Public HMDs: Modeling and Understanding User Behavior Around Public Head-Mounted Displays

Head-Mounted Displays (HMDs) are becoming ubiquitous; we are starting to see them deployed in public for different purposes. Museums, car companies and travel agencies use HMDs to promote their products. As a result, situations arise where users use them in public without experts supervision. This leads to challenges and opportunities, many of which are experienced in public display installations. For example, similar to public displays, public HMDs struggle to attract the passer-by's attention, but benefit from the honeypot effect that draws attention to them. Also passersby might be hesitant to wear a public HMD, due to the fear that its owner might not approve, or due to the perceived need for a prior permission. In this work, we discuss how public HMDs can benefit from research in public displays. In particular, based on the results of an in-the-wild deployment of a public HMD, we propose an adaptation of the audience funnel flow model of public display users to fit the context of public HMD usage. We discuss how public HMDs bring in challenges and opportunities, and create novel research directions that are relevant to both researchers in HMDs and researchers in public displays

Wattsup? Motivating reductions in domestic energy consumption using social networks

This paper reports on the design, deployment and evaluation of “Wattsup”, an innovative application which displays live autonomously logged data from the Wattson energy monitor, allowing users to compare domestic energy consumption on Facebook. Discussions and sketches from a workshop with Facebook users were used to develop a final design implemented using the Facebook API. Wattson energy monitors and the Wattsup app were deployed and trialled in eight homes over an eighteen day period in two conditions. In the first condition participants could only access their personal energy data, whilst in the second they could access each others’ data to make comparisons. A significant reduction in energy was observed in the socially enabled condition. Comments on discussion boards and semi-structured interviews with the participants indicated that the element of competition helped motivate energy savings. The paper argues that socially-mediated banter and competition made for a more enjoyable user experience

Mixed Reality Architecture: a dynamic architectural topology

Architecture can be shown to structure patterns of co-presence and in turn to be structured itself by the rules and norms of the society present within it. This two-way relationship exists in a surprisingly stable framework, as fundamental changes to buildings are slow and costly. At the same time, change within organisations is increasingly rapid and buildings are used to accommodate some of that change. This adaptation can be supported by the use of telecommunication technologies, overcoming the need for co-presence during social interaction. However, often this results in a loss of accountability or ‘civic legibility’, as the link between physical location and social activity is broken. In response to these considerations, Mixed Reality Architecture (MRA) was developed. MRA links multiple physical spaces across a shared 3D virtual world. We report on the design of MRA, including the key concept of the Mixed Reality Architectural Cell, a novel architectural interface between architectural spaces that are remote to each other. An in-depth study lasting one year and involving six office-based MRACells, used video recordings, the analysis of event logs, diaries and an interview survey. This produced a series of ethnographic vignettes describing social interaction within MRA in detail. In this paper we concentrate on the topological properties of MRA. It can be shown that the dynamic topology of MRA and social interaction taking place within it are fundamentally intertwined. We discuss how topological adjacencies across virtual space change the integration of the architectural spaces that MRA is installed in. We further reflect on how the placement of MRA technology in different parts of an office space (deep or shallow) impacts on the nature of that particular space. Both the above can be shown to influence movement through the building and social interaction taking place within it. These findings are directly relevant to new buildings that need to be designed to accommodate organisational change in future but also to existing building stock that might be very hard to adapt. We are currently expanding the system to new sites and are planning changes to the infrastructure of MRA as well as its interactional interface

Dynamical evolution and chronology of the Hygiea asteroid family

The asteroid (10) Hygiea is the fourth largest asteroid of the Main Belt, by volume and mass, and it is the largest member of its own family. Previous works investigated the long-term effects of close encounters with (10) Hygiea of asteroids in the orbital region of the family, and analyzed the taxonomical and dynamical properties of members of this family. In this paper we apply the high-quality SDSS-MOC4 taxonomic scheme of DeMeo and Carry (2013) to members of the Hygiea family core and halo, we obtain an estimate of the minimum time and number of encounter necessary to obtain a $3\sigma$ (or 99.7%) compatible frequency distribution function of changes in proper $a$ caused by close encounters with (10) Hygiea, we study the behavior of asteroids near secular resonance configurations, in the presence and absence of the Yarkovsky force, and obtain a first estimate of the age of the family based on orbital diffusion by the Yarkovsky and YORP effects with two methods. The Hygiea family is at least 2 Byr old, with an estimated age of $T = 3200^{+380}_{-120}$ Myr and a relatively large initial ejection velocity field, according to the approach of Vokrouhlick\'{y} et al. (2006a, b). Surprisingly, we found that the family age can be shortened by $\simeq$ 25% if the dynamical mobility caused by close encounters with (10) Hygiea is also accounted for, which opens interesting new research lines for the dynamical evolution of families associated with massive bodies. In our taxonomical analysis of the Hygiea asteroid family, we also identified a new V-type candidate: the asteroid (177904) (2005 SV5). If confirmed, this could be the fourth V-type object ever to be identified in the outer main belt.Comment: 13 page, 15 figures, and 4 table

Participatory, Visible and Sustainable. Designing a Community Website for a Minority Group

This paper tackles three aspects of community-based technological initiatives aimed to support minority groups’ public expression and communication: participation, visibility and sustainability. Participation requires\ud the active involvement of the community members in various project phases (from design to evaluation), sharing decisional power with project leaders. Visibility\ud refers to the capacity of community messages to reach a relevant audience outside the boundaries of the community itself. Sustainability indicates the capacity of a project to continue, under the control and management of the local community, beyond its “supported” lifetime. The mutual influence of these three dimensions is examined in general and also in the light of a specific case study: an initiative involving a Romani community in rural Romania, having as main outcome the development of a community website (www.romanivoices.com/podoleni)

When the fingers do the talking: A study of group participation for different kinds of shareable surfaces

and other research outputs When the fingers do the talking: A study of group par-ticipation for different kinds of shareable surface

Dynamical evolution of the Cybele asteroids

The Cybele region, located between the 2J:-1A and 5J:-3A mean-motion resonances, is adjacent and exterior to the asteroid main belt. An increasing density of three-body resonances makes the region between the Cybele and Hilda populations dynamically unstable, so that the Cybele zone could be considered the last outpost of an extended main belt. The presence of binary asteroids with large primaries and small secondaries suggested that asteroid families should be found in this region, but only relatively recently the first dynamical groups were identified in this area. Among these, the Sylvia group has been proposed to be one of the oldest families in the extended main belt. In this work we identify families in the Cybele region in the context of the local dynamics and non-gravitational forces such as the Yarkovsky and stochastic YORP effects. We confirm the detection of the new Helga group at $\simeq$3.65~AU, that could extend the outer boundary of the Cybele region up to the 5J:-3A mean-motion resonance. We obtain age estimates for the four families, Sylvia, Huberta, Ulla and Helga, currently detectable in the Cybele region, using Monte Carlo methods that include the effects of stochastic YORP and variability of the Solar luminosity. The Sylvia family should be $T = 1220 \pm 40$ Myr old, with a possible older secondary solution. Any collisional Cybele group formed prior to the late heavy bombardment would have been most likely completely dispersed in the jumping Jupiter scenario of planetary migration.Comment: This paper has 13 pages, 14 figures, and 4 tables. Accepted for publication in MNRA

The influence of the ship's speed and distance to an arbitrarily shaped bank on bank effects

A displacement vessel obviously displaces a (large) amount of water. In open and deep navigation areas this water can travel almost without any restriction underneath and along the ship's hull. In restricted and shallow waterways, however, the displaced water is squeezed under and along the hull. These bathymetric restrictions result in increased velocities of the return flow along the hull. The resulting pressure distribution on the hull causes a combination of forces and moments on the vessel. If generated because of asymmetric flow due to the presence of a bank, this combination of forces and moment is known as bank effects. By far the most comprehensive and systematic experimental research program on bank effects has been carried out in the Towing Tank for Manoeuvres in Shallow Water (cooperation Flanders Hydraulics Research Ghent University) at Flanders Hydraulics Research (FHR) in Antwerp, Belgium. The obtained data set on bank effects consists of more than 14 000 unique model test setups. Different ship models have been tested in a broad range of draft to water depth ratios, forward speeds and propeller actions. The tests were carried out along several bank geometries at different lateral positions between the ship and the installed bank. The output consists of forces and moments on hull, rudder and propeller as well as vertical ship motions. An analysis of this extensive database has led to an increased insight into the parameters which are relevant for bank effects. Two important parameters are linked to the relative distance between ship and bank and the ship's forward speed. The relative position and distance between a ship and an arbitrarily shaped bank is ambiguous. Therefore a definition for a dimensionless distance to the bank will be introduced. In this way the properties of a random cross section are taken into account without exaggerating the bathymetry at a distance far away from the ship or without underestimating the bank shape at close proximity to the ship. The dimensionless velocity, named the Tuck number (Tu), considers the water depth and blockage, and is based on the velocity relative to the critical speed. The latter is dependent on the cross section (and thus the bank geometry) of the waterway