Casablanca: Designing Social Communication Devices for the Home

1. Casablanca: Designing Social Communication Devices for the Home Debby Hindus, Scott D. Mainwaring, Nicole Leduc, Anna Elisabeth Hagstrom and Oliver Bayley Interval Research Corporation

2. Project Goal • Incorporate media space concepts into domestic environments

3. Influences • Previous work in computer-mediated communication (e.g. awareness, audio-related media spaces) • Home technologies (e.g. HomeNet)

4. Early Prototypes • CommuteBoard • NeighborNet • KitchenNet Poor video performance over ISDN

5. CommuteBoard • Handwriting and audio sensing • Helping carpool participants arrange their rides more effectively Feedback: pros: useful, fun, casual interface. Cons: audio not informative, handwriting hard to read, space limited

6. CommuteBoard Conclusions on home-based technology • Use simple, expressive means to communicate • Aesthetics are important • Video and audio: need high-speed to be effective

7. Themes • Household as displays • Household as sanctuary • Family life is household priority • Women are household communicators • Telephone not adequate • Design implications: focus on aesthetics, family life and adult women

8. Concepts • Awareness-related • In Touch- “thinking of you” tokens • Presence Light – linked objects showing activity • Audio Space-related • RoomLink connects rooms in 2 households via high quality audio • Note and Picture Sharing • MessageBoard- a way for collocated individuals to share notes, photos etc on the same space

9. Feedback • RoomLink widely regarded as useful Appreciated sound quality • MessageBoard- valued for group coordination, artifact sharing abilities • In Touch – fun but not very practical • Presence Light- perceived as a privacy threat

10. Prototypes • Intentional Presence Light- share a user’s presence only when activated by user • Curtain /lampshade devices • Users choose icons to represent them • ScanBoard- similar to messageboard using existing technology • Post messages • Scan pictures • move/hide notes • Automatically updated through shared database

11. Prototypes-Results • IPL valued for Intentionality and aesthetics • ScanBoard valued for scanning and sharing • Both valued for Expressiveness and simplicity

12. Conclusions • Domestic domains are distinct from workplace environments, with different goals and priorities • Media space in homes will span a wide range • Social communication is a valuable research area • Let users express themselves, but keep it simple • Don’t make users feel obligated to keep in touch

13. Questions • Isn’t focus group data fundamentally flawed? • Most of these applications only work if other people you know had them also. How will that affect popularity? (curse of the videophone) • Are these applications appealing to men also? • What happens when things malfunction?

14. At Home with Ubiquitous Computing: Seven Challenges W. Keith Edwards and Rebecca E. Grinter Computer science laboratory, Xerox Palo Alto Research Center

15. Smart Homes • Definition: Domestic environments in which we are surrounded by interconnected technologies that are responsive to our presence and actions.

16. Aware Home Research Initiative (AHRI) • Interdisciplinary work at Georgia Tech • Uses both location-aware and context aware technologies • Challenges in both developing the technology and addressing privacy concerns

17. AwareHome Design for people: improve communication, create memory aids, home assistants- especially good for elderly and homebound Examples: Dude’s Magic Box Gesture Pendant

18. Seven Challenges • The Accidentally Smart Home • Impromptu Interoperability • No Systems Administrator • Designing for Domestic Use • Social Implications of Aware Home Technologies • Reliability • Inference in the Presence of Ambiguity

19. The Accidentally Smart Home • Existing homes do not have infrastructure in place • Technology will most likely be added piecemeal • Result: Unintended communication btw devices • How will people understand how to fix problems as they arise? • Design Challenge: Provide ways to help users understand the capabilities of the technology and how to control it

20. Impromptu Interoperability • The ability to interconnect without advance planning • How do we solve Issues with incompatible device/software? • Challenge: every device must be programmed to understand every device it may ever encounter or need to connect with • Standards may help devices connect with a class of devices but not every individual one • Need new models of connectivity (e.g. CoolTown, Speakeasy)

21. No Systems Administrator • Computers in home = users become system administrators • Home networks add increased workload and complexity to admin tasks • Challenge: don’t require “expert level” knowledge to use system • How can small devices provide rich interaction without sacrificing simplicity? • How do we design for remote diagnosis and support while preventing unwanted parties from using it?

22. Designing for Domestic Use • Vendors and users find it hard to predict in what context people will use technology • Most home devices “shared”, rules dictate use • Best technology are the most flexible • Smart technology will be disruptive in domestic environment • Challenge: Designing Technology that can adapt to domestic routines

23. Social Implications of Aware Home Technologies • Labor saving devices really labor-changing: reduce work time initially, but increases expectations • Good parenting- discussion of “values” regarding technology use can lead to broader debates( e.g. V chip) • Privacy issues

24. Reliability • Existing domestic technology very reliable • Different development culture- wary of bugs, hard to implement patches, upgrades • Different technological approaches – bulk of functionality placed on network, not device utility approach) • Different market expectations-appliances so reliable, not seen as complex systems • Different regulations- safety, service standards in place • Challenge: Achieving expected level of reliability – need adequate time and resources

25. Inference in the Presence of Ambiguity • Technology that assists/predicts human behavior, not well received • How smart does a smart home need to be to be useful and successful? • Machine inference- greater possibility of error • If inference is required, models of actions and preferences must be built • Challenge: Ensure ambiguity is not hidden from users or parts of system that need to access it • Inference needs to be predictable and recoverable

26. Conclusion • Homes not currently designed to be smart • Need a balance between reliability and Interoperability • Social impact of technology hard to predict • Big question: How smart does the smart home need to be? “Smartness” makes it disruptive to users, unpredictable

27. Questions • How will these technologies affect the “home as sanctuary” belief? • How expensive would these systems be to set up, even if they were built in to a new house? • Will there ever be enough demand to warrant standards in connectivity? • How will Smart homes change communication within families? • Because routines are so personal and unique, how do we design a system to adapt seamlessly?