Mobile UDC: Online Media Content Distribution among Finnish Mobile Internet Users

Peer reviewe

The consumption of media contents through mobile devices in Finland

O campo dos media na Finlândia encontra-se num processo de mudanças aparentemente imparáveis, com os dispositivos móveis, tal como os smartphones e tablets, a influenciarem cada vez mais os padrões de produção e consumo de media. Nesta dissertação é defendido que esta situação é influenciada por factores históricos, sociais e culturais: desde os livros e jornais como meio de manter a língua finlandesa até aos benefícios da Segurança Social que permitiram que até as pessoas com menos rendimentos comprassem o jornal para se manterem a par dos desenvolvimentos do país, bem como a grande tradição de leitura que é associada aos finlandeses, assim como as condições que ao longo da história fazem fizeram com que os finlandeses sejam fascinados pelas novas tecnologias. Adicionalmente, presto especial atenção às estratégias que são adoptadas pelas cada vez mais convergentes companhias de media para enfrentarem a competição de elementos como os social media

Automatic Mobile Video Remixing and Collaborative Watching Systems

In the thesis, the implications of combining collaboration with automation for remix creation are analyzed. We first present a sensor-enhanced Automatic Video Remixing System (AVRS), which intelligently processes mobile videos in combination with mobile device sensor information. The sensor-enhanced AVRS system involves certain architectural choices, which meet the key system requirements (leverage user generated content, use sensor information, reduce end user burden), and user experience requirements. Architecture adaptations are required to improve certain key performance parameters. In addition, certain operating parameters need to be constrained, for real world deployment feasibility. Subsequently, sensor-less cloud based AVRS and low footprint sensorless AVRS approaches are presented. The three approaches exemplify the importance of operating parameter tradeoffs for system design. The approaches cover a wide spectrum, ranging from a multimodal multi-user client-server system (sensor-enhanced AVRS) to a mobile application which can automatically generate a multi-camera remix experience from a single video. Next, we present the findings from the four user studies involving 77 users related to automatic mobile video remixing. The goal was to validate selected system design goals, provide insights for additional features and identify the challenges and bottlenecks. Topics studied include the role of automation, the value of a video remix as an event memorabilia, the requirements for different types of events and the perceived user value from creating multi-camera remix from a single video. System design implications derived from the user studies are presented. Subsequently, sport summarization, which is a specific form of remix creation is analyzed. In particular, the role of content capture method is analyzed with two complementary approaches. The first approach performs saliency detection in casually captured mobile videos; in contrast, the second one creates multi-camera summaries from role based captured content. Furthermore, a method for interactive customization of summary is presented. Next, the discussion is extended to include the role of users’ situational context and the consumed content in facilitating collaborative watching experience. Mobile based collaborative watching architectures are described, which facilitate a common shared context between the participants. The concept of movable multimedia is introduced to highlight the multidevice environment of current day users. The thesis presents results which have been derived from end-to-end system prototypes tested in real world conditions and corroborated with extensive user impact evaluation

Framing the User Experience in Mobile Newsmaking with Smartphones

Mobile handheld devices are changing the practices of newsmaking, the roles of journalists and readers in it, and the published news in profound ways. The activity of mobile newsmaking aims at a tangible outcome, the news, which are consumed by an audience. Relatively little research exists in HCI (Human-Computer Interaction) that explores what is user experience of mobile systems in goal-oriented creative activity in organizational settings and especially in the natural contexts of use. This thesis addresses this gap by focusing on user experience, which arises when smartphones are used in mobile newsmaking to create and publish online and print news in the newspaper industry. This thesis has two main goals. First, it aims to gain a holistic understanding of user experience in mobile newsmaking with smartphones from the viewpoint of mobile reporters as users. Second, it explores how mobile and location-based assignments assigned by the newsroom can support cooperative newsmaking. This thesis contains nine scientific publications based on twelve case studies. The research approach of the studies is primarily qualitative. Seven of the studies included the usage of a mobile service client for newsmaking in the mobile context of use. Two of the twelve studies concentrated on reader participation in newsmaking as a form of mobile crowdsourcing. The rest of the studies focused on professional use. Over one hundred participants participated in the studies, of which a majority were students of visual journalism with prior work experience in journalism. The empirical findings are synthesized in the thesis summary. The model of user experience in mobile newsmaking with smartphones and the process model for mobile assignment-based processes summarize the thesis work on user experience and cooperative processes. User experience in mobile newsmaking is constructed in a process of using the mobile system in a goal-oriented and creative activity in the mobile context of use. The activity of mobile newsmaking consists of several subactivities starting from encountering a newsworthy event to the publishing of the news. It may include mobile reporter’s cooperation with others, who are in the field or in the newsroom. The constructed model of user experience has seven main components: user, system, the context of use, tangible outcome, descriptive attributes, overall evaluative judgments, and consequences. The model emphasizes the characteristics of the tangible outcome of system use (news material, news) as a fourth component that can contribute to user experience in addition to the characteristics of the user, system and the context of use. User’s experienced quality of the system is described by verbally expressible descriptive attributes divided to four components. The components of the descriptive attributes are the quality of the outcome (technical and content-based quality) and the perceived impacts (benefits and costs) that complement instrumental (pragmatic) and non-instrumental (hedonic) qualities from prior models of user experience. Ease-of-use, speed, light weight, small-size, unobtrusiveness, reliability, connectivity, controllability, being always along, and multifunctionality are key attributes for positive user experience. For users, pride of the outcome, fit with needs, motivations and goals, feeling of being in control, mastery of the system and activity, and the fit of the system to user’s role and situation are important. The process model for mobile assignment-based processes illustrates the coordination and cooperation related information and communication needs of the mobile reporter and the newsroom at differenct phases of newsmaking. The constructed models and synthesized results can aid academics and practitioners when designing, studying, and evaluating solutions for mobile work that can be complex, cooperative and creative and which aims at a perceivable or tangible outcome. They can also aid in recognizing the critical success factors of the solutions for different types of users and circumstances of the context of use. Further, results can aid when selecting and planning ICT solutions for media organizations and when planning the related editorial processes, workflows, and work roles. Finally, the constructed models can be used and validated in future research in other fields of mobile work and crowdsourcing

Immersive Journalism as Storytelling

"This book sets out cutting-edge new research and examines future prospects on 360-degree video, virtual reality (VR), and augmented reality (AR) in journalism, analyzing and discussing virtual world experiments from a range of perspectives. Featuring contributions from a diverse range of scholars, Immersive Journalism as Storytelling highlights both the opportunities and the challenges presented by this form of storytelling. The book discusses how immersive journalism has the potential to reach new audiences, change the way stories are told, and provide more interactivity within the news industry. Aside from generating deeper emotional reactions and global perspectives, the book demonstrates how it can also diversify and upskill the news industry. Further contributions address the challenges, examining how immersive storytelling calls for reassessing issues of journalism ethics and truthfulness, transparency, privacy, manipulation, and surveillance, and questioning what it means to cover reality when a story is told in virtual reality. Chapters are grounded in empirical data such as content analyses and expert interviews, alongside insightful case studies that discuss Euronews, Nonny de la Peña’s Project Syria, and The New York Times’ NYTVR application. This book is written for journalism teachers, educators, and students, as well as scholars, politicians, lawmakers, and citizens with an interest in emerging technologies for media practice.

Immersive Journalism as Storytelling

"This book sets out cutting-edge new research and examines future prospects on 360-degree video, virtual reality (VR), and augmented reality (AR) in journalism, analyzing and discussing virtual world experiments from a range of perspectives. Featuring contributions from a diverse range of scholars, Immersive Journalism as Storytelling highlights both the opportunities and the challenges presented by this form of storytelling. The book discusses how immersive journalism has the potential to reach new audiences, change the way stories are told, and provide more interactivity within the news industry. Aside from generating deeper emotional reactions and global perspectives, the book demonstrates how it can also diversify and upskill the news industry. Further contributions address the challenges, examining how immersive storytelling calls for reassessing issues of journalism ethics and truthfulness, transparency, privacy, manipulation, and surveillance, and questioning what it means to cover reality when a story is told in virtual reality. Chapters are grounded in empirical data such as content analyses and expert interviews, alongside insightful case studies that discuss Euronews, Nonny de la Peña’s Project Syria, and The New York Times’ NYTVR application. This book is written for journalism teachers, educators, and students, as well as scholars, politicians, lawmakers, and citizens with an interest in emerging technologies for media practice.

Immersive Journalism as Storytelling

This book sets out cutting-edge new research and examines future prospects on 360-degree video, virtual reality (VR), and augmented reality (AR) in journalism, analyzing and discussing virtual world experiments from a range of perspectives. Featuring contributions from a diverse range of scholars, Immersive Journalism as Storytelling highlights both the opportunities and the challenges presented by this form of storytelling. The book discusses how immersive journalism has the potential to reach new audiences, change the way stories are told, and provide more interactivity within the news industry. Aside from generating deeper emotional reactions and global perspectives, the book demonstrates how it can also diversify and upskill the news industry. Further contributions address the challenges, examining how immersive storytelling calls for reassessing issues of journalism ethics and truthfulness, transparency, privacy, manipulation, and surveillance, and questioning what it means to cover reality when a story is told in virtual reality. Chapters are grounded in empirical data such as content analyses and expert interviews alongside insightful case studies that discuss Euronews, Nonny de la Peña’s Project Syria, and The New York Times’ VR application NYTVR. This book is written for journalism teachers, educators, and students as well as scholars, politicians, lawmakers, and citizens with an interest in emerging technologies for media practice