Japan Archives
Contactless Confusion
Dec 30, 2008
A feature of contactless cards is the ability to authenticate (pass through ticket barriers/make payments/...) without removing the card from the wallet or purse.
Except that as the cards become more prevalent, and the features of one card start to trump another people end up carrying multiple cards with overlapping functions. The only way for the user to know which card to use? Gosh - to remove the card from the wallet. Convenience indeed.
It's easy to remove out of date cards from a wallet - so why aren't they? Users imagine that the old cards contain some kind of residual value but at the time when the wallet is being cleared out they are nowhere near a machine that could communicate it's current status/credit, many are carried in-finitum.
Just because the cards are read differently by the system don't assume that the user will always remember which card is used for which purpose. The TASPO contactless card used to authenticate that the person buying cigarettes from a vending machine is in fact over 18, is frequently mistaken for the PASMO card used to travel on the subway - requiring user-education in the form of signs at the subway entrance. This is only the beginning - at this rate we're going to see contactless cards with some form of ticketing/service access/monetary credit handed out for free - with the service provider making money either from the advertising on the card, leveraging insights from tracking usage, or merely as an encouragement for users to switch to a newer system, with more profitable features naturally. The number of contactless cards in the wallet competing for your attention will only increase.
One card to rule them all?
Wishful thinking.
Contextual Advertising I
Nov 27, 2008
Why has this form of advertising has made its way outside the phone booth in Japan but less so elsewhere?
More sex here. Yeah you just had to look didn't you.
Design Competition: A Future Perfected
Nov 08, 2008
If you (or your class) enjoy a design challenge then this might be for you...
Like an unruly child with overgrown hair and tourettes Future Perfect is growing up to be a tad unmanageable - after 3 years and ~2,000 posts the site is now in need of a hair cut and a gentle guiding hand. The 45mm alternative doesn't bear thinking about.
I'm need help with a site redesign that balances the immediacy of regular updates with content from the considerable archives, all wrapped up in a elegant, future-quirky and efficient design. Whomever takes this on will naturally get access to the site analytics - understanding current usage will be key.
This isn't a paid commission, but there's a decent bottle of sake and not a little appreciation to be had. Think you have what it takes? Send an email to ping at janchipchase dot com to start that conversation.
Ta to the change agent.
The Psychology of What We (Don't) Know
Oct 21, 2008
The human tendency to look forward, to take in the parts of approaching objects that we haven't yet seen. Or is it a desire to see what comes next?
Tokyo Buh-ling
Oct 21, 2008
Urban Interactions
Oct 20, 2008
The evolution of how we interact with the world around us: information pickup in Tokyo Midtown (above), ticketing, vending machines and laptops.
Laptops? Touch your 'felica/wallet' equipped mobile phone against the logo etched into the laptop to initiate a website payment that is billed to your mobile phone bill.
Ego Spam
Oct 19, 2008
A heads up for statesiders - I'll be presenting at the Wireless Influencer's Conference in Dana Point, heading up the coast to Palo Alto / Mountain View on the 29th, LA/Calabasas on the 30/31st, Washington DC on the 3/4th and NYC on the 5th. A couple of extra talks to be announced.
DC on election day should be fun.
Photo by design studio colleague Duncan Burns who happened to be in NYC when the New York Times piece came out.
Fantasy. Reality. Stir.
Oct 19, 2008
An open studio for wedding photos - in the garden of the Meguro Gajoen Hotel above (& incidentally the view directly below my office window), and an idealised view of the Tokyo Tower below.
A camera is not merely a camera, but a device for capturing and time-shifting experiences. In a networked, geo-tagged world there is so much other data to draw on, not least the 1'000's of photos taken from the same spot. How does the process of capturing experiences change? Does the 'user' need to be part of this experience? And given that so much of what is out there can be captured automatically, how will future 'experience/media' leverage the human need for learning, evolution, attainment? Where's the satisfaction when the whole process can be automated?
Communicating Differences
Sep 25, 2008
As the design of 'energy saving' light bulbs has evolved to physically appear more like its incandescent predecessor - the relative importance of using packaging design to communicate its differences.
For every product - the pros and cons of evolution versus revolution.
Delivery Infrastructure
Aug 24, 2008
Clip outside this Shinagawa hotel room supporting the delivery of up to two newspapers.
There's always a slight frisson from spending a night in a hotel in your home city. Arrive at reception with no luggage aside from a photo-shootingly-large camera, ne. A receptionist sighs, I head to the room.
Two by Four
Aug 24, 2008
Increasing the effectiveness of using traffic wands to control pedestrians.
Motivations For
Aug 05, 2008
Bus stop with Japanese flag - public transport one of the services in Kabul supported by Japanese aid.
Alternate States
Jul 23, 2008
Monday afternoon taking a teleconference call from home - sharing the line with an early riser in Espoo, and a LA based Design Studio colleague driving home from a Sunday night gig at the 'Bowl – the three of us united by the need to consolidate knowledge before the summer break. The meeting generates a short to-do list, one that can wait at least a few hours, and the carbon fibre of the bike creaks a little with an out-of-saddle acceleration. Every city has its urban sunset – sights and sounds so everyday they are as natural as the solar cycle: a shinkansen glides over the Tamagawa River as the five o’clock song is broadcast from a nearby factory. The road stretches ahead, a little energy reserved for first real hill climb of the day.
Tuesday afternoon, in the office-office and every item on the to-do list has been crossed off. Take the elevator down the reception and feel an involuntary smile light up from within, the mental packing has begun. On the ride home the open air pool beckons, breathing regulated 50 by 30.
This morning nursing a decent Colombian for breakfast, building one last email from a flurry of comments in the inbox. The most enjoyable aspect of team work is seeing unique skills applied to a whole, that will one day be shared.
There is no such thing as 'the office', only spaces that are or are not able to accommodate what that needs done. Switching off is easy – 5 weeks of nothing planned.
Tokyo this morning, Bangkok by nightfall and then, well, lets see.
You Don't Say?
Jul 21, 2008
Last day in Handan and I'm part of a crowd watching five guys dressed in light green uniforms use grappling hooks and a limp lasso to gently hook a head-down floater out of the canal. I can't help wondering how long it takes for a body to decompose and somewhat irrationally whether we're going to witness a body part tear away from the torso.
It'll be no surprise to you that the crowd drew me here, and tapping on the motorbike driver's shoulder we slowed to a halt, dismounted and nosed around. About a dozen police officers are positioned behind the police tape keeping the crowd at bay, and a video camera which could belong to the police (a la G8 protests) or simply a local journalist doing his job scans our side of the canal bank, lingering on yours truly. The cameraman talks with a blue uniform and that uniform talks to another blue uniform until in colour co-ordinated harmony they circumnavigate the crowd and head in my direction.
There's a tendency of citizens of any culture to want to show visitors to their fair land the best of what's on offer. It works at the individual level when we're being shown around the homes of our study participants, in the discussions with the local team hired to help us access and understand what it is we are there to study and the level of (self) criticism in the conversations that follow and, in this instance - with the police trying to keep a lid on this floater of an incident.
The experience of being detained by the authorities varies from country to countryy. Today, fighting in my corner I've got a valid business visa, an innocent enough reason for being here and a world weary yet smiling detective who looks like he's doing things by the book. The uncertainty staring at me from across the ring is that I'm lugging a seriousish looking camera and have been taking photos of the scene, which may or may not be a crime scene; I'm not carrying a mandatory photo ID which is back in the hotel; I have a Chinese vocabulary of about a dozen words - half of which are useful only if I'm ordering drinks in a bar. My motorbike driver, despite my our proximate intimacy when he leans into the corners - only met me a few hours ago and speaks no English. I could of course phone a Chinese speaking friend, if my mobile wasn't in the hotel charging. The rest of the research team have left already, and my Beijing bound train leaves in a few hours. Journalists need to be registered and right now I need to prove I'm no journalist. In the mean time, the photos are reviewed by one of the officers and deleted from the camera.
When we enter a participant's home the question is not whether they've done anything to prepare themselves and their private space to 'public presentation', but how?. And ultimately if we're able to earn enough trust with the family or indeed, with our locally hired assistants then we are able to shift the conversation to why - understanding what is missing from the space, what we didn't see, and ultimately what motivated them to keep it out of view. What you don't say speaks volumes whether you're acting as an individual or as a representative of your country. In a clear cut world deleting photos from a foreigner's camera is censorship, but for all our rhetoric nothing is ever that clear cut - neither here or in your country.
A gentle two-handed raising of the glass to Niu Lei, Zhao Yujing, Liu Guofu, Hu Meirong and Zhang Jing in Handan and Ajit, Skikar, Vaibhar & Shweta in Ahmedabad for guiding us through the collision of people and places in such good spirits - much appreciated. MM, ZH and LX ta for the setup.
Photos - miscellaneous from Handan none of whom were involved in the floater incident.
Some of you go in for the bike thing.
Remixing Culture, Design & Technology
Jul 21, 2008
If you've got proven design research experience working in the Philippines and/or Indonesia there's an upcoming field project that might interested you. (This request is not on behalf my employer, and apart from this introduction I'm not involved in the study in any way). Ping me a short email to info @ janchipchase dot com and I'll forward your details to the potential client.
Service Advertising
Jul 20, 2008
An almost poetic level of advertising - next to each and every door in this housing estate. Mostly for sewage removal services. How long before the volumes of geo-tagged spam render certain spatial overlays of the city essentially worthless?
Plate
Jul 20, 2008
Art Quake
Jul 20, 2008
Rubble covers the basketball court - just part of the massive city-wide rebuilding process. It's as if the city is one giant experimental art piece.
The Properties of a Driving School
Jul 20, 2008
What do you need to create a driving school? Ideally a cul-de-sac, pedestrians keeping a wide berth, having objects to avoid running over. And someone taking money.
From Handan.
Bling Norms
Jul 19, 2008
Gem blinged tooth. Forgot to test whether it was a stick-on.
Formal Urban Annotation
Jul 19, 2008
Where the electricity flows...
Kiddie Haircut Norms
Jul 19, 2008
Postures of Use
Jul 19, 2008
Corrective Behaviours: The Tap
Jul 19, 2008
If you own a device where the display switches between landscape and portrait modes according to its physical orientation – you’ll have experienced a situation where the orientation is out of sync with, well, gravity. And like many people you probably find yourself shaking or gently tapping the device to help it re-align to your and the rest of the universe's reality.
Having to correct the devices 'gravity' is annoying enough, but particularly so when the speed of the device is slow and the correction slower, and the pain is multiplied when the task at hand is urgent.
Thoughts for today: using an understanding of corrective behaviours and metrics that gauge consumer frustration to speed up the corrective process, in real-time on the device.
Reflections
Jul 08, 2008
For the next two hours this is my office - a sofa in the Lotus, located in a Omotesando back alley. I've spent the day criss-crossing Tokyo by bicycle - a reflection of my preference to brave rainy season showers over the damp-from-the-rainy-season subway passengers, and the need to fit more meetings than there are available time slots in the calendar. The telco with design studio colleagues from LA and Helsinki is scheduled to start in ten minutes. Just enough time to order coffee, find the quietest spot in the cafe with decent cellular reception and settle in.
This is the kind of place where taking out a laptop is. not. appropriate, and it stays open long enough to retrieve the information required for the next hour. A coffee arrives. 5 minutes before the call starts.
A hand cupped around the headset helps keep more of the conversation to myself and cut out some of the ambient noise. Or does it? The psychology of justification. Copious use of the mute button helps keep things sane, but I get the impression I've annoyed the hell out of my calling partners. Sorry. An hour later, we're done.
If mating beasts were drawn to one another by the ergonomic constraints of their clothing no doubt we'd see the stick thin boys with their lowest of low-slung jeans shuffling in romantic harmony with kimono clad girls. Omotesando makes for a decent enough office if you're after inspiration but it's difficult to focus. Next meeting starts in 30.
China on Tuesday.
Our Augmentable World
Jul 08, 2008
In a future perfect world where a % of the urban population is wearing or carrying a device that is capable of augmenting reality what are the surfaces, contexts, textures where we are most likely to see, er, reality augmented? And of course augmented with what?
Given the challenges of smoothing-the-edges between the physical and the digital what are the inherent properties of the urban landscape that make one surface more or less augmentable? Is it the white spaces that are overlaid with informational and advertising hoardings? Or is that blue sky just a bluescreen waiting to happen?
Crude urban annotation from Daikanyama crossing.
A Fear/Love of Mechanical Objects
Jul 07, 2008
The pleasure/fear of the anticipation of using a mechanical object versus the pleasure/fear that comes from actual use.
Sangenjaya launderette vending machines.
Conscious Design Choices
Jul 07, 2008
The flooring of this Sangenjaya sento? Carpet patterned linoleum. Disorientating.
Ambient Reality Checks
Jul 07, 2008
If you've ever tried managing a cross-cultural project where the team hails from Europe, China and India you've probably come across decimal place separator issues. Non-trivial when figures are fly back and forth and people are talking 100,000's, 10,0000's and 10,00,00's.
And so it was during the preparation of our next field study - where in a telephone and instant messaging session with subcontractors zero and decimal points were dancing in one direction and the next. A city with a population of 5,00,0000 or 50,0000? And on our mental background layer we're zooming in and out of Google Maps - a reality check to understand the spread and size of the city.
For every task or activity - the new sources of ambient data from which to shape assumptions.
Off to China this week - a blitz of research in pre-Olympic Beijing followed by a full-on study in Handan , another Chinese city you've probably never heard of with a population of 8.5 million souls.
Dot
Jul 04, 2008
Natural, Ordered, Structured
Jul 04, 2008
Flowers in the rainy season.
Tagging People and Objects for Profit
Jul 04, 2008
Last day in Ahmedabad - our rickshaw driver shouting over the drone of the 2-stroke, and she stops to pull in the scarf. We collectively exhale.
Consider the same situation in the future perfect world – where the passengers of the rickshaw can conduct a visual search, use real time video pattern matching to discover related content such as videos of choking motorcyclists (oh you had to follow that link didn't you?) pulled from the ‘tube and stats of actual incidents worldwide. You’re right – this kind of system is far more likely to highlight advertising for where to buy that lovely er, choker, or those fine pink shoes.
In a world of (revenue generating) user generated content – whether knowing about the probability and consequences of an accident the viewer is more likely to simply record the accident waiting to happen. Throw in some form of autonomous vehicles, no-doubt sponsored by You-Tube and you have 21st century paparazzi.
Tagging People and Objects for Pleasure
Jul 03, 2008
With the means to identify people and objects around you - with or without their knowledge, a framework to discover, access and extrapolate that data, and a personally carried tool through which to do all of this on the fly and without ever pulling up a web page - how long before the practice of digitally tagging angels and devils kicks off?
When you're queuing for coffee and with a smile the server hands over your order and quietly refuses your money; or ditto with a scowl refuses to serve. For every culture: a heroine or hero; a scapegoat.
An angel of sorts from Naka Meguro (above) and Los Angeles (below).
Which site will be the most popular for tagging errant drivers - with videos to match?
Objects Prepared for Use
Jul 03, 2008
Onsen baskets in Yakushima (above) trolleys at Singapore airport (below).
Incentivised Recycling
Jun 30, 2008
The mental distance between the act of recycling, and what happens with what is recycled. My neighbourhood paper recycling van in Sangenjaya drops off (recycled) toilet paper for customers that recycle paper (above).
And for mobile phones flipswap and its variants.
The process of moving towards upcycled mobile phones.
Auto-Rickshaw Mud Flap Customisation
Jun 27, 2008
One of the sweeter aspects of whizzing between meetings in Ahmedabad has been seeing occasional glimpses of of artistic inspiration fly by - in the form of Bollywood and Gollywood customised rickshaw mud-flaps. There's something just a little GTA about them - a reflection perhaps of the real-life chaos on the roads.
By chance we managed to drop by a cluster of street stalls where they are sold. Cost? Between 200 and 300 Rupees (3 to 4.5 Euros) for an off the shelf design. Add a similar amount if you opt for a truly personalised design based on movie stills of your choosing.
Managed to commission kustom Bollywood style mud flap featuring the research team. Awaited. With. Baited. Breath.
Update: and reader Meena Kadri points to a flickr pool with more designs from the streets of Ahmedabad.
Highly Qualified Small Print
Jun 27, 2008
From the Ahmedabad press. Sort of related - the future perfect of warranties here.
Rickshaw Interior Customisation
Jun 27, 2008
Mostly Bollywood stars, but as design team colleague Duncan pointed out - also surprising amount of shiny red motorbikes and cars sitting in front of white picket fenced houses. Aspirations indeed.
Photo: from last month in Ahmedabad.
Tooth Brush Norms
Jun 26, 2008
From the streets of Ahmedabad, India. And a stall selling more of the same on the streets of Old Delhi.
Inherently Shared Objects
Jun 26, 2008
Instructions for sharing written on the side of this 100% orange juice lolly. The extent that sharing is actively supported, implied in the design. The cultural un/acceptability of licking the same object? The contexts where multiple mouth's touching the same object becomes more acceptable?
Wondering how these practices evolve as we develop a nano/bacterial understanding of the world around us...
Related: the common sharing practice of the half life of food on a plate, why and how mobile phones are shared; and how sleazy punters are sleeping around by supporting multiple networks on one device. Shocking.
Carrying & Interaction Behaviours
Jun 25, 2008The slides from today's Nike Tokyo Design Studio co-presentation with Fumiko Ichikawa on Interaction and Carrying Styles can be viewed above or downloaded from here [PowerPoint, 5MB]. Regular readers will note it's a minor update to previously published research. Thanks to Fumiko Tsuji and Howard Lichter @ Nike for hosting.
Related material includes: an essay on where people carry phones and why, this might interest you; a thread on carrying behaviours around the world; a taster of how we conduct the research and, um, shoes.
Related research can be found here.
Cellphone, Anthropology
Jun 23, 2008
Readers arriving from the New Scientist will probably want to read this thread about life on the road, and peruse the research downloads here.
On a side note - it's interesting to see how other people label that thing that you do. I'm neither a trained anthropologist nor do I aspire to be called one - but whatever it takes to get on with the job. Ditto - only a small % of the work is related to mobile phones - life is way more interesting than little lumps of plastic and metal.
A Space, Lingered
Jun 21, 2008
This corner of Mishuku, fairly close to my home where the taxi driver's pull up their rigs, take a pee in the nearby pubic lavatory, catch a smoke and Japan being the home of passionate baseball fans and diligent teams - watch the game.
Why, as a service designer spaces-to-linger might interest you - in this Tokyo pachinko parlour and extrapolated to this Ahmedabad shopping mall.
Public Spaces, Seating Norms
Jun 20, 2008
The seating offered to passengers waiting at Kagoshima airport - include raised tatami mats.
Mobile Phone Airline e-Ticketing
Jun 20, 2008
The scanner at the JAL ticket gate, Yakushima airport for reading the QR bar code of the e-ticketon the mobile phone display.
Personalised Apology in a Group Context
Jun 20, 2008
A member of the ground crew (left of picture) stands with head bowed, apologising to passengers for technical delays. For every culture and/or industry: whether customers expect an apology; whether it is forthcoming; the form it takes; and the effects of that acknowledgment of [guilt] from calls for compensation to soothed anger.
After an earlier canceled flight, manage to narrowly avoid an extra day on the island. Back in Tokyo in time for izakayas.
Japanese Restaurant Condiment Norms
Jun 20, 2008
Default condiments on this Yakushima restaurant table: Tabasco, soy, chili powder (for soba/udon), goma (sesame) salad dressing and toothpicks. Compare to a UK UK caff
Nudity in Context II
Jun 20, 2008
And continuing on the thread of nudity in Japanese society - the now outdated practice of pixelating pubic hair in pornographic videos. More information on its history here and a dissected pixelated photo still from a porn movie.
Channel surfing in the hotel since you had to ask. But you had to ask, right? Tsk.
Nudity in Context I
Jun 20, 2008
I've got an hour before the next transport trundles by, so it's off to the local onsen - where the pool just so happens to be situated a pebble's throw to the beach on the outskirts of Yudomori - and is for mixed gender bathing. For the record m'lud - onsen are normally the least sexual places you can imagine. My only other gender-mixed onsen experience (um, in Japan) was by co-incidence also situated next to a beach - this time on the Izu peninsular. Not quite knowing what to expect I unwittingly ended up knee to knee in the pool with two Tokyo porn starlets and a good dozen otaku.
Yakushima is dotted with geo-thermally fed onsen - public and private pools where both locals and visitors to the isle strip, wash and once cleaned, bathe. Only a heathen would sit in their own dirty water, right? Here in the sticks the onsen functions as a social hub for the elderly - a neutral place where one can unwind, chat and slowly get into a state-of-mind to move onto something else. Or not - island life is slooow. Yeah, the experience is not a million miles from a bathhouse in Iran or its many equivalents in Finland.
Onsen are often sold on their unique attributes and if you happen to be in Yakushima - the JR Yakushima Hotel has an onsen with water so soft it feels like you're gliding through a pool of aloe and stepping out is as refreshing as having your your body licked by a perfectly minty tongue.
Most public onsen are gender separated but, as with today, on occasion you can find men and women sharing the same pool. It's fairly normal to take a rest from the intense heat of the pool by perching pool side - one leg dangling in the water, but I couldn't quite figure out why in my Izu experience these two attractive women would every so often rise out and stand at a right angle to the pool before turning their head to gaze out to sea a maneuver that, as you might expect, contorted the body to give an all too perfect bodily profile. I'm all for new experiences but this one I couldn't quite place - everyone seemed to know each other, but they weren't talking like friends.
It turned out that it was a informal porno package tour - the guide / pimp who introduced himself in faltering English drove a mini-bus down from Tokyo with paying punters and the aforementioned starlets. With a couple of bemused locals and the token white guy making up the 'pot. Every so often one of the gents would haul a small waterproof-cased camera from the pool and snap the ladies in situ, and after a while they kindly offered to take a photo of me sandwiched between the two ladies in a seating position that revealed their freshly shorn hooves. Pretty sure that had I accepted - that the photo would have been used as an advertising lure to pull in foreign punters for the next tour.
Context is everything. Especially when it out of context.
Two-handed Interaction Styles
Jun 19, 2008
Interaction style on this musical instrument of unknown origin of a Zimbabwian Mbira - ably demonstrated by the owner of the Green Shower cafe, Yudomori.
Ta Carsten.
Youthful Abstractions
Jun 19, 2008
Kids paintings are the supermarket's keep-the-kid's-occupied/mum-happy medium of choice - from the A-Coop in Onoaida. Somewhat surprising? The volume of facial hair sported in many of the pictures - Japan is generally a clean shave society.
Brands as Intergral Part of the Neighbourhood Landscape
Jun 19, 2008
The National Panasonic logo has a particular significance in the landscape of urban Japan - where many neighbourhoods host one of it's petit electronics stores. I'm guessing that they've been hit hard by widespread available of (price/competitor) information - you can't survive on selling light bulbs and offering neighbourhood repair services, or can you?
For every neighbourhood - the brands that take a generation to fade.
The store supports the recycling of spent fluorescent light tubes, and a similar recycling option elsewhere on Yakushima.
Objects That Bridge
Jun 19, 2008
The humble role of the welcome mat.
Mystery Objects, Expected Use
Jun 19, 2008
A timer left by the previous tenants in the bathroom of this Yakushima home. For timing younglings toothbrush activities.
Call 119
Jun 19, 2008
Given the extensive use of emergency phone numbers in un/popular culture - the extent that it's easier to remember the emergency number from another country?
A comprehensive list of emergency numbers here.
Design team colleague Fumiko mulls on the (mis) use of emergency numbers in Japan, including the introduction of a fast-track emergency number here, and Younghee touches on the report-a-North-Korean-spy number in South Korea here.
Bamboo Cushion
Jun 19, 2008
With a surprisingly comfortable give, since you ask.
Lunch / Read
Jun 19, 2008
It's fairly typical for neighbourhood restaurants to supply a range of weekly manga for customers.
Puri Kura'd
Jun 18, 2008
The conceptual distance between an activity (photography) and the use of content and materials created through that activity. Like doodling on the cover of a sketchbook.
Key Varients
Jun 18, 2008
An awkward mixture of wood, carbon fiber and RFID to turn on lights - in this Yakushima hotel room. For all the freedom afforded by having a tray on which to place key fob, it was only practical to place it in one position and have the RFID tag read.
The designer had a choice whether to adopt international practices to control the master power for the room - place room key in slot by the door / have a master 'light' switch. For frequent completed tasks - introducing a new way of doing things can be the right solution but for occasional users - most guests would stay one or two nights in their life-time, introducing a new form of interaction is the wrong choice.
Electrical, Natural Trails
Jun 18, 2008
Iwatani Primus
Jun 17, 2008
Ah, the brands we know and love - the comforting yellow glow of an Iwatani Primus cannister - pleasantly reassuring given the backdrop of nature with it's uneven surfaces and earthy colour palettes, and purpose for which it is used - hot grub after a day of gaining altitude, and overflowing rivers.
Slightly Less Mild
Jun 17, 2008
It's raining hard by the time I manage to find the start of the trail, tantalisingly located next to the local onsen. Two old dears, cooling off on a wooden bench after a morning's bathe stare, and once eye contact is confirmed they look up to the skies and back at me with the body language that asks the Japanese equivilent of 'you're sure you know what you're doing?' I wave. They wave back. Our mutual acknowledge of each other's presence, my heavy pack and the fact that I'm dressed head to toe in full rain gear is an outward affirmative. They are still staring in my direction as I turn away to start climbing the narrow trail. The rain kick it up a notch and the thunder rolls in.
A country where the population is largely squashed onto whatever flat land exists - take two steps off the beaten track and it's just you, the mountain and whatever hopes and fears you start out with.
And so it is for the day.
Into the Mild
Jun 16, 2008
Today's Monday morning commute takes me past the southern tip of the Japanese mainland to the island of Yakushima with a heavy back-to-back agenda of, doing nothing for a week.
Well OK, maybe a little bit of something.
Still need to become heat-of-the-moment comfortable with a newish camera and certainly in need of some mental space to day-dream. Freebasing for the mind so to speak. Plus there's the little matter of the back-country to explore.
Time + energy = bliss.
When People and Places Rub Shoulders
May 29, 2008
Another day, another journey this time to Ahmedabad for a study on [redacted]. Not quite a hand-luggage only trip but nice to work on a scale where the number of assistants can be counted on one hand. With colleagues arriving from Finland, Los Angeles and Delhi the stuff that brings us together eh?
Time to brave the Tokyo rush hour traffic - see you on the other side.
All That You Come Back To
May 28, 2008
One of the late night conversations that seemed to occur with regularity during our Ghana field study was the stuff we do that makes us feel like we're back 'at home'. For one colleague it's surfing the Pacific, for me late night cycling around Tokyo or an occasional visit to a nearby bath house/sento.
These photos are from my local sento in Sangenjaya , a fairly working class district - about ten minutes cycle grind or two subway stops from Shibuya and home to a fair amount of small studio apartments that don't come with good any home bathing facilities. Which helps explain why, whilst sento's are gradually dying out in Japan there are still a number of them dotted around the neighbourhood.
A photo amongst all that nudity? Just prior to closing, when the other punter's have left the building.
Cooling Options
May 28, 2008
A common post sento ritual for many punters involves slumping on a toweled benches that line the changing room or, in winter pacing the outside veranda - either naked of with a towel loosely tied to hips. Wafting a fan gently speeds up the evaporation process and if you're in the mood for the full experience pull a bottle of once-upon-a-time branded drinks from a chilled glass cabinet, sip and chill. It's a building where history stares right back at you.
My regular sento includes a bandai style entrance - where the attendant sits astride of the wall separating the men's and women's changing areas - sometimes a gent sits there and sometimes his chatty/grinning sister. For the latter making use of the fan whilst letting it all hang out is not appropriate.
Lliteracy Plus, Published
May 27, 2008
Those of you who like your mobile phone related research in print may want to peruse Handbook of Mobile Communication Studies edited by James E. Katz. Based on the time and effort it took James & MIT Press to bring this to print - I'm guessing it's a labour of love.
The book contains 32 chapters in sections covering: digital divides and social mobility; sociality and co-presence; politics and social change; and culture and imagination. My own minor contribution comes in a chapter titled Understanding Illiteracy as a Barrier to Mobile Phone Communication. Yeah it is online. The slides that accompany the essay can be viewed below or download here (PowerPoint, 6MB), or you could just watch the video.
Photos from one of the literacy research field studies in Hangzhou, China, 2004, taken by the students working on the project.
When Teens Poster-Bait
May 26, 2008
Posters for local politicians on this Sangenjaya - look carefully at the face of the third poster to see it has been gently vandalised.
In many of the places you see static advertising today you should expect find some form of dynamic advertising tomorrow - South Korea is probably the most advanced culture in terms of 'displays everywhere'. Imagery that reacts to ambient factors such as the time of the day, the weather, who is walking by and of course their purchasing habits, and perhaps also an equally dynamic poster from a competitor.
By 2015 some form of poster-baiting will have entered the arsenal of bored teens around the world - think Google bombing but with the sole aim of tipping dynamic, sensor aware advertising hoardings into some form of errant behaviour. The only thing more fun than a dynamic, sensor aware poster featuring a politician is one at odds with the other sensor aware poster featuring a politician. May the best algorithm win.
The Small Crowd That Lingers
May 26, 2008
Take the Keio Exit out of Shibuya Station and hang a sharp left and you'll soon come across a crowd of spectators watching the monotonously addictive pachinko.
The everyday places that we linger will start to take on a new relevance with the widespread adoption of devices equipped with proximate wireless connectivity - Bluetooth, RFID, WiFi, ..., when the simple act of lingering creates opportunities for meaningful data exchange. And we all know what data exchange leads to.
Right now it's a long way from being seamless, but when it does it will change the sociability of spaces. For every culture, a pachinko parlour crowd.
More on the value of you being there.
Everyone Needs A...
May 26, 2008
... place to hang an umbrella.
Monkeys, Chimps & Bananas
May 25, 2008
Found myself on the other side of the lens this week, the lens of Tokyo based Jeremy Sutton Hibbert to be precise. Photo shoots can be a weird beast - with an intense personal dislike of being digitally captured offset by the opportunity to learn from a pro - for all the photography that our research entails it's a world away from what they get up to. And for now at least the front of camera stuff hasn't yet got in the way of the real work and has certainly created opportunities and opened doors.
The heat and humidity has arrived and Tokyo has kicked it up a gear with far more interesting subject's sauntering by. Monkeys and chimps? That probably makes me a banana.
Related media here.
Absolute versus Relative Wayfinding
May 25, 2008
Street corner signs in Tokyo (above), London and Dubai (below) highlight information architecture norms in each of these cities.
Japan is a country where buildings typically are found by district, sub-district and so on - so finding a specific building is a process of reducing alternatives (or increasingly looking at your mobile phone's map application). In the UK you're screwed without an exact address, and building's are largely numbered sequentially. And in the building frenzy of Dubai new street signs exist but are rarely referred to by locals when giving directions.
Tokyo Through a Different Lens, Darkly
May 23, 2008
A short lull between field trips heightened by a visit from an old friend. Summer's arrived and life in Tokyo is pretty simple, ta RB. Blinged pair of Technics? That'll be Shibuya then.
Two nights of ad-hoccing down. One to go.
Signs as Indicator's of Expected Practices
May 23, 2008
Sign on the toilet door of our friendly sancha dive bar. The extent to which "do not" signs trigger behaviours?
Touch Screen Devices, Touched
May 23, 2008
Touchscreen interaction for karaoke selection, posture, hand positioning, support, interaction.
Way Searching, Finding
May 23, 2008
Maps that start with a "here". The ability to automate the same.
Ambient Service Expectations
May 21, 2008
From the ticket office in Nagoya station. A mat is a mat right? Sort of... the from around the world and from a sex product store in Akihabara.
Delivery Norms
May 21, 2008
Japanese apartment vegetable delivery norms.
Shared Solitary Serial Experiences
May 20, 2008
Two Tokyoites - on the right of the photo engaged in the same task watching the same television program on their mobile phone each using their own device, with comments passed back and forth.
The reaction, and shared emotions of the people we're with is an important part of the whole TV watching experience - so in some contexts squishing up against the other person and sharing once screen can compromise the viewing experience, but enhances the experience. Can be kinda romantic too.
Shared, solitary, serial experiences. If time shifting content (watching when you like) becomes the norm, add synchronised to this list of s's.
See also: this short essay on ten things you didn't know about Mobile TV or download this presentation [4MB, PowerPoint].
Gilroy Updated
May 20, 2008
Human Flows, Redirections
May 20, 2008
Careers x 2 x 3
May 16, 2008
You've read about what we do and by now you should have a sense of where we're coming from. Maybe its time to join our team? The good news is that we're expanding - with 6 positions opening up for a few talented individuals in our Services and User Interface Design team to be precise.
To see what's on offer and apply you need to head to the job search page and enter the following job codes.
In Palo Alto the positions are for two Interactions Designers [Job code: SAN000000BQ, SAN000000BP] and a Communications Designer [SAN000000BV]. Whilst in Espoo we're looking to hire two Interaction Designers [ESP0000022U, ESP0000022T] and a Communications Designer [ESP0000022V].
Since I'm not handling these positions please do not send queries or resumes to me, you'll need to go through the proper channels.
For those geographically challenged individuals out there Espoo is right next to Helsinki. If you don't know Helsinki...
Based purely on the URL of the job site - it appears to be the work of Taleo who, frankly might consider hiring a decent interaction designers of their own. Or perhaps letting their interaction designer's do their job without compromise - I presume they make it difficult to deep link to individual jobs to avoid harvesters, but in a connected world where every touch point says something about your organisation. this. is. frustration. defined.
Photos: last year's Ghana field study.
Lolita, Perched on the Bed
May 14, 2008
One of the challenges of running a large scale field study is staying on top of all the incoming digital data that can easily include interview transcripts, ambient audio, video and between 15 to 20 thousand photos that are typically generated per city.
Because the field team can arrive from and eventually disperses to the four corners of the earth the aim is to have everything processed and backed up prior to leaving the location. It's a process that often requires a dedicated data manager and laptops solely for batch processing - a task that, power-cuts allowing, often runs through the night. With a field team of up to 25 people and with much gear flying around its hard to track what equipment should used by whom, hence giving names to otherwise inanimate objects.
The photo above? One of the slides from last week's Behind the Scenes presentation - thats Lolita working away during our Dharavi field study. Laptops = Names beginning with L.
Under a Thousand Watchful Eyes of Chairman Mao
May 13, 2008
Run a decent sized (two week, 25+ person team) field study in emerging markets it's highly likely that you end up handling a lot of cash. Services need to be paid for, expenses and bills settled. And whilst as a SOX compliant corporation the preference is for subcontracting and invoices the fact is that in some contexts and cultures this simply isn't possible. You don't invoice a taxi right? Extrapolate.
After two weeks in the field most of the field team are a little bit frazzled, the hard work is done and the mind is already drifting towards home. For our locally hired assistants it's the end of, what for many is an intense working and learning experience - their work hours need to be signed off and their ready to re-join the wrap party that usually already underway. If the accounts have been well kept during the rest of the study it takes a long half day to process everyone: settle up and conduct a short exit interview to garner feedback on how we can run things better next time.
Local money changing facilities can vary considerably - in some countries travelers cheques, credit cards and ATM's are fine, in others they simply don't exist without a high risk of fraud - credit card misuse in Ghana for example, or with impractical constraints such as daily traveler cheque exchange limits of two hundred Euros.
So on occasion we end up in these slightly surreal situations in the field office/hotel room with piles upon piles of carefully counted cash, receipts waiting to be signed and with members of our local team knocking, entering and leaving 15 minutes later with kind words and a smile. Easy enough to take out of context that. Collecting enough local currency to settle accounts can be non-trivial: in Rio de Janeiro a city known for its street crime it involved multiple visits to a local bank and shuffling nonchalantly back to the office in flip-flops and shorts trying to look like pockets weren't stuffed with thousands of Euro's; in India carrying plastic bags literally bulging with bricks of cash, in China sorting receipts under a thousand watchful eyes of Chairman Mao.
So now you know.
And since I know you know, it's time to move on.
Related: the ethics and practice of providing blank receipts.
The Making of, Behind the Scenes
May 12, 2008Last week our London Design Studio invited journalists from around the world for a glimpse of the design process - the story behind the numbers if you like. Younghee and I took the opportunity to present something old, something new and the slides from the presentation (mostly for the benefit of the note taking journos) are posted above and can be downloaded from here (PowerPoint, 7MB).
Some of you may remember Remade - the phone literally made from nothing new. Well, my guvnor Rhys Newman shared some of the thinking behind the project that internally has gone by the name of Homegrown (for it's origins think starting at home rather than something herbal). Read up on the thinking, other concepts and people behind the project here and here and download the Homegrown presentation here (PDF, 1MB).
More on the different threads of Homegrown, no doubt later. Rhys managed to put our permalag into perspective by completing a 24 bicycle race (the team gained a podium place), hopping on plane in LA and upon landing at Heathrow heading straight to the studio to present. Designers? Stamina? More than you think.
Writing a presentation and getting it to flow is more art than science and is that much more difficult when the double in your bill is separated by time zones/rational sleep patterns. No surprise then that 'last minute' edits started at 2am sternly overlooked by head-standing dwarfs in the hotel lobby (nice rooms, crap in-room WiFi btw), continued over a decent full English to be wrapped up as the journos filed into the building. No stress then.
And wrapping up the behind the scenes thread - Fortune has posted a story-lite and some of the faces behind the N810 tablet here. And if any internals reading this have a spare '810, wouldn't mind borrowing one for a bit...
Fur Hoody
May 11, 2008
Unlikely Combinations
May 11, 2008
Sort of related: rational clusters of shops in an Inglewood strip mall.
Transparency is for Suckers
May 09, 2008 | 34 Comments
If, like me you place writing about blogging on a par with staring at your own excrement you’ll want to skip this post.
Future Perfect is a modest little site, but has grown to the point where bandwidth costs are now non-trivial - helped in part by a hosting a fair amount of photos, research downloads and having the occasional traffic driving article. Consequently I’m in the un/enviable position where people place enough value on the site to keep coming back, and I enjoy the privilege of paying for it.
I’ve looked at different ways of off-setting bandwidth costs, including: shutting down; posting material so tangentially up my own posterior to drive away almost everyone except perhaps my long suffering (colonic) irrigator; and have even half-heartedly toyed with advertising - more to get a, um, sense of how Adsense works than to make money, but its enough to turn me off the idea for now at least. If you feel compelled to persistently click on the advertising on this page - it’ll no doubt help me learn how difficult it is to return from click-fraud purgatory. There’s nothing like going out in in blaze of nickels and cents... I don’t have a book to sell and the six figure conference circuit is on hold until I retire.
I’ve recently discussed ways to have my employer underwrite my hosting costs and am caught between wanting to maintain independence in mind and wallet and finding an easy solution. Taking the 's money is not a done deal but neither would it take a lot of pimping to make happen. In many ways my employer already underwrites Future Perfect - showing flexibility in tolerating/ignoring the frank discussion about work related topics that sometimes appears here. In the early days I also had the support of various colleagues (hei TE, HN) to turn my back on the traditional academic/journal publication process and explore ways of bringing research to a wider audience - not an easy or obvious thing within the rigorously scientific confines of the Tokyo corporate research lab.
If like me you're a sucker for transparency this is where I'm at. So where to go from here? Would taking a corporate hand-out compromise the integrity of the site? Ping your missives to bandwidthoffset at janchipchase dot com or stick ‘em in the comments below.
Now stop staring, flush, and don’t forget to wash you hands
Stacks of cash on a bed? For that you'll have to tune in Monday...
Inside Outside Norms
May 08, 2008
A common sight with so many single room apartments in Tokyo - the washing machine outside the home. Helps put this into context.
Accidental Empires
May 07, 2008
Late last week tried to get a sense of the snow conditions on the top of Mount Fuji - the official climbing season starts in July but the pre-season provides an opportunity to beat the crowds and perhaps, heh, catch a little powder on the way down. Whilst 'everything' is only a Google away therein lies the rub for the hurried researcher - you not only want the most appropriate site, but want the data in a sufficiently familiar format - from language to layout. The quick and dirty solution? Search Flickr for Mount Fuji sorted by date.
The point at which content/social networking sites accidentally become sufficiently definitive sources of tangential information.
Photo: Storm drifting over a wintery Lhasa.
I/We Be Here, Then
May 07, 2008
A stamp in the trekking hut at the beginning/end of the Akadake mountain trail (above) and a two Tokyo high school girls annotating a print club sticker (below, photo by my then colleague Aico Shimizu).
The highly evolved practices of gathering proof of where you've been with whom and why - supported by formal stamp treasure hunt in Hokkaido's Chitose airport; walking sticks branded on the way to the summit of Mount Fuji to making and collecting print club stickers relatively common amongst teen girls in a number of east Asian countries.
And how these practices will be reinforced and amplified as life goes increasingly digital - - everything from the way we navigate our urban environments; what we search for; the things we interact with; and the services we pay for.
Honesty Box
May 05, 2008
The going rate? 100 yen to spend a penny. Why bother compared to the great outdoors? Heated seats.
Related: donations and percepts of honesty in London and Tehran.
Font Erosion
May 05, 2008
Mainstreaming Mobile Payments
May 05, 2008
The mainstreaming of mobile payments - bus tickets in Akadake above, parking meters in London below.
Everything Right There
May 05, 2008
Advertising for Japan's CATV gives a snapshot of local TV norms.
Newspaper Stacked, Displayed & Prioritised
May 03, 2008
The extreme battle for space on this Shinagawa station convenience store dictates that newspapers are either folded and stacked vertically or, in the case of the more popular titles stacked like ice-cream cones. And whilst it’s possible to find more expansive newspaper displays that include clearly visible headlines - it is very much the local Japanese norm.
Compare to the display of full newspaper pages in newspaper kiosks in Milan or Rio de Janeiro (kiosk photo below) or the relatively common practice of posting entire newspapers in China?
To what extent does the Japanese newspaper form effect people's ambient awareness of (headline) news? Are the display norms a reflection of the particularly habitual purchasing behaviour of Japanese newspaper consumers? What attributes of how the newspaper is displayed e.g. densely folded, carry over into how the newspaper is browsed and read? And as with this discarded newspaper from the London underground (above), how does the disposal method affect ambient awareness?
Donning the service designr cap for a moment and given the answers to the above, how does ambient awareness affect the likely adoption of mobile news related services?
A Better Thing
Apr 27, 2008
Fortunately during the upcoming week I'll be double-billing with colleague Younghee who co-incidentally starts the next leg of her truly nomadic existence with a move to London.
The photo of her reading the Assignments Aboard Times taken during last year's study in Mumbai. We're sitting in the lobby of our Dharavi hotel waiting for a breakfast of dhal and sweet lassi to arrive, watching the pedestrian traffic negotiate the monsoon weather through the doorway, and listening to religious intonations from a shrine along the corridor.
A wiser person than me accurately described our endless journeying as a holiday romance without the holiday, and without the romance - friendships and respect forged from working through blood, sweat and occasionally tears. In a world of change, our framing of history is the only constant.
A Good Thing
Apr 27, 2008
Once more into the breach - heading to Helsinki/London for the week, including a full day in the company of the fourth estate. A little fear is a good thing, right?
Info! Pick! Up!
Apr 26, 2008
QR bar codes positioned at the exit of Omotesando station - point your mobile phone camera at the code and be redirected to a mobile website listing the surrounding area. You'd probably think twice about calling a phone number placed in the same spot and advertising the same service - so ultimately how does the expectation of what happens next differ depending on the medium through which additional information is requested?
As to whether this is truly destined for mainstream adoption? Keep eyes peeled for street hacks.
Related: out of date annotation in Helsinki, the freshness of sex service advertising in London.
When Localisation Comes to This
Apr 26, 2008
Local Japanese colour variations of this recently launched feature rich product. Compare this to competing (with itself) on (pantone) colour.
D [Arrow] A [Arrow] - Counter Wayfinding
Apr 26, 2008
Spend more than a few years in Japan, most likely you'll have enjoyed numerous visits to the immigration building - a short drab bus ride from Shinagawa Station. Monotonous but, from experience far more pleasant than its Berlin or London equivalents.
The [A] counter handles re-entry permits.
Visual Flow
Apr 25, 2008
Oral. Ablutions
Apr 24, 2008
Restaurant bathroom includes a dental floss dispenser - from last year's study in Rio de Janeiro.
Dental Aspirations
Apr 24, 2008
Dental advertising from Hue (above) and Lhasa (below).
And the use of a dental brace vehicle for status in in Bangkok.
Cultural Stereotypes: Thief
Apr 23, 2008 | 11 Comments
Hospital poster warning against theft - uses an image of a stereotypical thief in Japan: male; chubby; bearded or with a few day's stubble; local i.e. Japanese; wearing plain clothes with a hood; swag carried in a sack made out of cloth with the corners tied and slung over one shoulder. If animated: walking quietly on tiptoe.
Given our increasing ability to digitally observe and retrospectively identify thieves - whether this stereotype will change? Given the awareness that more diligent members of this profession are likely to have for surveillance, whether awareness will lead to a generalisable (or stereotypeable) shift in appearance?
What does a stereotypical thief look like in your country? Answers in the comments below...
Anticipatory Preparation
Apr 23, 2008
Pre-Paid TV
Apr 23, 2008
Evolving from coin to card to...
With more media being carried, and the occasional benefits of big-screen over small - business models that enable infrastructure roll-out and usage.
Monday Morning Commute
Apr 21, 2008 | 1 Comment
This morning's office is cramped to say the least - my nose is pressed up against the collar of a salariman whose fresh pomade and comb induced rice rows (the local unintentional equivalent of cornrows) I am now intimately familiar. Just to my right a lady is reluctantly pressing her petit, squishy breast against my rib cage propelled by an influx of yet more pushing bodies. To my left a row of four heads are dipped, dozing and by co-incidence the angle of each head perfectly reveals a bald spot in the rough of each of the four suited gents. In a future perfect world of augmented reality slot machines (motto - 'pattern match, win prizes') four-in-a-row is a definite winner. But right now, having staked a claim on some the few seats in this rush hour train the dozed are snoozing through their jackpot.
As it leaves the station, the mass of bodies start to settle and the muscular tension that was countering its acceleration starts to dissipate.
Every space has its own etiquette but few as fascinating, and as fascinatingly dense as the Tokyo subway during rush hour. For trains traveling in from the 'burbs every additional stop before a mainline destinations like Shibuya ratchets up the pressure - no-one leaves, a brave few take a breath and enter.
It's rare to have the opportunity to enjoy this Monday morning commute - cycling being my regular vehicle of choice and Tokyo being eminently cycleable, so subway journey's like today are a novel experience to be savoured. The Denentoshi becomes the Ginza becomes the Marunouchi in this cross-town safari to my ultimate destination - a hospital in Ochanomizu.
Let the week begin.
Hospital Gift Norms
Apr 21, 2008
Elasticity of (Anti) Social Spaces
Apr 20, 2008
Mobile phones used in this Ochanomizu hospital, restricted to phone booths. In a world of smaller more discreet objects, how to know what activity a person is engaged in? The extent to which the anti-social aspects of that activity (externalities) are noticed by people in proximity? Or that these behaviours can be analysed retrospectively? The effect that knowing someone's historical behaviour will effect their current behaviour.
Related - a dedicated mobile phone booth in this lounge in Copenhagen airport, cutting down on the mobility of smokers in Tokyo.
Object Darwinism
Apr 20, 2008
Tech Dunes
Apr 19, 2008
It took three year's to fill 48 page passport, and three working days to apply for a replacement.
Despite the proximity of an automatic passport photo booth to the British embassy in Tokyo - applicants are directed to a human mediated studio with a "he knows how to take them just right". The rules for what make an acceptable photo have tightened up and what was once OK, no longer is. Thought for today: the extent that higher quality and more prevalent tools to re-produce stuff - from photo printers to 3D copiers, leads to changes in the rules for acceptable submissions - like sand dunes rolling in parallel across a desert.
Neighbourhood photos studios are window's to the community: from the photo booth without a camera in Brazil; photo enhancement services in Ho Chi Minh City; the aspirational nature of the backdrops in Lhasa and New Orleans night club.
And the gent in a wicker basket/helmet? Last year's motorbike driver taking me to his favoured photo studio in Fujian Province.
Service designer's out there might like the guidelines for submitting appropriate photos presumably based on tens of thousands of inappropriate submissions. Photos should be: not to close; too far; mustn't show another person; have a busy background - think flock wallpaper; be to blurry or too light; have shadows across the face; be looking away; portrait style - body at 45degrees, face looking at camera; mouth open; hair across eyes; frames covering eyes; dark tinted glasses; wearing a hat; face covered. Download the full guidelines for applicants and guidelines for photo studios.
Disembodied Voices II
Apr 18, 2008
Customers of this vending machines situated in Izu Koogen station are talked through the process of obtaining a new travel pass by a remotely located assistant - the machine includes a scanner, highlighted in the photo below, for passing on printed information. If you were to take the red-eye from Tokyo to Salt Lake City and pull your rental into the parking lot of this bagel bakery - standing at the check-out you might unsure whether the server is talking to you, or some remote other. In any given retail context to what extent do you want or expect a human server to be the interface between you and, speaking broadly here, that retail experience?
And in a world of manufactured retail experiences and advertising everywhere the ability and desire of consumers to engage and disengage on their own terms is helped by a deep arsenal of tools - from reading materials to sunglasses, to personal stereos and headphones, to (seemingly) talking on a mobile phone.
Sometimes the inquisitive researcher has to partake in a bit of anti-social behaviour to figure out the boundaries of things - Kate Fox gives an lovely example of deliberately queue jumping in an pub in her book Watching the English - the Hidden Rules of English Behaviour and if you're British your stomach's probably just knotted up thinking about her reaction to their reaction so ingrained are our behavioural norms . And so it was yesterday in the Shibuya Apple store going through an entire browsing and purchasing process - avoiding eye contact with the trained-to-acknowledge-your-presence-within-x-seconds greeters and keeping 'buds firmly in-ears to avoid any form of verbal interaction with the check-out staff. (Whilst raw this break down of an Apple store retail experience has a lot going for it). My own deliberately disengaged experience felt wrong, the body language of the servers and in particular the check-out staff indicated social discomfort, but as a consumer in a carefully crafted retail environment boy was it self-empowering.
(Yeah, I know, Apple, Competitor. But I could equally be talking about experiences closer to home. And no, this wasn't a formal experiment, I do occasionally need to shop y'know)
In our increasingly sensor rich world the arms race for your sensory attention is stepping up a gear. As a consumer sometimes the only way to step back is to kick back. New weapons for the disengaged consumer and the engaging retailer are just around the corner, more of which later.
Sort of related: advertising and the value of you is that you are here.
Newspaper Vending Norms
Apr 18, 2008
Business 24/7 vending machine includes a 45 degree angled slot for retrieving newspaper from Dubai above and a typical US style Wall Street Journal vending machine from Washington DC below.
Vending machines are not particularly common in the United Arab Emirates - but I’m guessing that ex-pat customers will be broadly familiar with the US style of buying vended newspapers - if not hands-on then from exposure to popular/unpopular culture. To what extent does transparency - both of what is inside the machine and how the machine works effect the purchasing experience? Standing in front of this machine - what goes through your mind?
Are any newspaper’s left? How sure am I that the paper on the inside is the same as the one on the outside? What is the perceived likelihood that the machine will simply swallow the coins and not deliver - due to some kind of mechanical or cosmic failure? What is the actual likelihood of failure? And how does this perception change through use or observing other people’s use? That little moment of panic when you’re down to your last Dirham or Euro or quarter. Does someone nearby offer a vending-free alternative way to purchase the same thing? And given all this what % of willing consumers standing in front the Business 24/7 vending machine end up walking away, coins still in pocket?
And in world that’s increasingly shifting to digital to what extent does any of this matter? Is the purpose of the machine to vend? Or to remind consumers that the content exists and to facilitate access to the that digital content?
Related: shortening the path through key-words and QR bar codes.
Squatting Evolved
Apr 17, 2008
During our Chongqing morning session we came across numerous folk hurrying along to somewhere carrying small stools. It turned out they were all heading to a seminar sponsored by a medical company (below) in a place where seating was not supplied.
Do you live in a culture where its normal to sit or squat? How does this impact the (seating) infrastructure you expect to find, and in which context? How does it impact what you are likely to carry? And (gosh) if you design things that people carry (how) does this affect their likely interaction preferences?
Packaging/Display Norms
Apr 17, 2008
Bean sprouts from a neighbourhood vegetable market, sprout-head facing outwards - rounding off today's Chongqing detour.
Table Annotation
Apr 17, 2008
The advantages and disadvantages of annotating the table itself (from street side cafe above) versus a fixed point of reference proximate to the table (below) - both photos from Chongqing.
The extent that an object is expected to move in relation to its surroundings? And how this, and our ability to track objects changes in our future perfect world where objects have a degree of autonomous mobility?
Motivations for Protecting
Apr 17, 2008
Chopsticks covered with a plastic sheet - in line with colleague Younghee's thread on freshness and protection (that's her in the baseball cap, below). Given that you might expect (rain) water to be associated with it's cleaning properties - to what extent are the chopsticks covered because a damp wooden chopstick behaves and tastes differently to a dry one? Or that it is locally assumed that the rain carries with it pollution? - whilst this pot of 'sticks was exposed to the rain, more sheltered pots were not similarly covered.
These photos are from Chongqing during a wake-up-with-the-city walk - one of the research methods we use to orientate ourselves with a new location. We awoke at some unreasonable hour it was raining hard, a due to distinct lack of umbrellas had to dance our way through the deluge to eventually grab breakfast of steaming congee, deep fried sugar-flour washed down by soy milk - morsels of choice for manual labourers, students and hungry researchers alike. Good times. A little more here.
Air Hacks: Tangible Reminders
Apr 16, 2008
Part of the protocol of coming into land is checking that bathrooms are clear and locking the door - by lifting the lavatory flap and locking from the outside. During a recent United flight the seen-everything attendants placed a small plastic cup just so on each of the doors. But why a cup and why in this location?
The cup happens to be the object to hand - the door includes a small water fountain and a stack of cups; its positioning acts as a sufficiently out of place visual and tangible reminder to unlock the lavatory; and by being wedged under a well sprung metal flap it reduces the likelihood of broken finger nails. Simple. Effective.
Moral Authorities/Services
Apr 16, 2008
Unclaimed (or spare) shoes outside this Bur Dubai mosque.
Looking at the infrastructure and objects around your neighbourhood - what is free to take, what can you use and in what contexts, and what is off-limits? To what extent does the moral authority of the mosque extend to these shoes? And as with the back-alley wall annotated with shrine symbols (photo from Sangenjaya, below) how can this authority be extended to other objects and services? What do you assume to upload to a Yahoo branded web-hosting service? What about a hosting service provided by this mosque? So yeah, at what point does the Vatican muscle into the web hosting business?
Now switch your assumptions about 'moral authority' from the perspective of a devout atheist.
Kind of related: the practice of leaving bags on the streets of Urumqi.
Design Elements that Say "Bicycle"
Apr 16, 2008
When It's Acceptable to Overfill
Apr 16, 2008
The extent that overfilling is part of the experience and the infrastructure that is required to support this.
Photos show: sake from a Shimokitazawa izakaya; an Izu Koogen balcony bath wet rooms being the norm in Japan; and for this coffee-junkie at least, the ritualistic filling of a cafetière to the brim to ensure that grits make it into the cup.
Digital equivalents?
Tasks Supported
Apr 16, 2008
In JR Shibuya station booking office.
(Lack of ) Visual Authority
Apr 16, 2008
Why this stop sign has less authority then you should expect?
More on deferring authority, and how it plays out in our future perfect.
Tools for Mobile Activists
Apr 15, 2008The presentation-lite slides from last week's Global Philanthropy Forum panel on Early Warning: Listening, Technology, Activism can be downloaded from here (PowerPoint, 2MB).
To recap the framing discussion: that for many the mobile phone is their primary video/photo/audio capturing and sharing device and as such their skills surpass what you might expect. The photo below from the streets of Cairo shows a screen shot from a mobile phone movie that re-created scenes from the Godfather shot and edited entirely on the mobile phone (the gent in the photo isn't an activist just someone whose mobile phone editing skills are highly evolved, and yeah the pixelation is just to maintain a degree privacy); that a person's understanding of what happens when they use mobile technology can be significantly out of sync with what actually happens - something that system designers sometimes refer to as the user's mental model. It doesn't necessarily matter that the mental model differs from how it actually works - but it can quickly become an issue if that person is trying to try out new features, recover from an error or say, wants to stay one step ahead of the authorities. Examples from both ends of the spectrum of understanding: Ken Banks talking about activists in Pakistan using Frontline SMS whilst riding around the city in a truck to reduce the risk of detection by base-station triangulation, to an interviewee in Tehran (but could equally be an example from my/your country) assuming that a voice mail message stored on the phone's memory was out of reach of prying government ears - never mind that the message originally passed over the network which may be monitored. The spread of tools that can capture experiences means that more people are in a position to document and publish (human rights) abuses - including many ad-hoc activists who wont be aware that of the relative ease of tracing communication - and this in a world before the widespread adoption of geo-tagged photos.
But why use a photo of a street signs in Tehran as an example of mental models? Explanation here.
The three things on the device that will impact the spread of activist material in emerging markets and beyond: lower device cost's are broadening the base of who can afford a feature rich mobile phone - putting more people in a position to capture and communicate what they see and hear; memory prices are rapidly dropping and sufficiently-large-for-storing-media memory capacity will filter down into the lowest cost handsets increasing the range of what is stored and the ability to communicate via the sneaker net - photos and video passed from hand to hand, rather than say sent over the network; and mobile phones equipped with TV Out e.g. N82 will leverage existing big-screen infrastructure and practices. I'm less sure of this last one - but included because most people aren't aware of the feature.
After the session Gigi Brisson asked a smart question about the likely strategies for staying one step ahead of whomever is trying to snoop - the simplest is single or limited use communication tools e.g. using one SIM/phone used for a single conversation before disposing of it. Whether this is affective assumes other factors such as buying from different sources, varying the location from which the communication is carried out, encrypting what is communicated and so on and on. Even though countries like Japan or India are supposed to register pre-paid SIM card consumers at point of purchase there are enough lost, stolen or hacked SIM cards/phones to create a steady supply. NGO's looking for a comprehensive solution should start with Benetech and in particular Martus - with thanks James Fruchterman for the pointer.
Back to the panel - ta to Mitul Shah for hosting, and Mark Smolinski, Erik Hersman and of course the attendees for making it the first panel I've actually enjoyed. Photos in the slides from Accra, Ayni, Cairo, Delhi, Seoul and Tehran.
Form / Alignment
Apr 15, 2008
Related: the alignment of license plates in Chongqing, street annotation in Pasadena and curbs in Tokyo that reveal the geometry of the city.
Static, Then Evolution
Apr 15, 2008
The pieces of infrastructure that become fixed reference points - which then evolve over time. From my local 'hood, Sangenjaya.
Advertising Norms
Apr 14, 2008
Street accommodation advertising from Bur Dubai includes: “for South Indian”; “Keralite preferred”; “for Muslim bachelor” and “decent executive Muslim bachelors”.
For service designers: whether to explicitly support categorisation based on race, religion, geography? In a world with more personal data floating around whether we're likely to see this extended to: social network; sexual history; STD status; credit rating?
Update: reader Alexander Baxevanis points out that stating a discriminatory preference of race, color, national origin, religion, sex, familial status, handicap or disability is illegal in the US - for example articulated for Craigslist users here.
Shall We Overcome?
Apr 14, 2008
Want to know to what extent your multi-cultural colleagues really get on with one another? Consider for a moment whom they hang out with over lunch - whilst behavioural norms are reasonably well defined for how to behave in the workplace - people tend to 'switch off' on their lunch hour - hanging out with people with the same cultural, food and language preferences. It takes effort do otherwise, something that in part implies a degree of respect.
That's not to say that this kind of voluntary segregation is negative - it probably contributes to the 'recharging' process - particularly for people who spend most of their time speaking [English] as a second language.
Photo: the highly ritualistic tea making process from the streets of Xiamen. And yeah, back home in Tokyo enjoying a 3am permalag induced start to the working week.
NYT, Links
Apr 13, 2008
Reader's arriving from the New York Times might appreciate the following links: a short essay on the speed at which mobile phones are making their way around the planet here; a list of research and downloads here; and if for some reason you're seduced by the idea of life on the road, re-align your thinking with the thread titled today's office.
The main study mentioned in the article focussed on communities in Mumbai (photos above, below), Accra, Rio de Janerio and Chongqing.
It's common for the media to tell a story through an individual - the simple fact is that a lot of people's hard work goes into making these studies happen - and not everyone has the opportunity (or ego) to put out there. Thanks to the NYT and the article's ever-so-patient author, Sara Corbett for giving us the opportunity to share with a wider audience.
If you want to keep in touch with where all this research is heading send an email to subscribe @ janchipchase.com.
New Perspectives Changing Value
Apr 13, 2008
In a world of ubiquitous aerial, street level or [insert new way of seeing] imagery the extent that new views enhance or depreciate the the financial value of what is seen?
One aspect of living in a cul-de-sac's is the assumption of a greater degree of privacy than say, a through road. Whether contempory tools tools should build this assumption into the granularity/detail of what is shown on aerial maps? And for whom? And given this sadistic brave new world how increased discoverability plays out in sales for new property developments such as the cul-de-sacs of the Palms islands in Dubai (pictured).
Related: threads on privacy and wayfinding.
Associating of Things and People
Apr 01, 2008
Method for associating orders with punters from Narita Airport. Compare it to this solution in a Singapore restaurant.
Street Hacks Presentation / SF
Apr 01, 2008
How long have you been using your current cell phone? And what happened to your previous one? If you live in a country like India, China or Ghana the answer is likely to involve the vibrant used phone market and, somewhere along the line the informal repair cultures - guys on the street who appear able to fix pretty much anything using little more than a flat surface a screwdriver and somehow, just the right knowledge.
Those of you who have followed this research and are based in the Bay Area are invited to a talk by myself and Nokia Design colleague Duncan Burns, titled Street Hacks: From Design Research to Prototype to kindly hosted by Adaptive Path. (AP also plan to present some new material, TBD)
Want to join? Details and sign up here
The presentation will highlight the mobile phone hacking skills available on the streets of cities from Accra and beyond, the sophisticated ecosystem of reverse engineered repair manuals and how it challenges our thinking about what it means to make and distribute and support our products. The presentation will also introduce Remade - a phone made from upcycled and recycled materials.
Surely something missing from title of the talk? Nah - just our intent to open up the discussion to how design research and design prototypes can be used to change how an organisation thinks and does. Or not. That's why it's called a discussion...
Oh yeah, photos from around Chengdu's mobile phone repair market - fake 8800 above, and repair services below. Tokyo this morning, Beijing (airport) for lunch, Dubai tomorrow. See you on the other side.
Here Come (Reports of) Violence
Apr 01, 2008
Those of you with interested in the role of mobile phones and other newish media tools in activism should take a look at Ushahidi.com a site to facilitate the reporting of acts of violence in post-election Kenya. For a broad range of other examples and a well articulated big picture I recommend Clay Shirky's new book Here Comes Everybody. And in the spirit of re-use I've got a well-thumbed copy of which I'm happy to pass on to anyone living in Tokyo.
Incidentally, the gent behind Ushahidi - Erik Hersman also contributes to Afrigadget will be in attendance and adding his voice to the discussion of this Street Hacks talk.
Photo from this in Rio de Janeiro.
His, Her, His, Her
Mar 31, 2008
Regular shoes and more traditional zouri.
Local Heroes
Mar 31, 2008
A reflection of popular culture seen in the sale of lollies in Izu Koogen above, or in children's face masks for sale in Cairo below.
Urban Annotation
Mar 31, 2008
Sakura Cam
Mar 31, 2008
Printed web page showing the current state of the soon-to-be-flowering cherry blossom. Whether its surf cams showing the current state of the ocean, to sakura cams making it easier to time your sakura watching. For every culture/sub-culture the range of status information that is tracked.
Household Norms
Mar 30, 2008
The yukakiboo - hot water stirring stick commonly found in Japanese domestic bathrooms.
In a culture where you scrub down before climbing in the bath and one tub of bathwater is good for a whole familiy's worth of sequential bathing, the water re-heating process can result in an uneven temperature - hence the need to stir. Whether you live in a culture with wet rooms - where the whole bathroom is designed to cope with being splashed, dry rooms or indeed you have no-room or water to splash around in.
The psychology of stepping into a bath and feeling the water overflow versus cultures where the aim is to keep the water in the bath. Same question for kids other age groups. And given the intensity and ritualistic nature of the bathing experience on the senses whether and how this affects how we perceive the world?
Open Platforms
Mar 30, 2008
These screens located at the entrance Izu Koogen station show a close circuit TV picture of the train departure times as seen from the station platform, plus ambient data of the platform itself.
For every closed system the interface to something, more, open. The loss of data granularity and for the consumer of that data whether it makes a difference?
Sufficiently Noise Cancelling Headphones
Mar 28, 2008
They don't need charging, require a carrying case, or leave your ear's hot after a long haul. They do cut out most of the ambient flight noise. Yeah they're not perfect - the cable is prone to being snagged on zips and from ears-on experience the more expensive pairs aren't worth the money or last any longer. But they pretty much do the do, and have been part of my hand-luggage only trips for a while now. A more rigarous review here. Product page for the ER6i's here.
Problems of accessories and accessory design in relation to Mobile TV discussed here and nice to see a built-in kick stand on the N96, photos here.
Nobody asked the right question...
Gestures of Silence
Mar 28, 2008
From a Bangkok library above and Darjeeling below. Assumptions about whether the noise comes from humans or technology.
Assumptions from Tokyo Midtown that a dog is both carryable and cageable.
20 x 20, In Print
Mar 27, 2008
Fans of Pecha Kucha will want to sneak a peek at 20 Images x 20 Seconds published by KDa and edited by Tokyo's own Uleshka Asher. For all the digital I still get a buzz from having research material appear in the physical - the book includes a number of photos from the presentation on Cultures of Repair, Innovation (PowerPoint, 2MB).
And if that doesn't grab you, these two Pecha Kucha presentations won't either: The Promise: Lessons For Service Design from the Packaging of Libido Enhancers in China (PowerPoint 3MB) or Exploratory User Research (PowerPoint 3MB).
And on the topic Future Perfect in print Harvard Business Review published a short piece titled Happy MetaData Trails as part of their series of 100 break through ideas for 2008. It's subscription only (what a breakthrough idea), here.
A Shoko, Bathed
Mar 26, 2008
Shoko being the former Aum Supreme Truth Cult leader, Shoko Asahara combined with the very here yet very tired A Bathing Ape logo. For those wanting a some more depth on the latter, Clast has an sorted write up of the evolution of the BAPE brand here.
Mobile Identities
Mar 25, 2008
My colleague and Tokyo design studio neighbour Younghee Jung wrote about the South Korean practice of sticking a mobile phone number to car windshields in the event the car is an obstruction and the owner needs to be contacted. These are not one-off hand-written notes but formal stickers. More on Younghee's site here.
It's an interesting and common example of the trade-off between convenience in this instance mostly for the benefit of others and giving up information that some people consider to be private. But are users really forgoing privacy? To what extent are South Korean consumers likely to own multiple devices, are mobile phone numbers already 'public knowledge' or are they likely to channel more private communication through other means?
The practice points to a newish kind of service - where an identity is specifically set up for communication relating to a particular task or purpose in some cases filtered by intermediaries before being forwarded to you. It's a common enough practice with email accounts but, largely because of one to one relationship between phone and phone number, its less common for mobile phones.
In a future perfect world of ubiquitous location awareness, how likely is it that the future social norm will include revealing some level of the owners current proximity, me here now, writ large on your windshield? And of course in what contexts, with what level of granularity? How does this scenario play out with vehicles with a degree of autonomous mobility - for starters cars that are capable of parking themselves? And given the communication that can happen between vehicles, their owners, their proxies and the urban environment who will offer the future service of calculating your route from A to B and i.e. getting other vehicles to move out the way, all happening prior to you stepping into the car?
Transactions and intermediaries, so yeah what kind of new hustles does it enable?
Sort of related: mobile identities from Ho Chi Minh City, Uganda and beyond and specifically dual SIM card supporting phones and hacks.
Both photos byYounghee.
Behaviours Reflected
Mar 24, 2008
This Akasaka coffee shop includes a row of accessible power sockets (running a long the edge of the window) primarily to support laptop use - though over the course of an hour a number of people charged their phones (yes people here sometimes carry petite phone chargers). Recharging mobile devices in coffee shops is nothing new - but to what extent does the explicit nature of the infrastructure lead to new behaviours? Like? Well, maybe plugging in a printer? Or setting up a server. Or, or...
In some ways customers that don't use the power socket are subsidising those that do - after all they pay a the same for a cup of coffee. Or do power using power-users spend more money either on more items or on items that will last longer? What if the electricity socket was a stand-alone working micro market? As you plug into the socket your devices authenticates itself to the system, negotiates how much power (or fuel-cell fuel) it needs and charges away. As with the explicit presence of the socket to what extent does the explicit presence of a micro-market for power this extend existing behaviours? And given the relaxed ambiance that this coffee shop is trying to create is it desirable to create a market in this context?
Now read the above paragraph replacing the word power socket with bathroom or, or...
Thoughts for today: the extent that transparency of action changes how things are consumed, which in turn speeds up or slows down the consumption process. Like? Sitting in a cafe with a regular ceramic cup versus a take-out paper cup with lid.
This harks back to a piece of research conducted with colleagues Jan Blom, Rosalinde Belzer and Intel's Wendy March, Ken Anderson and Dawn Nafus amongst others, where we considered how public use of technologies such as say laptops or mobile phones change if everyone knows exactly what you're doing. That guy in the corner with the laptop: is he IMing with a loved one? Surfing porn? Or perhaps a bit of both? Does it matter that he plans to leave in five minutes, or that he's going to sit there for hours? And how does transparency (of what aspects) of his use change his relationship with the cafe, the cafe owners, other patrons, you? And in turn how does this affect his patterns of use?
The psychology of the empty coffee cup, indeed.
Redefining Manufacturing
Mar 24, 2008
Wander around a Tokyo neighbourhood and you'll soon come across a small engineering workshop - part of the urban infrastructure and a skill base that enables small scale repair and manufacturing and is very much part of the flavour of living here (and lies in stark contrast to growing up in a we-do-services-not-objects London). But what of manufacturing in the age of cheap electronics, mass personalisation and a shared knowledge? The re-definition of manufacturing discussed in this essay by Julian Bleeker & Nicholas Nova titled What Is Manufacturing in the Era of Design-Art-Technology? including slides here.
Photos: small scale manufacturing in Chongqing China (above) and a reverse engineered mobile phone repair manual - with the latest versions updated over the internet from Accra, Ghana (below).
UI Choices
Mar 24, 2008
On last week's return flight on United - an almost bewildering array of seat adjustment options, though reasonably well clustered.
Super Sex on Pista
Mar 23, 2008
Visitors to Tokyo looking something a little more, shall we say fixed should point their headset in in the direction of Sexon Super Peace a mere 5 minutes grind from Shibuya with a small but Tokyo-tuned line of handmade skull caps, chain protectors and this being Japan, Louis Vuitton handle bars.
And if any of you are in tha' biz, Shingo*420 is on the lookout for foreign distributors, apparently.
A Gulf, Streamed
Mar 22, 2008
A heads-up for readers based in the United Arab Emirates I'll be giving a talk titled Future Connected at the World Summit on Innovation and Entrepreneurship on April 3rd. From the speaker list it looks like a horizon-broadening kind of event. And a full weekend to get sand under finger nails before heading to the Global Philanthropy Forum from April 9 to 11th in Redwood City.
Photo: Air Neon from a hazy late night in Tehran.
Textures of a Era Onsen Hotel
Mar 20, 2008
Bank holiday here in Japan - a good enough reason to escape into the mountains and overnight in an remote town. Wake up in the clouds, the only person in the onsen, spend half an hour listening to rain falling on water steam rising all around.
And the hotels includes layers of history wrapped up in objects.
(New) Ways of Seeing,
Mar 20, 2008
The extent that real time visual information speeds up our ability to appreciate the consequences of actions and bodily re-actions - in this case a stomach's reaction to choking on a tube shoved down a throat. The positive and negative ripple effects.
SuiPo: Proximity Interaction
Mar 20, 2008
The eagle eyed amongst you will have no doubt spotted the SuiPo (Suica Poster) touch point situated to the left and right of this Tokyo Station beer commercial. More here (Japanese only) or ACM members can pull up the CHI'07 paper here.
How does it work? Register your phone/pre-paid travel card with the SuiPo service and win gifts or have vouchers or campaign information sent to your mobile phone. As with all of these services: how do you know what kind of service/reward/... this poster represents? Is it enough to induce interaction the first time? Subsequent times? (And not a million miles from waiting for a car to reboot and wondering what not to touch).
This space becomes far more interesting when the first street hacks appear.
Localisation, Norms
Mar 20, 2008
Localisation is a matter of degrees. But at what point does localisation change the very DNA of the company? And is this a good or a bad thing? And for whom? (think internal resistance to a change in design direction within the company more than anything else).
In Japan this equates to the incumbent - Yahoo and the laggard Google, with the latter now adopting a just launched slightly more portalesque home page here and its equivalent from Korea.
Expectations
Mar 20, 2008
The difference in textures between clean and dirty spaces.
Money, Not a Bank In Sight
Mar 19, 2008
Imagine a world without access to banks and the services they provide - baseline services such as credit, money transfers, savings. For many of the world’s poor this is the everyday reality and it's a space where in part due to the spread of mobile telephony there are disruptions and innovations.
Readers wanting to get up to speed with the current state of mobile payment systems should read Bill Maurer’s summary paper titled Retail Electronic Payments Systems for Value Transfers in the Developing World. Yeah the title's a bit of a mouthful but the paper is concise and dare I say it, entertaining. Download the paper here [PDF, 0.2MB].
I was also recently pointed to a paper titled Payment and Social Ties by Viviana A. Zelizer that gave a lovely account of the use of dance tickets as a form of currency in the 1920’s and 30's dance taxi ballrooms. Women made a living by dancing with paying customers - with one ticket buying one minute or one song of dance floor action - think head-on-shoulder gently-rocking-side-to-side rather than You Got Served. The dance as a unit of currency reminds me of an ad-hoc interview a few months back with an erotic dancer in Uzbekistan - who after trying to unsuccessfully trying to sell a lap dance plonked herself in the seat beside me and over a slow drink, and numerous business related interruptions proceeded to patiently explain the business side of a lap dancing joint - some of which is outlined in this article. To take but one snippet - in the same way that restaurants offer standardised portion sizes lap dancing songs are typically cut to a specific length using WinAmp no less. A memorable evening all in all, not least because of the articulate interviewee and perhaps a topic for another day. But I digress.
The same paper cites Robert Coles discussion with a 17 year old prostitute in The Moral Life of Children talking about how what might appear on the surface to be a single unit of currency can be treated by its owner as 'good or bad depending on how it was earned “I put it in a separate place in my wallet. I don’t let the money touch some of the other money I make”. There’s a tendency for many of today's service designers to treat digital stuff as equal - with systems often making little distinction between say, one photo/contact/message/... and the next. As more of your digital self is carried it's a distinction that will increasingly be drawn into sharp focus.
Photos from our recent field study in Mumbai, the above photo showing a cash register highlights how faith can make its way into everyday processes - the religious icons are touched as part of the flow of every transaction.
Cultural Arbitrage
Mar 18, 2008
Pattern recognition with a given format - URL, phone number, address, QR bar code...; the speed at which domain squatters squat; cultural nuances within a given format e.g. with numbers - the meaning of 666 in western culture or the number 4 in China; the opportunities for cultural arbitrage.
Related: the projection of status through phone numbers in Iran, Mongolia and China.
Groped
Mar 18, 2008
Sexual harassment in public spaces in a sensor rich environment?
Form & Flexibility
Mar 18, 2008
Sports,Tracked by Phone
Mar 17, 2008
Japanese mobile operator KDDI/AU gently stretches, jogs and cycles its way further into the service space with its Smart Sports service - use your mobile phone to track your exercise route, sync your music etc. For most people I'd anticipate it being an aspirational purchase and ends up being used by commuters to count walking-from-the-station-to-the-office calories - not that there's anything wrong with that, eh, Hayashi san.
Punters with an N-Series phone can download the Sports Tracker beta which is well regarded, not that I've personally made the time to use it in anger.
Update: and reader Tom points to the alpha of Zyked (video but not much yet in the way of content).
Photos from Shibuya station - the chap running above no-doubt overwhelmed with his new mobile and taking the posters all to heart.
Form Enablers
Mar 17, 2008
How to avoid drowning the tea-bag, from a back-of Shibuya cafe.
Unintentional Happiness
Mar 16, 2008
Shoe horn hook.
Form, Balance
Mar 16, 2008
Artistic license for the text to run left to right, right to left, top to bottom.
Textures of a Rooftop Batting Range
Mar 16, 2008
From a petite, how-can-they-possibly-stay-in-business batting range on the roof of a Sangenjaya pharmacy.
Local Delivery for Global Organisations
Mar 16, 2008
Second Life
Mar 16, 2008
Worn out baseballs for additional grip.
See also: the second life of tennis balls.
Monday Commute
Mar 10, 2008
Heading to the Evergreen State today - a chance to put names to faces and research at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. See you on the other side.
Hearts, Minds, Wallets
Mar 09, 2008
In the battle for a presence in your wallet this prepaid card does well by maintaining an ultra-slimmed down credit card form factor. 4,000 Yen (about 25 Euro) buys you 10+1 entries into the Daikanyama pool with the amount of credit remaining is printed on the front on the card after each transaction. Japanese swimming pools have their own unique culture ranging from walking lanes to everyone-out-of-the-pool for whilst we check for floating bodies and submerged body parts, to the changing-of-the-(life)-guard. Visitors to Tokyo with a desire to shake off a bad dose of long-haul should head over to Daikanyama Pool - a mere five minutes walk from the eponymous station, fifteen minutes walk from Shibuya. Map here. It's less tourist destination than sento but a subtly nuanced slice of everyday Tokyo life.
Zero Dead / Two Twenty One Injured
Mar 09, 2008
The number of deaths and injuries today/yesterday on Tokyo's roads - commonly found posted outside koban - the community police boxes.
The Business of Convenience
Mar 09, 2008
Continuing along the lines of the infrastructure and services you can take for granted - this AM/PM convenience stores has started offering regular clothes washing services. Not high value dry cleaning but washing.
I have no idea whether as a service it is profitable. Given that most Tokyo homes have a washing machine - what makes a clothes washing service (potentially) viable in the context of urban Tokyo?: the frequency and urgency and lack of desire to do the laundry; the prevalence of sole occupancy apartments, a distinct lack of servants, family members who the task can be delegated to; the likelihood of having a clothes dryer in the home; the time it takes to wash and hang clothes; the space to hang clothes - clothes horses are an almost permanent feature of apartments and there's often not enough room to swing a 9 iron; that items left on the balcony may be dirtied by pollution - Tokyo has major motorways running through the city; the proximity of and already frequent visits to the convenience store itself.
And on the downside: a person's willingness to carry laundry to a nearby store; cost; the social interaction of handing such a personal item to the store clerk yeah, they're likely to be not out back sorting the whites clothes from the coloured laughing at the stains on your smalls, but trust is an issue; not being able to retrieve items from the laundry bin to wear one more time.
Return to Sender / Guaranteed
Mar 09, 2008
A single glove bagged and posted to this Shimo Kitazawa wall. As with bags used to advertise the availability of labour and skills in Urumqi how to know whether an object is deliberately discarded, placed or accidentally lost?
An object + a recognised owner + the ability of that object to negotiate its way home = objects that come with with 'return to sender' guarantee.
Yeah, how to know whether an object is deliberately discarded or accidentally lost?
Note, Not Bikes
Mar 09, 2008
I *Heart* Abstractions
Mar 09, 2008
Personal Chaperone
Mar 09, 2008
The positioning of an open clamshell phone to support the status-checking of incoming communication and (more for women then for men) sending a social signal of: being engaged to remote others; wanting to be less engaged with people in close proximity.
From an Akasaka cafe.
Personal Supply Chains / Trust
Mar 08, 2008
The black cat logo of the Kuro Neko Yamato delivery company. A compelling feature of their service is the ability to drop off and pick up packages from your local convenience store and change the delivery destination through your mobile, conveniences indeed. The service is popular amongst snowboarders and golfers - 3,780 Yen (24 Euro) to have your gear magically appear in the hotel boot room as your arrive and re-appear on your doorstep the day after you return.
As the relationship between people & people & things becomes more transparent, and the tools to maintain location awareness more prevalent - is there more or less scope for a social delivery service? The neighbourly equivalent to the Japanese convenience store? And in what contexts? Do you want your neighbours handling your parcel before you do?
Sus.ta.in.able
Mar 07, 2008
A paper by Elaine Huang of Motorola Labs and Khai N. Truong of the Department of Computer Science at the University of Toronto on Breaking the Disposable Technology Paradigm: Opportunities for Sustainable Interaction Design for Mobile Phones probes people's replacement and disposal strategies. It's geared towards an academic audience, download here [1MB, PDF].
Photo above of the Remade concept nicked from Raphael here - posted here because most of previous photos or the movie of the concept didn't show it working. No there was no network coverage when the photo was taken. Yeah, it works.
Bits, Bytes, Teeth
Mar 07, 2008
Local Sangenjaya dentist chair now includes a retrofitted flat screen TV (below) used for showing DVDs to fearful punters (Wallace & Gromit on heavy rotation since you ask) and is used to display x-rays shortly after they are taken. How long before visual dental record data such as x-rays can be digitally picked up by customers on the way out? Or simply forwarded to your secure home account? Along the lines of the near field communications.
And given our very-human penchant for losing things how long before data ends up in the 'wrong' hands.
Wrappers, Containers, Rituals
Mar 07, 2008
Tape, extolling the value of fresh vegetables wrapped around a bunch of bananas.
Whilst the tape does an admirable job of keeping the bananas bunched how likely are they to unbunch on their own accord? What does it say about how fruit is presented and sold - in bundles rather than by weight? In a culture with a higher risk of theft the reinforced bunching might make them harder to steal - but its a low likelihood here.
From a consumer perspective the tape introduces scissors into the unpack-everything-in-the-kitchen ritual, something that is mentally at odds with nature's bounty.
Related: packaging norms from around the world.
Sten.ci.l
Mar 07, 2008
Public, Private, Personal
Mar 06, 2008
The practice of wandering through a neighbourhood - in this case Tokyo's Shimo Kitazawa en mass and picking up litter. Common enough in Japan, sometimes spotted as part of sponsor-a-highway campaigns in the US.
Of note in this context: it's a Sunday and the neighbourhood is roughly equivalent to the Camden Town, Williamsburg or Prenzlaurberg - studenty-trendy give or take; the group are in their early 20's - at an age when peer group affiliation and appearance is at the fore; they are wearing uniforms; the task they are engaged is non-glamorous and benefits the community. Welcome to the social.
A Light Extinguished
Mar 06, 2008
Ta UB & RB.
Lead Use Case
Mar 06, 2008
A Body of Language
Mar 05, 2008
A Japanese phone user (in the shadows, center) conducts a call facing the wall - the body language of making a phone call.
Service Pollination Opportunities
Mar 05, 2008
Shoe formation from a classroom's worth of pupils taking off their slippers at the entrance to the room. The importance, or otherwise of wearing the 'right' slippers on the way out - slippers are numbered but are otherwise identical. In a sensor-rich-everything-tracked world the opportunities for service discovery or service pollination by wearing someone else's footwear. From the Niseko Park Hotel, Hokkaido.
Related: behaviours related to clean and dirty spaces, shoes.
Elevated, Abstracted UI
Mar 05, 2008
Size, Colour, Density
Mar 04, 2008
Big Brother / Little Sister
Feb 29, 2008
When it comes to surveillance most people think of big brother, but increasingly its your (early adopting, tech savvy, sensor loaded) little sister. Which makes the whole notion of opting out of technology adoption one of whether to opt out of society. Exactly. Slides taken from this presentation [PowerPoint, 4MB].
Photos? Above - a selca moment in Seoul and below from a field study in Brighton.
A long weekend in Hokkaido kicks off in a few minutes, altitude + powder beckons.
Going Local
Feb 28, 2008
Readers on the other side of the globe (to Japan) can now head over to our local Satellite Design Studio in Rio de Janeiro located at the Design School of UniverCidade. It's a similar setup to our studio in Bangalore and reflects the need to absorb the local into the design process. More here.
Photos? The Rio dawn seen from the office deck during last year's field study and favela fonts.
Traces
Feb 27, 2008
A cable that runs between the body of this Japanese toilet and the seat - to power the under-seat heating. Having an exposed cable is a surprising design choice given the issues related to cleanliness and (male standing) splash-back. For any device (think flip-phone...) or system the internal and external ways of moving power/bits from A to B and the associated costs of each. Someone should bring together the toilet and mobile phones design communities for an, um, sit down.
The Domestic Traces Human Spaces flickr pool has some tranquil examples of, well, human traces in domestic spaces. How does this relate to this photo? In a country where heated toilet seats are common a warm toilet seat doesn't imply the recent presence of another human.
Related: traces from Brazil, India, China & Japan.
Common Tokyo Winter Ailments
Feb 26, 2008
Win Bose 3's - A Nation Decides
Feb 25, 2008 | 58 Comments
The competition for the most entertaining example of mobile phone anti-social behaviour drew in entries ranging from the inane to the insane, obviously encouraged by the chance to win a pair of Bose 3 noise cancellation headphones. You can read all the entries here.
It's decision time. Once you've reviewed the entries you can record your vote here.
Let the vote rigging begin!
Update: voting is now closed.
Update: in the true spirit of a dysfunctional democracy we have a clear, if vote rigged winner. Ta to everyone who submitted entries and Steve ping your address to info at janchipchase.com to receive your prize. No more shall you be cursed by ambient noise (unless of course you forget to charge the headphones battery)
A Market For...
Feb 24, 2008
A stall selling water by the sachet can be frequently spotted in and around Accra where many homes have limited access to mains water.
Thought for today - for every neighbourhood: the proximity of individual dwellings to infrastructure - water, electricity, lighting, covered sewage, internet connectivity,...; the social dynamics that enable or deny access and to whom, and in what contexts; the markets that spring up to either extend access to those who don't be default have access, or to make it more convenient for those already do; and the technologies that are being created to make those markets feasible.
Lastly - how the whole dynamic changes as more of what we consider to be 'infrastructure' is bundled into ever smaller packages and becomes increasingly mobile?
Decent brew of coffee, K dozing in the next room, gaggles of joggers a-jogging under the balcony. Tokyo on a Sunday.
Sachets That Mimic
Feb 24, 2008
Sachet's mimicking the design of a tube. For what product and in what context is it desirable for the tube mimicking the design of sachets?
From Accra.
Recycled, Upcycled: Remade
Feb 12, 2008
Is it possible to make an upcycled mobile phone entirely from recycled materials? One that consumers will want to buy? How about at a price that puts it within reach of the mass market?
If your interest is piqued take a look at the following concept called Remade developed by a number of my Nokia Design colleagues from our Calabasas Studio - Andrew Gartrell, Duncan Burns, Rhys Newman, Raphael Grignani, Pascal Wever, Tom Arbisi, Simon James, Pawena Thimaporn and Peter Knudsen. Photos and a video of Remade appear here, and I guess a more corporatesque press release (if you go for that kind of thing) will eventually appear here.
Of all the internal concepts I've followed this year this is one I keep returning to, not least because sustainability is a pressing issue in a billion+ products-per-year industry - but also because the team tackled a number of related weighty issues in what was a far reaching project. I hope that in due course more of their design thinking makes it into the public domain, not least to stimulate critical feedback from people like your good selves. (I’m happy to pass your comments onto the team - email info at janchipchase dot com so you can converse with them directly).
Some readers will recognize the use of the term upcycling from Cradle to Cradle and it’s fair to say that well-thumbed copies have been circulated and more importantly provoked debate within our community. And yes the concept evolves the thinking about cultures of repair and innovation that can be found on the streets from Accra to Bangalore to Chengdu. A presentation of this research can be downloaded from here (PowerPoint, 4MB)
Returning to the original question from this post: Is it possible to make an upcycled mobile phone entirely from recycled materials? One that consumers want to buy? At a price that puts it within reach of the mass market? The discussion is well underway.
These photos? We joined three two of the Remade team in Accra where they were in the middle of testing and refining the concept with the aid of the local population.The gent pictured? Owner, and talented entrepreneur of a neighbourhood mobile phone repair shop.
Loan Advertising
Feb 04, 2008
Localisation Norms
Feb 04, 2008
Menu title written in English, menu items in Japanese, tax written in English, numbers in Hindu/Arabic/Western. What we know,what we assume our customers know.
View From Above. Proximate
Feb 03, 2008
The tools to discover the location of resources whether you're in a hurry to find helicopter landing pad (on the Tokyo hospital roof, above) or somewhere to buy a decent pair of flying goggles are becoming increasingly mainstream and increasingly pocketable - using technologies from base station triangulation, GPS to WiFi Positioning.
I'm intrigued about the knock-on effects of proximate awareness - the ability to sufficiently understand location based on the knowledge and mediation of other people who themselves have access to this technology. Think of all the services offered by a well equipped information kiosk made mobile, in the hands of a service provider. Or street hustler. We first came across proximate literacy during our research into illiterate communication practices [essay PowerPoint 6MB]. The idea of proximate anything should interest you because it speeds up the mainstreaming of technology - you get many of the benefits and drawbacks of a technology without having actually purchased it yourself.
Thought for today - the ways in which ready access to a product or service differs from actual ownership - in terms of cost, maintenance, use. Certainly topics for next week's Systems, Cities and Sustainable Mobility conference.
Cheers PFW for the view.
The Power of Repetition
Feb 03, 2008
The practice of kitting out a bunch of students in a uniform and sending them out onto the streets, in Shibuya (above) and Chengdu (below). Group advertising of this nature is relatively common practice in China in part because labour is relatively cheap, and in part drawing on a rich culture of public performance.
Related: Putting an advertising spin on everyday accidents, advertising labour and skills in Urumqi, the future of in your face advertising in Taiwan, the unique format of job advertising in Sao Paolo, and not least - figuring out the value of contextual advertising on a Shibuya escalator.
Further, Faster
Jan 30, 2008
Today we're comfortable with the rapid dissemination of information and ideas from one side of the globe to the other. What's in Tokyo today can be in Tehran tomorrow and vice versa.
When physical things reach a certain size - being pocketable seems about right, their ability to be picked up and moved around increases considerably. All things being equal small objects much like ideas, travel further, travel faster. They are put into bags, pockets and inevitably are introduced to people in far off lands. And if those people in far off lands like and value them enough, the container ships follow.
Thoughts for today: Which of today's large objects are likely to minaturise to the point of of being pocketable? What features and functionality are you likely to find added to today's already-pocketable objects? What activities and consequent behaviours do these new features and products enable? Think adoption and adaptation of trends.
And the photos? Livestrong bracelets from Delhi (above) and Accra (below). Not given as an example of the adoption of Livestrong and everything it stands for, but rather an example of an object as a vehicle for personal decoration + fashion + status. Both, incidentally likely to be locally manufactured.
Objects below a certain size tend to be clustered (keys) and/or contained (credit cards). As pocketable objects continue to minaturise - what is the affect on their speed of distribution? The speed of adoption? The speed of trends?
Display Norms
Jan 30, 2008
Three Out of Four
Jan 27, 2008
Three out of four wheels removed - the point at which its better to simply start over. From Dushanbe, Tajikistan.
On Beeping & Being
Jan 22, 2008
Research from Microsoft Research India's Jonathan Donner that explores the practice of beeping - making intentional missed calls. The paper draws on field research from Rwanda in 2004, categorising three different types of beeping: call back beeps; pre-negotiated instrumental beeps; and relational beeps, and discusses the rules that define the what, why and how. Related publications here.
Reacting to prevelance of this informal practice carrier's such as MTN have introduced the Call Me service - where the user can send one of four pre-defined text message for free Please Call me, Can’t talk now. Please text me, I’ve missed you. Please call me! and It’s important. Please call me!. Given the myriad of ways that a beep can be interpreted which is a better, for whom and in what contexts?
Its probably more efficient for the carrier to send a pre-defined text message (small bits of asynchronous data) than to tie up an exchange trying to connect a call in real time (a synchronous connection), so this new service could be a win/win.
Our own research has come across forms of beeping from Helsinki teens to Indian housewives - typically, initially driven by a desire to save money. And neither is the practice restricted to telecommunications - one Chinese interviewee remembered when the default Chinese postal system was pay-on-delivery and the sender could include a short messages written on the outside of the letter. The receiver could read the message but reject the letter.
Thought for today: for every communication channel - what can be communicated for free? And on open hardware platforms whether this communication can be automatically translated into something more meaningful to the receiver? And how this affects the business model.
Photos: textures from our recent Ghana field study.
The Freshness of Contact Information II
Jan 20, 2008
The replacement cycle of sex-trade advertising in a public phone box in London. Compare to the Yellow Arrow sticker (previous entry) to what extent can we be sure that the contact information and the service it represents is still current? The design and contextual understanding that helps evaluate the 'freshness' of the advertising/links, in particular the frequency by which phone boxes are cleaned of fly-posted advertisements. The speed at which legal/authorised and illegal/unauthorised advertising is removed, and by whom? The opportunities that the differential in time creates, and for whom?
Related: phone box advertising norms in São Paulo, Bangkok and London, and the non-phone box advertising of sex services in Tokyo.
And after almost six weeks straight on the road safely back in Tokyo. Two weeks to get the body-clock into some sort of rhythm before it it all kicks off again.
The Freshness of Contact Information I
Jan 20, 2008
A sticker from yellowarrow.net on the Design Forum shop in Helsinki. Sending a text message to the code printed on the sticker retrieves information about that space that someone has posted to the yellowarrow site.
The notable aspect of this is not the crude geo-annotation of public spaces, but rather the developer's assumption that sufficient numbers of people would be willing to use this service to access user-generated opinions about that space, whilst knowing little or nothing about the individual who generated the link. Risk versus reward.
Unsurprisingly the yellowarrow site doesn't appear to have been updated since its launch in 2005.
Death Notice Norms
Jan 08, 2008
Obituary posters on the streets of Accra - highlighting the deceased, name, nickname, age, extended family and chief mourners (above), and death notice from Chalus, Iran (below). Whether the information on the poster is, or needs to be accurate? 110 year old called to glory above.
What does the prioritisation of information that appears on these posters tell us about local values in Ghana? What information is missing compared to a similar notice in your own culture? You have these posters in your culture right?
Next time you have the opportunity to pick up a non-local newspaper check out the obits. Personal favourite: the contrast between the size of Chinese families in mainland China after the one child policy kicked in vs. the Chinese diaspora - its not uncommon to see 60+ names listed under the extended family of mourners.
Related: the cost differentiation between types of use in a Accra toilet - updated to reflect first hand experiences of one-time Accra resident Ethan
Younghee @ LIFT
Jan 06, 2008
Continuing on the theme of presentations - Tokyo design studio colleague Younghee Jung will be presenting at the LIFT Conference Geneva in early February. Her talk will include material about a method we've been exploring - setting up 'open studios' in communities like Dharavi and Jacarezihno.
The full conference program is here and registration here. Those of you with a penchant for fast descents will want to pack your mountain gear and sweet-talk one of the LIFT team to catching a train out to the slopes.
(Short Term) Memory Aids
Jan 04, 2008
Ever been in a situation where your phone or laptop battery was about to die? What did you do next? A common strategy for the risk-averse is to make a hard copy backup of just enough information needed for the next tasks - an address, phone number, reference number.
And what if anything does this have to do with the poor quality key fob display (below) sold in an Urumqi market for a few Euro cents? It's a fairly typical don't-expect-it-too-last-too-long electronic gadget. It's also an unintentional precursor to a new class of object that you'll wonder how you did without, another small thing with a big future. The post-it or thumb drive of its time.
Take a display, preferably something persistent and with minimal power consumption, just enough resolution to display an address is enough to get started. Throw in a mechanism to synchronise data from your other connected stuff. The bill of materials is cheap. Sponsored versions where the default image is the advertising de jour, will be cheap enough to hand to a stranger.
Secondary and tertiary displays - optimised to support your (short term) memory. That account number you need to quote every time you call up tech support? Just where you want it. That appointment you're on your way to? Address and contact details automatically copied across. A trickle of pertinent information pulled from your life stream updating as your day evolves.
Related: charging from Soweto to Delhi to Tokyo.
Side note: Japanese mobile phone consumer's are more likely to pop into a convenience store if their battery dies - such is the benefit of having a power connector that is standardised across handsets - a phone feature defined by the operator for most products sold though its network.
Brand-Less
Jan 04, 2008
The practice of removing obvious traces of a brand from product to distance oneself from values it represents. Covered up Burton board, above.
Define Socially Acceptable
Jan 03, 2008 | 1 Comment
A sign-of-the-times moment from the Caravan Cafe - an upscale organic restaurant in the Tashkent suburbs: a lady walks in alone and sits at the only available table, perpendicular to my own. The two remaining tables in this cozy venue are occupied by couples having what most people would describe as romantic dinners.
Upon sitting, the lady immediately takes out her mobile phone, a RAZR variant and makes a relatively short call. Task completed she starts to play with her phone browses a number of songs and upon finding what she was looking for, plays it through the speakers. On full volume. Yes, a bit tinny, but on full blast it manages to drown out the restaurant's own sound system. Patrons shift on their seats, glance repeatedly over.
We've seen the growth of mobile phone boom boxing across the globe from Cairo to Helsinki to Shanghai (though admittedly not so much here in Japan where consideration for others often trumps one's own enjoyment). People using music to help define and strengthen their peer group, carving a space out of the urban environment.
Back to our lady. Is playing loud music at her table simply ostentatious see-what-a-fancy-phone-I-have projecting status? Or perhaps an extreme example of projecting personal values and identity through the choice of music? A defensive move using music to keep the single male on the other table at bay? Or she's simply having fun?
After ten minutes her friend arrives, she silences her phone and they disappear into snow storm outside. Let a thousand Radio Raheem's bloom.
Storage vs Display Norms
Jan 02, 2008
Storage lockers for snowboards and skis in the Prince hotel Naeba above, and a display case in Entebbe, Uganda below.
Sign Symmetry
Jan 02, 2008
Brand Extension
Jan 02, 2008
Miffy is widely used in advertising in Japan from banks to ski schools. Can't quite imagine Miffy on a snowboard.
The Power of Ten
Dec 31, 2007
The most popular content on Future Perfect in 2007?
The top four slots occupied by essays on Where People Carry Phones, Mobile TV, Mobile Essentials and Shared Phone Use with the essay on Repair Cultures also making the top ten. Writing longer pieces and side-stepping the traditional academic publishing process has proved a worthwhile strategy. Keyword streams for graffiti and customisation continue to prove popular - for a full list of tags see the site index. And the individual posts that round out the top ten include: signs; a chandelier; and the the two gents from a Delhi (above) - the latter no doubt a result of appearing in the first page of Google’s image search for the word "India".
The full list:
- Where People Carry Phones
- Mobile TV
- Mobile Essentials
- Shared Phone Use
- Graffiti
- Signs that trigger a need to pee
- Customisation
- Chandelier made from the inserts of penis pumps
- Repair Cultures
- Two gents from Delhi mobile phone market
On a side note: a few weeks back I posted information about job openings in our Consumer Futures teams in Delhi and Shanghai (if you responded - I've since forwarded the resumes that arrived by the deadline to the relevant person in Nokia). The surprisingly high number of responses were in part a reflection of the interest of working in this field (whatever it is you think this field is) and certainly received a boost with traffic from PSFK job search. Cheeky. Smart. Good luck to the applicants.
2008? The experiment will continue.
Waiting For Small Packages to Explode
Dec 27, 2007
You are walking in your high street and you see a bag on the ground. What goes through your mind? This?
What would happen if you left a bag like this on the ground in your neighbourhood, your high street? What are the cues that signal to others that the bag is unattended? Or that it is deliberately placed there? To what extent are the cues inherent in the bag and how it is placed, and to what extent in the context?
Consider a future perfect with widerspread surveillance and sousveillance, objects that maintain a location awareness and include sensors that can log the user and its use and of course bill appropriately. For some objects throw the ability to move autonomously. That object you see on the ground, on the bench, at the traffic lights - is it unattended or is it simply trying to appear unattended? Objects that appear in the 'right place' just when you (think) you need them - the perfect form of contextual advertising - you've picked it up so now its yours, go use, please. Oh, and we'll settle the transaction in 30 days.
Physical objects super-distributed.
And the bags? Photos taken at the People's Theater square in Urumqi - day labourers advertising their skills and availability by placing tool bags and boxes on the ground. The camera-shy would-be workers are huddled to one side trying to stay warm and chewing the duck fat - to a passer by the bags looked unattended.
Related: linked in - the effect of location information and personal tracking on the effectiveness of terror campaigns, and the art of triggering interaction.
Packaging, Waste
Dec 27, 2007
Street Food Display Norms
Dec 26, 2007
Street food exposed to the pollution you most large Chinese cities and off-set by the sub-zero temperatures. The only item in the bowl that remains protected from the elements? - Crab sticks.
Related: using skewers to denote cost in Chongqing, and the half life of food on a plate in Tokyo and beyond.
Slot
Dec 26, 2007
When the baby squats the slot opens.
From Urumqi, China.
Man Down
Dec 03, 2007
One of the metrics for a successful field study is unsurprisingly, ensuring everyone returns home safely. For our recent Accra field study this was, alas, not the case. To put it bluntly, we were denied the opportunity to do so by UPS.
A colleague (pictured above) who was set to join us had his passport (the remains of which are pictured below), newly stamped with a Ghanaian visa 'lost in transit' by UPS. When it eventually arrived it did so with its covers missing rendering it useless. As he recounts: "Later that morning, I went back to the Consulate General of France in Los Angeles to void my current passport and apply for a new one. On close inspection, the vice-consul was surprised to see the cover missing considering the overall good condition of the pages and suggested that it might have been removed intentionally to make a fake passport. The vice-consul went on to describe how the French passport is constructed; the cover and pages are really thick and sturdy and are sewn together. It is nearly impossible to detach the cover without human intervention."
The ability to track a person or thing is often mistaken for the ability to affect what happens to the tracked object. In the event of something out of the ordinary occurring the ability to track becomes a way for the consumer to narrow down where within UPS's own network a digression (accidental damage? theft?) has occurred - a subtle variation on sousveillance. But just how common is the problem of passport loss? A quick search turned up this article by the Guardian/Observer newspaper from 2003 that refers to "11,733 (passports) lost over the past four years" by the Royal Mail. Useful things passports. In the wrong hands.
How might today's scenario play out in our future perfect?
From a would-be thief's point of view it should be easier to identify which packages contain valuable cargo by running a RFID scanner over the packages pulling out those that flag up passport ID's. Give or take a shielded cover. And in the consumer's corner a parcel sentinel that sits in the package collecting rich sensorial data and sending this directly to the receiver. Yeah, the passport will still get nicked. But at least you'll know the aftershave/perfume of the thief.
Had my end-of-year work review last week. One of the objectives set at the beginning of the year, was to bring everyone in the team back safely all limbs intact. It doesn't count if they never get to leave the country right?
Razored. Bladed
Dec 02, 2007
30 yen (0.20 Euro) razor - its body made from a single piece of molded aluminum.
Textures of a Local Sento
Dec 02, 2007
One of more enjoyable aspects of moving to the new 'hood are the expansive local sento options. There are two easy ways to identify that a sento is nearby - a smoke-stack that juts out from the lo-rise skyline; and at ground level following the trickle of pristine punters to the source of their pristinity.
The Shimizuyu sento in Sangenjaya is more interesting than most - layers of bath-house history dating back to the 1920's encapsulated in objects & practices: an expansive Mt Fuji mural; a pool with a surprisingly strong electric current, a wood decked veranda to cool off and take a smoke; bottles of milk sitting in a glass fridge; a 1st gen massage chair that accepts 10 yen without living up to its end of the bargain.
Carsten, nice one dude.
Loosely related - public bath house in Iran.
NCS
Dec 01, 2007
Founding Fathers
Nov 30, 2007
Using people and events from local history to give a currency authority and relevance - here on an 10,000 Ghanian Cedis (0.7 Euros) note. The Ghanian currency is being devalued - at a rate of 10,000 to 1 with the new currency already in circulation - it needs all the authority it can get.
Almost totally unrelated - I once made a (work related, previous job) visit to a certain central bank and had the opportunity to visit their bank note design and print works. One of the bank's graphic designers pointed to a minor figure in a historical scene on one of the newer designed notes, then pointed to an elderly gent who worked in the design department for years - noting the physical similarity of the faces. Some people have historical backdrops thrust upon them.
I challenge anyone to walk into a decent sized gold vault without breaking into a large smile.
Cause(d). Effect(ed) (?)
Nov 29, 2007
Anti-smoking advertisement (posted by Japan Tobacco) raising awareness of the consequences of smoking. The extent to which different cultures care about the outcome once awareness is raised. The motivation for posting this sign in English - to what extent do the intended audience understand what is written?
Legitimising Behaviours
Nov 29, 2007
Empty can placed in the sweeper's pan - in the bottom right of this photo. Objects and their associated actions that legitimise otherwise anti-social behaviours.
Path of Least Resistance
Nov 29, 2007
A row of bikes with ground level and raised parking. Despite their proximity and the minimal extra effort to use the raised slots - all but one of the ground level parking slots were full, all the raised slots empty.
Throw in a micro-payment mechanism and you have your micro-market segmentation right there.
Now Hiring
Nov 26, 2007
Looking for a challenge in 2008?
Our Consumer Futures teams in Delhi and Shanghai are expanding and are looking for a few talented people with the skills to make trend and consumer research happen, and to apply the findings to affect how our colleagues think and do.
Naturally you'll have a deep cultural understanding of China, India and/or the region, have hands on experience of futures research methologies and have a good few years of industry experience under your belt. Oh, and your passport will still have a few empty pages.
Interested? Forward a short covering letter and resume by Friday this week to my work email address - jan dot chipchase at nokia dot com, I’ll make sure they reach the relevant person.
Photos? Dug up from field research in Delhi and the used phone market in Chengdu
Update: thanks to the people who sent in their resumes, have forwarded to the appropriate person who is dealing with the hires. You may also want to check out the careers section on the Nokia.com site - it lists globally open positions.
Spoken Interfaces
Nov 26, 2007
A sign at a local Sangenjaya fire station extols residents to install a fire alarm. Is the speaking alarm simply artistic license by the local illustrator or accurate representation of the device's aural interface? Actually the latter - many alarms sold in Japan have a voice that warns of "fire" to accompany the siren.
One of the pleasures of moving into a new home has been getting up to speed on Japanese domestic appliance (aural) interface norms - including a bath tub that intones in a slightly-too-electronic voice when the bath has been drawn to the correct depth and temperature; a fish grill that warns how much grill time is remaining and, yes the speaking fire alarm.
No word yet from the toilet.
Thankfully.
For a European with a penchant for simple devices spoken feedback of what is happening on the device is often a step too far, but here in Japan it can be found in anything from ATM's, ticket machines to having the time and date spoken when the key turns in the ignition of a rental car.
Spoken interfaces are often considered a partial solution to illiterate device use - if someone can read the interface then they're going to understand what is spoken right? Wrong. A least sort of - its a complex issue. A video explaining the different solutions to support illiterate consumers here the supporting slides here [PowerPoint, 6MB].
Raska
Nov 25, 2007
Landscape vs Portrait
Nov 23, 2007
Stacked landscape in the supermarket but, due to the opening being at the end of the box, it needs to be stored vertically in in the home.
Thought for today: modal shifts.
Units. Smaller Units
Nov 22, 2007
A sachet of gin bought from a Accra convenience store. For any product or service how to break down the value into smaller chunks? Can't go any smaller? You're not thinking hard enough. Tea by the bag? Done.
Other examples of sachet buying from Brazil and India here.
You're wondering what happens to the products bought in the name of research? On the rocks. The long weekend starts here.
Moving Anti-Crime Eyes
Nov 21, 2007
Motorbike with a goku bohan no me sticker - literally moving anti-crime eyes.
The Japan Times has a write-up of how they became a popular fixture on municipal and delivery fleets in Tokyo.
A Fear of Reconnecting
Nov 21, 2007
Travelers arriving home to Japan are often greeted by a backlog of multimedia messages - in this instance 35 spam messages pitching sex industry services. A lack of roaming agreements and interoperability ensure that it is not forwarded to the handset whilst on the road.
In the connecting-de-connecting-re-connecting equation in what contexts does reconnection occur? What technical boundaries - from bandwidth limitations, IP-blocking to interoperability issues affect how that reconnection will occur?
Priority Visa
Nov 04, 2007
With a winter trip to central Asia lined up for December and a return from Africa in mid-November my remaining time in Tokyo can be measured by how many days it takes to apply for each visa. The Uzbekistan embassy takes applications on Mondays and Tuesdays, Thursday and Fridays. Mornings to drop off, afternoons for pickup, woe betide you are in a hurry.
Dropping off my passport for the Kazakstan embassy my flights were booked into Almaty. On the day it came for pick-up the itinery had already changed toTaskkent. Applying for a visa for a country you don’t plan to pass through is a waste of a page on a passport with not enough blank pages.
Conversations echoed throughout a multi-cultural team with a heavy travel schedule.
Meta Data
Nov 04, 2007
Creating QR barcode links large enough to be read from the ambient background of other people`s video streams, photos.
With increasingly ubiquitous displays able to offer up personalised QR barcodes what`s the likelyhood that your QR cube ends up captured by someone elses recording device? Get ready for real time shoulder surfing.
When the Tone Rings
Nov 04, 2007
Taking a late night work telco whilst knocking the top off a nama in a Naka Megruo izakaya. The only other people in the bar are a couple of couples rounding off a meal and the end-of-a-shift energy emanating from host of this tiny joint. The remaining bodies alternate between sake shots, making runs to the loo, lighting up and nibbling on complimentary we’re-about-to-close chunk of melon. When a mobile phone rings its tone is familiar to these ears to the point of generic - the Nokia tune.
The reaction to that tune varies depending on whether you’re sitting in Europe or the US, or China or India, a hip bar, a queue for the 73 bus, a school yard. It can quicken the pulse, warm the heart, trigger a yawn, raise a smile or a smirk - it just depends who you are, and where you are at. For those around you it's a filter through which they view you - a ring tone being, after all an established vehicle for self expression and status.
But here, in this bar in Tokyo coming across that tune is well unusual. The Japanese market is dominated by local manufacturers so a sighting on a night out is not assured.
She reaches into her hand bag eventually fishes out the ringing mobile. And it’s not a Nokia.
Sachiko 28
Nov 03, 2007
Premium Manga
Nov 02, 2007
