Poster to UbiComp 2006 submitted. It reports on a qualitative study of spatial uncertainty in the context of a pervasive game named CatchBob!
Illustration of the CatchBob! TabletPC interface.
Yesterday, I had a meeting with Narcis Pares, from the Interactive Communication Experimentation Group at the UPF. I know him from Anna Carreras, a PhD student at the UPF interested in educational uses of virtual reality and who worked on MEDIATE.
MEDIATE, a work by Narcis’ group, tries to tend a multi-sensorial bridge to the interaction of autistic children and the world surrounding them.
I presented CatchBob! and my research scope on spatial uncertainty in ubiquitous computing.
I had to define clearly what aspect of uncertainty I focus on. I made the difference between uncertainty due to miscommunications and technological limitations. Then defined the different sources of the spatial uncertainty in location-aware environments.
Narcis went on questioning the potential bias in my data. How much of the uncertainty is coming from the system and how much from the game. According to him, the game lacks of some basic rules. The boundaries of the game are not define in some cases, and the player does not know what to expect. Reactions should be matched with certain rules. That is if there are fuzzy zone, then the player should know about the fuzziness (get an impression of the cold spots). Catchbob! players are like footballers playing on a field without lines. I argumented that the real world is like that (mentioning example of taxi drivers and GPS). One way for him to get better data, would be to setup and experiment in which the uncertainty is controlled.
He told me to think about what is under the control of the system, the user and neither. Giving me the example of one of his experiment in which the system had to support both 3rd person and 1st person interaction. In the third person interaction, the sensors tracked the shadow of user without the user noticing. So the shadow is neither under the control of the system neither the user.
Finally, does CatchBob! provide physical support for a virtual game? (related to the questions on the potential bias)
A la demande de Bruno Marzloff, j’ai eu le plaisir de contribuer au Mobilités : la clé des villes, cahier de tendances dédié à la ville et à la mobilité proposé par JCDecaux.
“Mobilités : la clé des villes” illustre au travers d’exemples et d’expériences glanés partout dans le monde, les innovations de la ville et prend appui sur des témoignages d’experts référents : 14 penseurs et acteurs de la ville. Chercheurs, urbanistes, anthropologues, architectes, mais aussi entrepreneurs et responsables de collectivités locales ; chacun livre ses propres “clés des villes”, des contributions originales articulées autour de sept thématiques essentielles.
Smartspace interviewed Jed Rice, VP and Market Development at Skyhook Wireless. Jed evangelizes, the adoption and acceptance of Wi-Fi positioning. He presents his view on the key principals to make locative services are going to become a reality:
One, build on top of technology platforms that deliver a user’s location to within 20-50 meters 90%+ of the time. There is nothing worse to a user than being put in the middle of a river or lake. Two, develop applications that appeal to a broad user base (Note: Skyhook now provides an API to developers). [...]. Three, develop applications and services that operate on the most number of devices as possible [...]. Finally, develop applications that can – to the greatest extent possible – operate independently of third party constraints (e.g. buying additional hardware, requiring third party distribution/permission from entities like carriers) [...].
Relation to my thesis: I am particularly interested at Skyhook’s aim at creating consistent and accurate location information (principal #1) to support location-aware application. They advertise coverage in term % of time and not % of an area then talk about user’s need of location accuracy of 20-50 meters. Very relevant for their business targeting urban lifestyle (related to Indoors 95.5% of the Time). However, generating consistent and accurate location information might be more complicated than promoting coverage and accuracy values. Providers of location information could present their offer according to the location aware application developers and designers requirements:
I am also interested in the way Skyhook represent the data that come from a muli-modal location-determination. How to support the differences in quality and timeliness of location predicted by several source.
A participated to the Second Blogject Workshop organized by Nicolas Nova and Julian Bleecker at the EPFL. I led the “nabaztag” group. We presented the concept of a “spokespet” for blogjects. An ambient device moderating and intermediating between a user and his/her blogjects. Mark Meagher did a good job summarizing the concept and the workshop.
My fuzzy attempt to draw on the blackboard the early concept of the “spokespet”
Key concept I keep from this workshop are:
- recycling of data
- object dynamic ecosystem including human
- Avoid control or judgment, advise instead
Related to:
Blogjects in the World of Interconnected Things
The Internet of Things, Moving Beyond the Refrigerator
Relation to my thesis: Meeting great people. Thinking of “beyond the fridge” scenarios for the Internet of Things.
