking spaces in the public domain but not to be used by everyone - doctor, ambulance, residents, VIPs only.

For designers of mobile devices, understanding how public infrastructure is used and abused is important not least because it affects what people decide to carry and the relative importance and positioning of what is carried.

For infrastructure in public spaces - who has what rights to use what resources? How do people understand what those rights are? Who will have have priority over whom? What happens if the rules are broken? And what is the likelyhood of infringements being noticed?

Writing from Tokyo | February 22, 2006 | Comments (1) | Permalink

Tea and Buttered Crumpets, To Take Away

all tags...

This morning's office is a cafe overlooking a fairly ordinary street in Brighton, a small city on the South coast of England. I've been sitting here, perched on a raised stool at the window since it opened at 7:30 am, in an effort to warm up - having been pacing the streets for a couple of hours already. To view the street I'm required to wipe condensation away the window every 5 minutes or so. There is a constant stream of teas, coffees, buttered toast and crumpets* being served to the morning rush-hour commuters.

I'm here to research something out there, but it's cold and the draw of toast and crumpets is enough to bring me in here. And anyway there things that can be learnt from being on either side of the glass. The time between ordering and the arrival of food and drink is long enough to be considered a micro break - enough time to take out a mobile phone check messages, perhaps send one or two. But no-one does. Why should they?

A 3 minute walk uphill from here is Brighton station. A 60 minute or so train ride and the passengers will dis-gorging from London Victoria and London Thameslink stations to join the fun that is London's rush-hour. I can't imagine anyone going from home to office in less than 90 minutes which means 15 hours a week spent on the activity known as commuting. Commuting to work in central London from London's suburbs can easily take an hour so for many of these people Brighton is a practical alternative.

Commuting habits are of interest to anyone who provides content or builds devices that are used to access content - whether it's web based, radio or mobile TV. These commuters have 90 minutes or commuting boredom to kill, enough time to listen to a lot of music, watch a feature length movie, read a newspaper from cover to cover, read a novelette. It's probably enough to write the first draft of novel. But how much of those 90 minutes do they really have? What does it mean to commute? How does commuting differ between cultures? And how will the commuting experience evolve with the availability of a wider variety of devices and content formats?

When the 90 minute journey is broken down to sub-tasks - leaving the home space, walking to the station, finding a seat on the train, the train journey itself, negotiating the station at the other end, using pubic transport at the destination and the eventual walk to the building. The longest uninterrupted part of the journey is likely to be the long distance train journey, and actually that's far from uninterrupted. Announcements occur every time the train pulls into a station, pulls out of the station, and when one is available - to notify passengers of the buffet car. We can't assume the commuter automatically finds a seat - many people spend part of their journey keeping an eye out for seating and in some contexts to relocate to better seating. Every time people get on and off lighting conditions, ambient temperatures and noise levels will vary - not optimal conditions for watching a movie if one is available.

How does a commuter differ from one-off travelers? They have in-depth understanding of the nuances of the journey they are taking - knowing which exit can shave a few steps off the journey time, where they are most likely to get a good seat, being able to prepare a ticket or card sufficiently prior to reach a ticket barrier.

The commuting experience varies significantly between cultures - whether its a single person driving a car in Las Vegas, a motorbike seating a family of four in Ho Chi Minh City or standing on the Yamanote subway Line in Tokyo. Is the culture one of early risers? Getting up early in Jakarta or Delhi provides an opportunity for avoiding the heat. Japan has more of a culture of (starting and then) working late.

[The cultural connoisseurs amongst you may enjoy the subtle but important difference between buttered crumpets and, well, buttered crumpet]

Writing from Brighton | February 9, 2006 | Permalink

The Value of You, Is That You Are Here

all tags...

This photo was taken on the escalator transporting passengers from the Keio Line exit of Shibuya Station and disgorging them into Tokyo's busy Friday night streets. In close proximity to the foot of the escalator there are 11 people representing 5 organisations hawking free magazines. They are not there because they love to dress up in lime green and red uniforms they are there because someone pays them to be here, someone sees a business opportunity. You can see something similar in urban centers all over the world - but why? What are the properties that make these spaces so popular for targeting pedestrians?

Quantum physics aside, being physically located in one space implies that someone is not physically present somewhere else at the same time. The value to the hawkers is partly based on the rarity value of a physical presence being in that exact location at that time, and from the possibility that that persons consumption behaviour might be influenced by first taking a magazine, then browsing, sufficiently absorbing and using information within it. (I'll resist the urge to write about the level of sensory engagement though its probably relevant here).

At some point in the future automated or semi-automated devices will be moving around these urban environments carrying out everyday chores on our behalf. The first of these are likely to be extensions of today's personal vehicles - who needs valet parking when your car includes a self parking feature? But before long the range of tasks they can complete, and that we feel comfortable allowing them to carry out on our behalf will extend. The view from the escalator will include non-human hawkers and non-human ped-estrians.

If devices are moving around and negotiating spaces on our behalf, what is their value to the hawkers? What happens to a person's value when its based on rarity, when something is maintains a physical presence on their behalf?

And what will the future hawkers be hawking?

Writing from Tokyo | January 29, 2006 | Permalink

Barriers to Market Entry

all tags...

You buy and sell second hand phones. What steps do you need to take before deciding whether to purchase a second hand device? How easy is it to check that the device works? And given that, what is the minimum infrastructure you need be able to operate? What are the barriers to entering the market?

A sign, a display case, somewhere to sit and something to sell. Photo from the extensive mobile phone market around Chengdu's Tai Shen Lan Lu.

Writing from Tokyo | January 22, 2006 | Comments (0) | Permalink

Gaming Services

all tags...

Location based services will use proximity interaction to identify users, and in some cases the implications of being in a particular place at a particular time or with a particular frequency will lead to 'rewards'. To what extent will location based services that rely on proximity interaction be gamed? By whom? By 2010 proxy-proximity interaction services will be available to carrry out proximity interactions on your behalf, much like the developing and selling of characters in online worlds today.

Hmm, will these kinds of scenarios will be covered in this book?

In research into what people carry, I spent time interviewing people about so-called 'loyalty cards'. A summary of their comments is that they had a vague perception that using the card provided 'benefits' but were mostly unable to articulate what the benefits were. It highlighted how easy, and with relatively little cost it is possible to get a (branded) card into a person's wallet and for it to be carried at least for a few weeks.

Writing from Tokyo | January 5, 2006 | Comments (0) | Permalink

Used Sales

Chengdu China mobile phone street used all tags...

Traders haggle over the price of a barely used, boxed mobile phone. One trader's stall in the foreground - buying and selling used phones, and a list of phone numbers for sale.

Photo taken last week in Chengdu.

Writing from Tokyo | December 23, 2005 | Permalink

Cleanliness (Not Godliness)

all tags...

Not come across this kind of infrastructure outside Asia Pacific: public phone charging station in Chengdu airport includes a small sterilisation pad (just above the red cables, inside the machine). On my travels Seoul appears to be the world capital of cleanliness paranoia - mobile phones shops such as Phone & Fun and member's clubs such as TTL have cleaning stations where you can wipe down, air-blast and sterlise your mobile phone.

What cultural differences are there in attitudes to cleanliness? Practical differences like dealing with dirt, access to clean water, the affects of extreme humidity, dust, animals living on-site or diseases? How does the perception of cleanliness of an environment affect use of infrastructure or personal objects and devices?

And lastly, just because the infrastructure is there does not mean it is being used, is used effectively, is understood, or is on a practical level, necessary.

Writing from Tokyo | | Comments (1) | Permalink

Scale of Repair Cultures

Chengdu China Lhasa mobile phone recycling repair culture Sichuan Tibet TV all tags...

Formal and highly organised mobile phone repair culture in Chengdu, above and more disorganised and smaller scale TV and other electronics repair in Lhasa below. What are the pre-requisites for informal repair cultures? What are the repair volumes for TVs vs mobile phones? Diversity of stocks? Size of components?

Writing from Tokyo | December 22, 2005 | Permalink

Premiums

all tags...

Phone numbers for sale from one of the many street vendors in Chengdu. The plus numbers e.g. +10, +20 refer to the RMB premiums required to buy those numbers. The phone number 86823666 has a premium of +400 RMB (40 Euro). Prioritisation of user preferences can lead to charging premiums, or alternately giving discounts.

Writing from Tokyo | | Comments (0) | Permalink

Perceived Threat, Perceived Security

cafe carrying Center of Gravity Chengdu China Lhasa perception Range of Distribution security Tibet today's office underwear all tags...

Street market in Lhasa sells a wide range of underwear with security pocket for men (shown but not tested) and women. We've had blind user study participants in India who used scent amongst other criteria to know the denomination of bank-notes, and I wonder to what extent the inevitable smell of sweat/urine/blood would affect this understanding? In what other contexts will objects pick up a physical or digital scent?

It's easy to underestimate how the perceived risk of theft affects how objects are carried and then positioned when not in use, and how for people living in that environment it becomes second nature.

Spent a couple of hours in coffee shop in Chengdu - observed the same behaviour on two separate tables: person A sits down and (is later proved to be) waiting for person B. Person A takes off coat and hangs it on the inside of the back of the chair and waits 10+ minutes for person B to arrive. Person A has strong tactile feedback with the coat. Person B arrives and takes off coat and hangs it on the outside of the chair - minimal tactile feedback to the coat. Person B is able to rely on the eyes of Person A to notice a theft attempt of the the coat itself, whereas Person A needs to fend for herself for a while at least and hangs the coat in in a manner that makes its removal more noticeable.

Yes, should have taken a photos to explain this, but it simply wasn't the right thing to do in the context. And yes, 80 RMB (8 Euro) for a cafe presse with fresh ground coffee was a little steep.

Writing from Beijing | December 20, 2005 | Comments (5) | Permalink

Odd Choices, Space For Media Consumption

all tags...

Been trying to figure this out. Both toilet booths don't have their own toilet paper holder - the user needs to reach outside to grab some sheets. First time you need to go you end up with none and have to open the door, reach outside. Second time and you are more likely to over-estimate need and take too much paper.

Many Chinese public toilets don't have doors individual booths - is this an obscure attempt to increase the sociobility of the (mainly western) users of this toilet?

In many cultures the toilet is: a private space; where the user has one or two hands free some of the time; that is socially acceptable to enter a number of times during the day (though there can be a social stigma associated with staying too long if this is tracked) - making it perfect for short bursts of communication or media consumption. Women have the relative advantage in that sitting typically takes longer than standing and provides more opportunity for two handed device interaction.

Writing from Chengdu | December 18, 2005 | Comments (0) | Permalink

Phone Number As Identity II

all tags...

Mobicom [the primary Mongolian carrier] offers a student sign-up package. Part of the deal is a mobile phone number with the pre-fix 9961

"It's a good deal, but if I went for a job and gave a [student] phone number they would want to pay me less"

Writing from Ulan Bataar | December 9, 2005 | Comments (0) | Permalink

Expectations Out of Sync

content disciples football Mongolia temple today's office Ulan Bataar women all tags...

Wandering around UB and chance up disciples playing football in a temple complex. They invite me into the warmth for a reason - to mine the memory of my phone of all its value. Half a dozen files transferred from my device - particularly interested in obtaining photos of women from Japan.

Writing from Ulan Bataar | | Permalink

On Cycling Cities

Beijing bicycle China ethnography field research future perfect today's office all tags...

The easiest and most pleasurable way to cover a lot of ground, spot interesting situations and when the occasion arises interact and document what is happening is simply to ride around the city on a bicycle. If the study focus allows it one of the first tasks is heading to the nearest bike shop to pick up transport for the study. A new bicycle in China can be yours for 130 RMB (13 Euro) going up to 330 RMB for a classic black-framed metal-lever-brake Shanghai bicycle. Prices in India are similar. The economics make a bit more of a dent elsewhere - rental in San Francisco is about 100 USD (85 Euro) for the week, New York is a bit cheaper. Seoul is the only city I've been researching in where there wasn't really a cycle culture to speak of. Some cities are better to cycle around than others. There no pleasant way to describe cycling through the pollution and expelled air-con heat of thousands of cars of Bangkok's rush-hour gridlock. Some Chinese cities can get a bit hairy - vehicles there tend to take the shortest path regardless of whether you are in the way. Cycling Hanoi is at first glance a chaotic wall of cycles and a few motorbikes, but becomes easier once you tune into rhythm of the city. Safety? My mantra is that it's bad luck for locals to run over foreigners - take a hit on their insurance premiums and get tangled up in red tape? More likely to swerve to the right or take pedal from the metal. If I keep posting the mantra continues to work. Cycling a foreign city requires confidence - especially if it's necessary to multi-task to document aspects of the journey. We sometimes run studies where the participants who are being shadowed are using bicycles - so naturally we do too. It's difficult to collect accurate photo and video data whilst on the move on a bike although there are a variety of clamps available to hold the camera steady. The smaller the camera the better - the larger ones work themselves loose too easily. Cycle courier footage taken with a with a fish-eye lens mounted at wheel level has wow-factor but at the end of the day has little practical research value. A personal favourite of footage taken whilst cycling was Shanghai during a dusk commute taken with night vision. One trip this summer involved cycling out from the center of Beijing and just keeping going. Each of the 5 ring roads that circle the city a marker of how far I'd gone. Weaving through neighborhoods, markets, onto the suburbs eventually to be replaced by factories and newly built technology parks, and soon after that (dorm) accommodation for some of these places. It took a meandering 90 minutes to reach the first fields which then continued uninterrupted for the remainder of the day, with only breaks for small hamlets. Yesterday bought another bike and nosed around the store whilst the mechanics were putting it together. The usual bicycle shop equipment joined by a soldering torch - hanging on the wall of the shop (photo above). It highlights two things: the evolution of what products are sold in what stores - electrically assisted bicycles have taken off in China and are sold in motorbike and bicycle stores; the move from the mechanical to the electronic. At what stage does it become impossible for the shop mechanics to repair common faults on the products they sell? Prior research into informal repair cultures highlights that there can be a business case for repairing mass produced objects such as mobile phones, but on the other hand the piles of circuit boards in trash dumps and corners of reycling plants tells me that this is not always the case. To what extent does the ability to repair affect how a product takes off in highly price sensitive markets?

Writing from Beijing | December 4, 2005 | Permalink

Processes & Errors

all tags...

Purchasing phone top-up credit from street vendor in Beijing.

The current process has plenty of scope for introducing errors. Alternatives available.

Writing from Beijing | | Comments (0) | Permalink

Location Shifting

Beijing carrying China Dashanzi location shifting personalisation phone straps today's office wheres the phone? all tags...

What percentage of mobile phone users have straps?
How is location of device in trouser pockets influenced by strap usage?
What are the design implications for device interaction and use?

More figuring out where, how, why people carry phones.

Writing from Dashanzi | December 2, 2005 | Permalink

Temporary Protection

all tags...

Arrive at restaurant. Coat goes on back of chair is covered by waiter by a tight fitting cloth. Coat stays close to owner, makes theft harder.

Writing from Design Research | December 1, 2005 | Comments (1) | Permalink

Wayfinding

all tags...

Mobile with GPS and map application. So you want to make a map reference in a hurry?

"It's easier to just ask someone"

In many instances so it is.

Writing from Daikanyama | November 23, 2005 | Comments (3) | Permalink

Non-Literate Mobile Phone Communication

all tags...

To communicate with someone outside your immediate proximity requires at least 4 things: something to communicate; tools to create what you want to communicate; an infrastructure to carry the communication; and a means of identifying with whom to communicate. There are an estimated 799 million non-literate peoples world wide. If you can't read and write how do you manage your contacts?

This simple observation was the starting point to conduct a series of (ongoing) exploratory research studies in India, China and Nepal - our aim to understand the communication needs of non-literate users. For mobile phone manufacturers who wish to address these needs: How does the inability to read and write affect the ability of mobile phone users to make effective use of mobile phones? Making and receiving calls? Creating and managing contact information? Text messaging? Using time management features? How can we design communication tools that draw on the knowledge and experiences that these users do have?

If your interest is piqued then you might enjoy the following essay entitled Understanding Non-Literacy as a Barrier to Mobile Phone Communication which explores these issues and proposes a number of possible design solutions. As with a lot of our work the original projects included a fair amount of concept development that is only touched on in this essay.

In the studies we spent time with non-literate users exploring, mapping and understanding the things they used and the tasks they wanted to achieve - from using washing machines to weighing scales to running motorbikes to re-tuning TVs to paying for things. How did they interact with objects with textual and numeric interfaces? What problems did they encounter? What strategies did they adopt to overcome these problems? Were these strategies successful? If not, why not? And how can we bring the knowledge from this research and apply it to create communication devices that are more in tune with our non-literate users?

Researching non-literate communication practices has been rewarding: it touches on a very basic human desire - to communicate across time and space; the potential payback for the research is obvious and non-trivial; and the study participants, collaboration partners and environments in which the research took place have been quite simply inspiring.

Photos taken from street research in Mumbia, Bangalore, 2004 & 2005.

Writing from Tokyo | November 20, 2005 | Comments (1) | Permalink

Where People Carry Mobile Phones

awareness carrying Cui Yanqing downloads Fumiko Ichikawa mobile essentials mobile phone presentations all tags...

Where do you carry your mobile phone? And how will this change if the phone were to adopt some of the functionality associated with other objects that you carry such as money and personal identity? (Both payment and ticketing are already available on handsets in Japan).

We've been conducting a series of studies to understand where people carry mobile phones and other mobile essentials. The original research was driven by a need to know to what extent people notice incoming communication and to what extent this was affected by where the device was carried. After all - the usefulness of a mobile phone is diminished if the user fails to notice that someone is calling. (For the record, we assume that the user wants control over whether or not to be notified in the first place - 24/7 connectivity is a discussion topic for later perhaps?) If you observe customers in a cafe for an hour one of the most frequent behaviours related to mobile phones, especially for women, is checking whether they have missed any incoming communication. User data on device location can support product designers for example helping them decide defaults speaker volume or lanyard placement.

My colleague Fumiko Ichikawa is today presenting the first fruit of this research in a paper entitled Where's the Phone - a Study of Mobile Phone Location in Public Spaces (download pdf) at the Mobility 2005 conference in Guangzhou, China. This paper draws on data from the first 3 studies - Helsinki, New York and Milan. Whilst I was not present in the original study in Helsinki I managed to take part in the follow-ups studies including cultures as diverse as the US, Italy, South Korea, Japan, China and India. In the future we'll be publishing data for these other cultures and explore the issues related to the full range of mobile essentials (the paper above focusses on the mobile phone).

Where people carry things today is interesting enough. The ultimate goal of this design research is to predict how the primary carrying location might change according to issues like new features and form factors. (New form factors will be enabled by technologlical advances such as minaturisation, flexible components or new charging methods). The fun part is figuring how this will collide with and influence future social and cultural trends.

And finally, if you're wondering whether I travel the world just to run these studies the answer is no - the team tends to run the street surveys in conjunction with more in-depth user studies that are already going on - its a good way to utilize assistant down time, meet hundreds of local mobile phone users and get a feel for a culture.

Writing from Tokyo | November 17, 2005 | Comments (2) | Permalink

Why do People Carry Mobile Phones?

carrying Center of Gravity forgetting mobile essentials mobile phone Per Persson Point of Reflection Range of Distribution security survival all tags...

Why do people carry phones?
Why do people carry what they carry?
And if we can understand why, how can we use this knowledge in the design of future products, applications and services?

Why people carry phones might seem like a rather basic question for someone who works for a mobile phone manufacturer, but the journey to try and understand the answer has been an interesting one.

A couple of years back I carried out a multi-cultural research project with Per Persson and a number of other colleagues to figure out what objects people consider to be essential when they leave home. We spent time studying 17 urban dwellers in San Francisco, Berlin and Shanghai and Tokyo with shadowing, home-interviews, plus 129 street interviews and numerous observation sessions. One of our screening criteria for in-depth subjects was that people had to own a mobile phone although during the screening process we made no assumptions about whether they considered the phone a necessity or not.

In the cultures we studied 3 objects were considered essential across all participants, cultures and genders were keys, money and mobile phone. Whilst this may seem obvious the interesting part of the study was in understanding the reasons why people considered these objects essential (largely survival, safety & security), why they were not always present (forgetting, awareness, making a conscious decision to be out of touch) and strategies people adopted to help them remember to take these objects. A lot of times money will be carried in a wallet or purse, but when it comes down to it, the money (cash and notes) are considered the essential objects before the other objects that are also contained there.

Some of the material from this study was presented in the DUX 2005 paper - 'Mobile Essentials - Field Study and Concepting' (download paper, 0.4mb). The paper introduces three interrelated ways to understand human behaviour to explain what we learned, and at some point I'll use Future Perfect to expand on some of these issues.

Firstly the Center of Gravity describes the most likely place where you are likely to cluster and consequently find these objects. In the home the Center of Gravity is likely to be the edge of a desk, a chair and often in the case of women, a bag. Objects don't stay in the center of gravity but over time they gravitate there.

The second idea is the Point of Reflection - the moment when leaving a space when you pause current activities turn back into an environment and check you have the mobile essentials. Typically this involves looking at the Center of Gravity, sometimes tapping pockets, sometimes speaking aloud. Not seeing the objects where they are supposed to be (the Center of Gravity) can be a sign that they are already carried.

The last behavioural concept is something we call the Range of Distribution - essentially the degree to which essential objects are likely to stray from the person, or from the person's line of sight/range of touch. Range of distribution is largely based on perceived risk of theft - the higher the perceived risk the further away objects are likely to be placed be allowed to 'stray'. This way of thinking about objects is important because the more likely an object is to be out of sight the more likely it is to be forgotten, and a mobile essential that is forgotten has little use in solving emergencies. In addition as mobile phones that take on functions associated with other mobile essentials for example access/identity (key, smart-card) or payment (money) can affect where and how they are carried.

As a private, relatively safe environment the home has a large range of distribution, whilst spaces like cafes or public transport have a relatively low range of distribution. The lowest range of distribution we observed was bus commuting in Shanghai rush-hour. The most extreme example of range of distribution was given to us by a vice cop in Berlin who explained about a drug dealer that double wrapped his produce which was then stored it his mouth - if the cops tried to bust them swallowed. Waiting for the produce to clear the digestive system was often too much hassle for low level busts, and was presumably rather unpleasant and messy.

Taxis are interesting environments in that they are often treated as a temporary private space - in which people can relax and objects are likely to spread out within the natural boundaries of the environment. When combined with other parameters such as: people using taxi's whilst tired or impaired e.g. drunk/high; the likelihood of using the mobile phone in the taxi; placing objects on the seat/out of sight after use; and a pressured sequence of tasks at the end of the journey such as thinking what to do next on arrival at the destination and paying the driver, help explain why mobile phones are often left in taxis.

There are naturally many other reasons why people carry a mobile phones - for entertainment, projecting status, a sense of belonging, or capturing and communicating an experiences using a camera phone to name a few, but the commonality was essentially their ability to help us survive.

Most people consider other objects essential - driver's license (particularly in the US), medication, travel pass and lip-stick are just some that have been mentioned but these can change over the course of the day and according to context. I would argue that nearly all objects that people carry are essential, because the carrier has already gone through a conscious and subconscious selection process to select those objects from all the objects they own or have access to. Nobody carries stuff just for the hell of it. Well actually that's not strictly true - many people carry things that they are not aware they are carrying - phones increasingly have features that the owner considers useful, is not aware are on the device. In these instances the smart question is what situations trigger initial awareness of a feature, and many researchers are working on contextual understanding in part to present the user with the right feature/knowledge at exactly the right time that it is useful.

The exceptions to why people don't carry these objects are in some ways more interesting than the fact they do in the first place. Designing solutions that meet a user needs are relatively easy, but for a product to be adopted into the flow of someone's life takes a good understanding of exceptions. Mobile essentials are often forgotten, despite the strategies for remembering. Keys are not necessarily needed if you live in an extended family or in areas of high unemployment. Some people like to 'switch off' and talk about quality time without the interruption of the mobile phone (I expect there to be different attitudes towards constant connectivity with younger generations). There is also the issue of at what point in a person's life they are entrusted to carry these essentials and in the case of children, if they are lost, who is responsible to replace them?

In one sense the easiest way never to ever forget anything ever again is to have nothing to remember. This is not as glib as it first sounds - it is possible to delegate responsibility to remembering to other people or indeed to technology. (The concept of delegating can be considered as a solution to many problems except entertainment and bodily functions).

A number of interesting avenues have come out of this research:

Why people make a conscious effort to leave mobile essentials behind and in the case of their mobile phone - switched off. This loosely comes under the heading connecting people, dis-connecting people, and re-connecting people.

My colleagues have initated a study of where people in Helsinki carry their phones and whether they notice incoming communication. A paper, drawing on data from follow up studies in Milan and New York will be presented at the Mobility Conference 2005 in Guangzhou China. (I'll post it when its available)

Another theme is the role of the phone in supporting and on occasion triggering personal crisis. Not life threatening events but things like being locked out of home, being lost late at night, breaking up with boyfriend/girlfriend and yes, mobile phone theft and loss. Notice the overlap between mobile essentials and personal crisis?.

Writing from Tokyo | November 11, 2005 | Comments (1) | Permalink

Tokyo Graffiti

all tags...

Decent pop-ethnography magazine covering ordinary Japanese, what they carry, what they think and sometimes running features like documenting everything a person has in their bedroom, or bag. Very accessible and good if you want tips on how to present research material.

Writing from Shibuya | November 2, 2005 | Comments (4) | Permalink

Headsets and Earpieces

all tags...

Knowing whether someone is speaking on the phone is easier if they're speaking into a Hulgar P-Phone headset - it looks like it does on the box. For 8,000 yen you get a novelty that works with a mobile and a nice box but not much else.

Writing from Shibuya, back of | | Permalink

Surprise, Delight

all tags...

Picked up a iRiver U10 on last trip to Korea. The purchasing experience in the iRiver shop was pretty good and included a demonstration by a knowledgeable member of staff. The device plays video (along with about a dozen other features), which is relatively easy proposition for consumers to understand. It is presented in an optional stand which for me had considerable 'come play with me' emotional pull, followed by delight in the way that the device ejected from the stand, and the puckered mammal face, above.

A few downsides on the out-of-the-box-experience. Everything in the package - cables, device, individual straps and even an 8 page manual came in a separate box within the box which was complete overkill. The boxes were desiged so it wasn't clear what was inside each one. The install CD design (just the design, not the software on it) was a complete rip of Apple iPod installer CD. And the box included a sticker informing the purchaser not to throw away the box without checking the bottom of the box packaging for a hidden pouch. Adding the pouch was clearly an afterthought followed by badly corrective design.

Writing from Seoul | November 1, 2005 | Comments (0) | Permalink

Mobile Phone as Personal Shrine

cover Japan mobile phone personal shrine personalisation physical recycling RFID today's office Tokyo all tags...

What can you learn from products about to be recycled?

When I first moved to Japan one of the first exploratory studies I carried out was to try and figure out how and why people customise their phone cover. It's fairly common in Japan, Korea and to a lesser extent China to see phones adorned with stickers as well as the more usual phone straps. I was looking for inspiration for new applications and services and this seemed a good a place to start as any.

On a hot summer's day I traveled down to a mobile phone recycling plant on the edge of Tokyo and with the help of a number of friendly factory workers spent a few hours sorted through over 6,000 used phone covers, documenting all and any physical customisation that was evident. The result was several hundred photos of stickers of designs, logos, decorations and puri kura - the print club stickers that are still relatively popular in Japan and some Asian cultures.

Only 11% of the 6447 covers had some form of physical customisation. I was expecting this to be more based on ad-hoc observations from the street, though this reflects the places and people I hang out with. The range of physical customisation can be categorized into: stickers of logos; print club photos; telephone numbers; and illustrations/decorations. There were also a few examples of 'super customisation' where people had obviously put in a lot of time and effort detailling paint jobs, tagging, graffiti covering the whole device.

Why do people physically customize their phones with stickers?

Putting a sticker of a brand on a phone is an obvious and easy way to project lifestyle choices, peer group affiliations and aspirations - for example 'I'm into surfing' or 'my crew wear's Gravis'. It's socially acceptable, though in some environments a little dangerous, to have the phone out on display and at the very least answering a call and text messaging provide opportunties for others to see. Print club photos adorning the phone cover both confirm and project to others who the owner is connected with, in some regards a physical manifestation of the phone book. Customisation can also send the signal that 'this is mine, hands off'. Lastly, on a practical level it solves the problem of knowing widget is yours when all the widgets look alike. This was evident in a different study where we discovered the motivation behind walkie talkie customization by San Francisco bike messengers and of school calculators by Shanghai school kids was the same - to figure out which device belonged to them. If a company bought its workers the same mobile phone model, I would expect a large % of owners to add some small physical customisation for this same reason.

One of the surprise findings from the Tokyo recycling plant research was the use of the inside back cover as a form of 'mobile personal shrine' a place for storing photos/memories. Unless the back cover was removed from the phone no-one else would see or would know the photo was there so my assumption is that the photos were for personal consumption, or at the owner's discretion for sharing with someone else. A number of the photos appeared quite intimate - a couple hugging, a child, friends doing things in privacy of a photo booth.

There are of course limits to what you can learn through the documenting used products. Many of the best insights come from talking with people about why and how, whereas the recycling plant data just shows what. I had no way of knowing, for example whether the phones were for work or personal use or whether the owner was male or female.

More and more data can be embedded in and on objects - QR bar codes printed on the back of a sticker, RFID tags embedded in a device. A visit to a recycling plant in 2010 will probably yield much more about the product and its owners than we can ever know today. Interesting from the research point of view, by today's standards a major privacy issue for pretty much everyone else.

Writing from Tokyo | October 22, 2005 | Permalink

Touch Interaction

all tags...

Poster extolling the virtues of proximity touch interaction.

Writing from Harajuku | October 20, 2005 | Permalink

22 And Counting

all tags...

30 minutes to kill before the embassy opens... Omotesando window shopping.

Stripped down cordless phone from + - 0. Despite its functional minimalism there are still 22 visible buttons, including separate on / off. Design trade offs: desire for symmetry vs. visible UI complexity vs. desire to map 1 function to 1 button?

Are separate on / off buttons easier or more satifying than combined in one button?

Writing from Omotesando | October 19, 2005 | Comments (2) | Permalink

Custom Covers

all tags...

For 3,400 Yen (24 Euro or so) in downtown Tokyo you can get yourself a custom phone cover design completed in 30 minutes. Choose any number of truly tasteful designs from samples on the shelf or from a booklet most are simple patterns, a scary number of cigarette company logos, fake Gucci, YSL, whales a-jumping, cats a-lookin cute that kind of thing. He prints the design on sticky film, carefully folds it onto the phone. 20 seconds with a hair dryer then spends the next 15 minutes cutting holes for the display, buttons and removing access film.

The quality of the final result is not particular inspiring - though this is due the resolution and colour caperbilities of the printer rather than the process itself.

The bling-my-fone option looks like being more interesting.

... and if you're wondering about the lightly clothed punters, these photos were taken about a month ago. You'll be happy to hear that today it's raining hard in Tokyo and I forgot my bike rain gear. Whoopy do.

Writing from Harajuku | October 17, 2005 | Comments (3) | Permalink

Vanity, reflected

all tags...

A while back I was discussing the differences between Japanese, English and Finnish cultures. One superficial difference is the degree to which Japanese people care for and maintain their physical appearance in public. Look at the mobile essentials carried by male or female Tokyo commuter you will find a relatively high proportion of items related tomaintain appearance compared to the equivalent contents from a London or Helsinki commuter - combs, make-up, mirror, deodorants, tissues etc *. Of course the opposite is equally true - the relative lack of appearance maintenance objects in the UK & Finland. I often leave Tokyo feeling like a slob and arrive in Helsinki feeling relatively smartly dressed (feel free not to comment).

There are many ways to explain the differences in volume of appearance-related-objects in terms of what people carry. Relatively long commuting times into Tokyo could mean that people have to carry more of the items they need for later in the day. Alternatively, more socializing takes place outside the home so there are fewer opportunities to use the home space as a status signifier, putting more emphasis on projecting status via dress and accessories. Retail is geared up to support getting the look just-right - in Tokyo you can take it for granted that even if you buy a pair of trousers in a mass-market retailer they will measure, cut and sew to your requirements pretty much within an hour of purchase, whereas in Europe to a large extent people accept what is available off the shelf - and walk around in (badly) fitting clothes.

Carrying the tools for maintaining ones appearance implies the need for ongoing efforts over the course of the day - combing hair or applying make-up on the subway, using the mobile phone display as a mirror or, taking out a compact. Gazing at a mirror for 'too long' in a public space in a city like Berlin and you'll be considered vain. But vanity is a relative thing and as was pointed out - in a city the size of Seoul (10 million) the opinions of people you will never meet again matter less - they might as well be part of the furniture.

During my visit to Ji Lin earlier this year I managed to spend about 5 minutes in the security office of the hotel we were staying at and, looking at the security screens got a sense of where all the close circuit TV cameras were placed around the building. There was a fairly innocuous camera in each of the elevators. You know how when the elevator doors close you look in the mirror and when they re-open you pretend that you were doing something else like fiddling with your watch? Well, that personal moment was not so personal - the security guard and his mates enjoyed your private moment too. Hmm, anyone know of user studies of what people do in elevators?

A ubiquitous manifestation of vanity with Seoul's younger residents is selca = self camera = the taking of photos of oneself typically for placement on a Cyworld homepage. No visit to a cafe or restaurant appears complete without digital cameras and camera phones being taken out to document oneself at the beginning of the event. This is not one or two quickly taken snaps - the camera angles are carefully thought out, results are reviewed, re-taken, hair is re-arranged, again and again and again easily for up to 10 minutes. It's interesting enough when it's just one person. The effect is magnified when all the people sitting around the same table are engaged in this same self-focused activity sometimes with minimal interaction amongst themselves. Camera phones are even marketed as having features that enable good selca - easy to hold and see self portraits whilst taking, and filters to change the photo appearance on the phone. The process is so removed from my reality I feel like I belong to another species. Do the experiences we have not exist if not recorded and displayed in some way? Do we not exist if we are not present in the photos of the event?

Thanks Kim and Younghee for the cultural guidance this past week.

*If you are interested in the whole what-people-carry-why-and-how topic Scott Mainwaring of Intel's People & Practices Group presented a paper at Ubicomp 2005, and I have a paper on a similar topic coming up at DUX 2005.

Writing from Seoul | October 1, 2005 | Comments (2) | Permalink

Sublime happiness

all tags...

The person who takes you the last leg of the journey often turns into the first local subject of the day. Sit in the front of the taxi - I can't verbally communicate with the driver (my Korean is non-existent) but there's more to explore. When did glove boxes stop containing gloves? Is this an extended battery option, or a regular part of the design?

On arrival the hotel suite slowly turns into mission control. Don't need full sized fridge. Do need more table and wall hanging space. Do need 10 more power sockets to charge the equipment. And do need to set everything up before we head out for our first excursion in the city.

Happiness is a timezone close to home
Sublime happiness would be somewhere decent to swim/run in the morning.

Writing from Seoul | September 23, 2005 | Comments (2) | Permalink

@ Mo

all tags...

@Mo is another concept store in Harajuku. 'Custom' FOMA P901is are placed in the context of clothing, chill-out leather sofas, tees and the ubitquitous Be@rbricks.

Its difficult to bring a custom and exclusive purchasing experience to mobile phones, which are largely the most mass of mass produced products, with a few exceptions of course.

This store leaves me cold - its all too template to be original. In a year it will be gone, but by then it will have already served its purpose.

Writing from Harajuku | April 22, 2005 | Permalink

Browse the Future Perfect archives by date or keyword

© Jan Chipchase, 2005 - 07 | Site Map