Microblogs for HCI Remixed

Reference Information:
                 Title: HCI Remixed
                 Author: Thomas Erickson and David W. McDonald
                 Publisher: 2008, Massachusetts Institute of Technology


Chapter 1: My Vision Isn't My Vision: Making a Career Out of Getting Back to Where I Started


Summary: 
A music major in the 70's who had no intentions of using computers was introduced to a digital music machine made by the NRC. The machine was mainly a HCI project with technologically naive users in mind when the it was being designed. The author loved the design and idea and has been trying to get things back to how he started his career.

Discussion:
I think in this essay the author is indirectly saying things are more complicated than they need to be in our current time. The story in general though is cool because he had no intentions of doing anything with computers but was shown that pretty much no matter what you do as a career that computers can be involved. So, now he spends his time trying to get back to where he started, which is think is the simplicity of the music machine.

Chapter 4: Drawing on SketchPad: Reflections on Computer Science and HCI 

Summary:
Sutherland's paper about SketchPad helps answer the question "why should HCI belong in a computer science program?" Besides many of the technical aspects of SketchPad, it anticipated over fifty years ago many of the programming ideas that are still with us today. The Sutherland paper says that HCI belongs in computer science because "the needs of innovative interfaces drive forward the science of computing". There is still a lot of work that can be done with computing systems designed as tools for experts.

Discussion:
The SketchPad is a good general example on how HCI is related to computer science. We can relate to the SketchPad paper on most of the projects we take part in today. I feel all of the matters discussed are still very relevant.

Chapter 5: The Mouse, the Demo, and the Big Idea
Summary:
This paper was about Doug Englebart's oNLine System (NLS) demo video and it's impact. This demo is often described as the "mother of all demos". Engelbart's research was based on augmenting human intellect with the computer mouse. This demo showed that the state of the art today is not unlike the one Englebart described, we have display editing, view control, collaborative remote authoring tools, linking, and object addressing.

Discussion:
I feel that most of this paper was about the author being inspired from the demo of the mouse. It made him realize based on his experience at MIT how important it was. He said that a great demonstration is not hype, but proof.


Chapter 18: Observing Collaboration: Group-Centered
 
Summary:
This chapter was about collaborating in the work-place. Research was done to see the tenancies of people while working together under certain conditions. One case was using a whiteboard or using a table. Different things were observed for each case.  From this research we can figure out ways to make things more efficient.

Discussion:
This was an interesting chapter because it involved technology that promotes collaboration. I think it's very important in terms of efficiency. The last paragraph in the chapter sticks out to me because the author says human factors relevant to collaboration will have a long "shelf life" and will be useful for a long time because people's collaborative practices today are generally the same as they were seventeen years ago. 

Chapter 20: Taking Articulation Work Seriously
Summary:
This paper could be the emergence of computer supported cooperative work (CSCW) as an area of research. They defined CSCE as "an endeavor to understand the nature and requirements of cooperative work with the objective of designing computer based technologies for cooperative work environments". Mutual dependence among the people who need to cooperate  and work together is whats called 'articulation work'. All work is socially situated and involves interaction and coordination.

Discussion:
This chapter highlighted the existence of CSCW as a viable and important research area. This goes hand in hand with the last chapter I read describing how technology can help collaboration and be more efficient.

Chapter 23: Video, Toys, and Beyond Being There
 
Summary:
Computer-mediated communication is described as a crutches for communication and physical contact is described as the shoes, the shoes being what we are more used to. Many things however can be used as "shoes" and enhance human performance rather than mimic it. Computers play an important role in the human experience and our goal in computational design should be to enhance the human experience intellectually and emotionally.

Discussion:
This chapter had good real world examples to help understand better. Things like google allowed the professor to throw out broad concepts because he knew most of his students would google it and ask him questions. He also mentioned the Lily doll who played a big role in interaction between his mother and daughter. It enhanced the human experience greatly and that should be the goal of computational design.

Chapter 24: A Simulated Listening Typewrite: John Gould Plays Wizard of Oz

Summary:
When speech recognition was first being researched,, John Gould used "The Wizard of Oz" method to help evaluate new technology. The method was to use a hidden human that would manipulate a computer interface that was under evaluation to see how it worked out. This simulation is still used today but most studies draw conclusions after much less exposure time to subjects.

Discussion:
This was interesting to read about because it is still applied to day according this paper. This seemed like an effective way to start this research because maybe at the time of the method's creation  they didn't have the technology to efficiently test the computer interface.

Chapter 25: Seeing the Hole in Space

Summary:
 The hole in space is an art scuplture type experiment that was done in 1980 to the people walking by Lincoln Center in New York and those in Century City in Los Angelas. These people were projected in store-front windows using projectors. These people could see, hear, and speak with each other.   

Chapter 26: Edward Tufte's 1 + 1 = 3

Summary:
The 1 + 1 = 3 comes from Edward Tufte saying that if you draw 2 lines you get negative space between the lines which adds another factor. The author gives an example about elevator buttons that illustrate 1 + 1 = 3 and says that the third element added is that the user has to parse, understand, then choose a button. This isn't good and he gives a couple ways to fix it through design. The point was to show that design proplems can be full of presentation clutter that confuses and complicates interaction.


Discussion:
 Many designs today still lack what this article was talking about. I think it is totally true that a lot of design add extra, unseen factors that influence how we use certain things today that aren't necessary.

Chapter 27: Typographic Space: A Fusion of Design and Technology

Summary:
This research area started with a paper that describes a Typographic Space system which allowed the user to lay out text in a three dimensional area  and to apply other basic  typographic attributes.This system opened up many other possibilities.  A new research domain emerged called kinetic typography. This domain is typography with motion as a design variable. The paper goes on to discuss different things that could be successful conveyed through this kind of typography.

Chapter 28: Making Sense of Sense Making

Summary:
The paper being discussed challenges critical assumptions about the functions of computers. Two claims were made that are still relevant. The first is computers are mainly sued for passive storage of information but this type of information is not particularly useful. The second was computers aren't very good at the important process of making sense of the information that is encountered. The first claim is because to Kidd, information is only useful during the act of informing. The second claim about sense making is perceptual and spatial processes are crucial and  AI won't help. It is vital to address Kidd's main questions of how new information is processed and what is the value of stored information.

Chapter 34: Revisiting an Ethnocritical Approach to HCI: Verbal Privilege and Translation

Summary:
This paper is based on Arthur Krupat's book, Ethnocriticism: Ethnography, History, Literature. The author rights that the principles of multiculturalism, polyvocal, and heterogeneity to relate to his design methods and developing. He modified Krupat's approaches to better understand and develop questions to help him think through the diverse and troubling choices he faced as an HCI worker.