Ants don't have friends: thoughts on socially intelligent agents

The question what is an agent? has been under dis cussion for many years. However, a consensus exists that the term 'agent' only makes sense in a multi-agent context - namely if there are at least two agents and assuming interaction and or communication between the agents. Agent research is generally done fairly independently in dfferent research areas, separated by the nature of the agents - natural or articial. This paper presents some thoughts on agency and sociality. Social intelligence is studied in the context of human style forms of social behaviour. Issues like embodiment, believability, rationality, social understanding,and different levels of social organisation and control are discussed

A cross‐faculty simulation model for authentic learning

This paper proposes a cross‐faculty simulation model for authentic learning that bridges the gap between short group‐based simulations within the classroom and longer individual placements in professional working contexts. Dissemination of the model is expected to widen the use of authentic learning approaches in higher education (HE). The model is based on a cross‐faculty project in which UK HE students acted as professional developers to produce prototype educational games for academic clients from other subject areas. Perceptions about the project were obtained from interviews with project participants. The stakeholders believed the cross‐faculty simulation to be a motivating learning experience, whilst identifying possible improvements. To evaluate whether the authenticity of the student–client relationship could be improved, the interview data were compared to four themes for authentic learning described by Rule in 2006. The data supported Rule’s themes, whilst highlighting the added value gained from meta‐awareness of the simulation as a learning opportunity

Choreographic and Somatic Approaches for the Development of Expressive Robotic Systems

As robotic systems are moved out of factory work cells into human-facing environments questions of choreography become central to their design, placement, and application. With a human viewer or counterpart present, a system will automatically be interpreted within context, style of movement, and form factor by human beings as animate elements of their environment. The interpretation by this human counterpart is critical to the success of the system's integration: knobs on the system need to make sense to a human counterpart; an artificial agent should have a way of notifying a human counterpart of a change in system state, possibly through motion profiles; and the motion of a human counterpart may have important contextual clues for task completion. Thus, professional choreographers, dance practitioners, and movement analysts are critical to research in robotics. They have design methods for movement that align with human audience perception, can identify simplified features of movement for human-robot interaction goals, and have detailed knowledge of the capacity of human movement. This article provides approaches employed by one research lab, specific impacts on technical and artistic projects within, and principles that may guide future such work. The background section reports on choreography, somatic perspectives, improvisation, the Laban/Bartenieff Movement System, and robotics. From this context methods including embodied exercises, writing prompts, and community building activities have been developed to facilitate interdisciplinary research. The results of this work is presented as an overview of a smattering of projects in areas like high-level motion planning, software development for rapid prototyping of movement, artistic output, and user studies that help understand how people interpret movement. Finally, guiding principles for other groups to adopt are posited.Comment: Under review at MDPI Arts Special Issue "The Machine as Artist (for the 21st Century)" http://www.mdpi.com/journal/arts/special_issues/Machine_Artis

Pushing the limits of design fiction:the case for fictional research papers

This paper considers how design fictions in the form of ‘imaginary abstracts’ can be extended into complete ‘fictional papers’. Imaginary abstracts are a type of design fiction that are usually included within the content of ‘real’ research papers, they comprise brief accounts of fictional problem frames, prototypes, user studies and findings. Design fiction abstracts have been proposed as a means to move beyond solutionism to explore the potential societal value and consequences of new HCI concepts. In this paper we contrast the properties of imaginary abstracts, with the properties of a published paper that presents fictional research, Game of Drones. Extending the notion of imaginary abstracts so that rather than including fictional abstracts within a ‘non-fiction’ research paper, Game of Drones is fiction from start to finish (except for the concluding paragraph where the fictional nature of the paper is revealed). In this paper we review the scope of design fiction in HCI research before contrasting the properties of imaginary abstracts with the properties of our example fictional research paper. We argue that there are clear merits and weaknesses to both approaches, but when used tactfully and carefully fictional research papers may further empower HCI’s burgeoning design discourse with compelling new methods

Game vaporware as design fictions

In this research we examine games, and games hardware, that can be classed as ‘Vaporware’. More specifically software that was never written, or hardware that was never built, and consequently no one ever played. In particular we are considering such vaporware as examples of ‘Design Fiction’ as they once represented speculative visions of the future based on emerging technology. Vaporware is a term generally used to describe products that are announced to the general public but are never actually manufactured. Whereas design fiction is a term used to describe plausible ‘diegetic prototypes’ that are built, or suggested, to create an opportunity for discourse about possible technological futures. Whilst it could be argued vaporware games are simply failed products that were justifiably scrapped before joining the long lists of come-to-nothing games and consoles, by reviewing examples we offer an alternative view that they can serve as objects of discourse for exposing the potential futures of video games and thus could be considered in terms of design fiction. To add further weight to the argument that games can be useful as design fictions we then consider “Game of Drones”, an example of a design fiction that pivots around a game element, to illustrate how the deliberate use of design fiction can stimulate discourse around game futures (in this case the growing promotion of ‘gamified’ services as means of engaging users). Whilst the notion of designing games that will never be built may seem paradoxical in relation to the Games industry’s predominantly commercial aims, we believe that the deliberate adoption of design fiction as a practice within game design would facilitate the emergence of meaningful discussions around future gaming without the frustrations induced by vaporware

On Making Good Games - Using Player Virtue Ethics and Gameplay Design Patterns to Identify Generally Desirable Gameplay Features

This paper uses a framework of player virtues to perform a theoretical exploration of what is required to make a game good. The choice of player virtues is based upon the view that games can be seen as implements, and that these are good if they support an intended use, and the intended use of games is to support people to be good players. A collection of gameplay design patterns, identified through their relation to the virtues, is presented to provide specific starting points for considering design options for this type of good games. 24 patterns are identified supporting the virtues, including RISK/REWARD, DYNAMIC ALLIANCES, GAME MASTERS, and PLAYER DECIDED RESULTS, as are 7 countering three or more virtues, including ANALYSIS PARALYSIS, EARLY ELIMINATION, and GRINDING. The paper concludes by identifying limitations of the approach as well as by showing how it can be applied using other views of what are preferable features in games

On Making Good Games - Using Player Virtue Ethics and Gameplay Design Patterns to Identify Generally Desirable Gameplay Features

This paper uses a framework of player virtues to perform a theoretical exploration of what is required to make a game good. The choice of player virtues is based upon the view that games can be seen as implements, and that these are good if they support an intended use, and the intended use of games is to support people to be good players. A collection of gameplay design patterns, identified through their relation to the virtues, is presented to provide specific starting points for considering design options for this type of good games. 24 patterns are identified supporting the virtues, including RISK/REWARD, DYNAMIC ALLIANCES, GAME MASTERS, and PLAYER DECIDED RESULTS, as are 7 countering three or more virtues, including ANALYSIS PARALYSIS, EARLY ELIMINATION, and GRINDING. The paper concludes by identifying limitations of the approach as well as by showing how it can be applied using other views of what are preferable features in games

Virtual Meeting Rooms: From Observation to Simulation

Much working time is spent in meetings and, as a consequence, meetings have become the subject of multidisciplinary research. Virtual Meeting Rooms (VMRs) are 3D virtual replicas of meeting rooms, where various modalities such as speech, gaze, distance, gestures and facial expressions can be controlled. This allows VMRs to be used to improve remote meeting participation, to visualize multimedia data and as an instrument for research into social interaction in meetings. This paper describes how these three uses can be realized in a VMR. We describe the process from observation through annotation to simulation and a model that describes the relations between the annotated features of verbal and non-verbal conversational behavior.\ud As an example of social perception research in the VMR, we describe an experiment to assess human observers’ accuracy for head orientation