Supporting Collaborative Privacy-Observant Information Sharing Using RFID-Tagged Objects

RFID technology provides an economically feasible means to embed computing and communication capabilities in numerous physical objects around us, thereby allowing anyone to effortlessly announce and expose varieties of information anywhere at any time. As the technology is increasingly used in everyday environments, there is a heightening tension in the design and shaping of social boundaries in the digitally enhanced real world. Our experiments of RFID-triggered information sharing have identified usability, deployment, and privacy issues of physically based information systems. We discuss awareness issues and cognitive costs in regulating RFID-triggered information flows and propose a framework for privacy-observant RFID applications. The proposed framework supports users' in situ privacy boundary control by allowing users to (1) see how their information is socially disclosed and viewed by others, (2) dynamically negotiate their privacy boundaries, and (3) automate certain information disclosure processes

Semantic discovery and reuse of business process patterns

Patterns currently play an important role in modern information systems (IS) development and their use has mainly been restricted to the design and implementation phases of the development lifecycle. Given the increasing significance of business modelling in IS development, patterns have the potential of providing a viable solution for promoting reusability of recurrent generalized models in the very early stages of development. As a statement of research-in-progress this paper focuses on business process patterns and proposes an initial methodological framework for the discovery and reuse of business process patterns within the IS development lifecycle. The framework borrows ideas from the domain engineering literature and proposes the use of semantics to drive both the discovery of patterns as well as their reuse

Digital Media in a Special Educational Needs Classroom: A Study

PhDThis thesis presents a series of design-led case studies concerned with the use of digital technology and the practice of interaction design for children within the context of UK special educational needs classrooms. It explores the use and development of accessible digital systems to support groups of students who have a range of special educational needs. Working with groups of mixed ability students has found to be the most typical situation for teaching in the participant schools and is a rich but underexplored area of concern for interaction design research. This thesis presents detailed accounts and grounded analysis of four embedded, design-led, case studies in two UK special needs schools. It makes three main contributions to the community of researchers, designers and educational practitioners who are concerned with the use of digital technology with children and more specifically working within the field of interaction design for children with special educational needs. These contributions are: A set of design guidelines developed through an analysis of the detailed and thorough accounts of four embedded design-led research projects in two special needs school in the UK. A discussion of the development of the research approach taken in this thesis. A set of design personas of teaching staff interaction designers are likely to encounter when working in a UK special needs schoolRCUK under the Digital Economy Doctoral Training Centre scheme

Aspects of product tracking systems in the supply network for caught seafood

Dissertation submitted to Molde University College - Specialized University in Logistics for the degree of Philosophiae Doctor (PhD

Creating traces, sharing insight : explorations in embodied cognition design

This investigation explores relations between 1) a theory of human cognition, called Embodied Cognition, 2) the design of interactive systems and 3) the practice of ‘creative group meetings’ (of which the so-called ‘brainstorm’ is perhaps the best-known example). The investigation is one of Research-through-Design (Overbeeke et al., 2006). This means that, together with students and external stakeholders, I designed two interactive prototypes. Both systems contain a ‘mix’ of both physical and digital forms. Both are designed to be tools in creative meeting sessions, or brainstorms. The tools are meant to form a natural, element in the physical meeting space. The function of these devices is to support the formation of shared insight: that is, the tools should support the process by which participants together, during the activity, get a better grip on the design challenge that they are faced with. Over a series of iterations I reflected on the design process and outcome, and investigated how users interacted with the prototypes

Playful interactions: A critical inquiry into interactive art and play

My practice-based doctoral research explores how I, as an artist, can create conditions and possibilities for playful interaction in and around interactive artworks. Using practice- based research methods four artworks were created, presented and examined in relation to my research questions concerning play. The three key research questions were:1] How do the properties and affordances of materials and technologies foster play and interactions?2] How can artists conceptualise physical participation and play in interactive artworks? 3] What kind of play takes place in and around interactive artwork?My inquiry focused on the development of a model for making playful and interactive artworks and the creation of a vocabulary of play, which demonstrates the different kinds of play initiated through my practice and research. The model provides alternative ways to think about the role of play within interactive art and consists of a series of tangible making gambits for eliciting playful interactions from the audience. The model will be useful for future interactive artists, as well as other fields concerned with the creation of playful experiences. Underpinning my process of creating playful experiences were methods of observation of the participants’ interactions, which were used in order to enable change and improvement of the artworks throughout the research process.I argue that by employing a sculptural approach to interactive art, using the visual arts tradition of working with the properties of materials and affordances of technology, an invitation to play was created. I propose that to focus on the material’s affordance, rather than on interactive systems, provides additional ways to create interactivity. I also suggest that by understanding technology as a sculptural and embodied material we can move the focus from the technology to what the art does and says. In this sculptural playful interactivity audience members are allowed and encouraged to touch and physical and immersive participation is invited. I explored the body as a particular mode of interaction that can bridge the divide between doing and looking in the gallery, developing theories of the playful body and how audiences connect through play. I argue that the combination of sculptural, captivating interfaces, where the artwork reacts reliably, enables the audience to develop play mastery and become fully engaged. These playful interactions invite people to be curious and seek to engage audiences into dialogue, thereby opening up the possibility for play. Play is an essential pre-condition for the emergence of possibilities and, as such, it is the flexible structure by which meaningful interaction can arise. These interactions are not about our relation to technology but rather about new ways of experiencing culture. In this context interactive art is part of a wider change in contemporary art, where artists are creating culture to be experienced rather than consumed

Geographic Citizen Science Design

Little did Isaac Newton, Charles Darwin and other ‘gentlemen scientists’ know, when they were making their scientific discoveries, that some centuries later they would inspire a new field of scientific practice and innovation, called citizen science. The current growth and availability of citizen science projects and relevant applications to support citizen involvement is massive; every citizen has an opportunity to become a scientist and contribute to a scientific discipline, without having any professional qualifications. With geographic interfaces being the common approach to support collection, analysis and dissemination of data contributed by participants, ‘geographic citizen science’ is being approached from different angles. Geographic Citizen Science Design takes an anthropological and Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) stance to provide the theoretical and methodological foundations to support the design, development and evaluation of citizen science projects and their user-friendly applications. Through a careful selection of case studies in the urban and non-urban contexts of the Global North and South, the chapters provide insights into the design and interaction barriers, as well as on the lessons learned from the engagement of a diverse set of participants; for example, literate and non-literate people with a range of technical skills, and with different cultural backgrounds. Looking at the field through the lenses of specific case studies, the book captures the current state of the art in research and development of geographic citizen science and provides critical insight to inform technological innovation and future research in this area

Privacy in location-based services

Während der letzten Jahre erfuhren mobile Geräte durch grössere Speicher, der Entwicklung schnellerer Prozessoren und höherer Übertragungsraten, um nur einige der wichtigsten Performanceparameter zu nennen, einen enormen Entwicklungsschub. Gleichzeitig sind die unterschiedlichen Positionierungssysteme mittlerweile ausgereift und klein genug, um in mobile Geräte verbaut werden zu können. Erst durch die Möglichkeit der Zusammenführung von solchen ausgereiften Positionierungs- mit existierenden Telekommunikationstechnologien kann die Basis für eine neue Generation kontextsensitiver Anwendungen und entsprechender Geschaeftsmodelle geschaffen werden. Abgesehen von den technischen Massnahmen die zum Schutz gegen Attacken, Verfaelschungen und Missbrauch sensitiver Daten eingesetzt werden, müssen diese auch allen rechtlichen Aspekten und Rahmenbedingungen von Telekommunikationssystemen entsprechen. In diesem Sinne muss das Ziel von Forschungen im Bereich neuer kontext-sensitiver Systeme und Anwendungen die mit Positionsdaten operieren der Schutz der Privatheit jedes einzelnen Nutzers sein. Diese Dissertation beginnt mit einer Diskussion über verschiedene Aspekte von Location-Based Systemen. Es werden weiters unterschiedliche Anforderungen aufgezeigt deren Erfüllung notwendig sind, um flexible Systeme anbieten zu können und die zudem den Schutz der Privatheit der Nutzer garantieren können. Der wohl wichtigste Beitrag dazu ist ein Mechanismus der auf dem Begriff des Pseudonyms basiert.Dieses Verfahren garantiert maximale Sicherheit und Schutz der Privatheit der Benutzer während der Nutzung von Diensten. Der zweite Beitrag der Dissertation ist eine Telekom Service Architektur die den erwähnten Pseudonym-basierten Mechanismus integriert. Durch Einbeziehen dedizierter Dienste von Telekommunikationsanbietern bildet diese Architektur die Basis für die Realisierung neuer Geschäftsmodelle und ermöglicht die Implementierung des pay-as-you-go Konzeptes. Dieses ermöglicht Kunden anonym mobile Dienste von Drittanbietern zu konsumieren, ähnlich dem anonymen Kauf von Gütern mit realem Geld. Schliesslich wird mit der Implementierung einer Service Platform sowohl die Funktionsweise des Pseudonym Mechanismus sowie die Interaktionen der in der System Architektur vorgesehenen Dienste und Komponenten die zur Realisierung von Location-Based Anwendungen benötigt werden demonstriert.During the last years the development of mobile devices has gained significant progress with respect to memory capabilities, advanced processing power and higher transfer rates to name only a few performance parameters. At the same time eclectic positioning and localization technologies are meanwhile mature enough to be integrated into mobile devices. Not until positioning, localization and telecommunication technologies can be combined, seamlessly the basis for the proliferation of a new generation of context-aware applications and business models can be build. In this respect, location and position information foster novel future context-awareapplications. But, if this information is in the wrong hands such applications may by the same token pose severe threat. Therefore, apart from technical means against attacks, forgery and misuse of sensitive user information the interaction of all these systems must comply with legal requirements that precisely prescribe all aspects of telecommunication systems. In this spirit, the main research ob jective addressed for the design of new context- aware and location-based systems must be the protection of the user’s privacy. This dissertation discusses first various aspects of location-based systems and out of it the various needs that have to be addressed to be able to provide flexible location-based services to mobile users by preserving privacy. The main contribution of this work is a mechanism that is based on the notion of pseudonyms. The use of this kind of pseudonyms provides maximum security and privacy for users during communication. The second contribution is a telecommunication service architecture that is tightly coupled with the pseudonym mechanism. It allows new business models to be applied by leveraging the use of some services of the telcos’ infrastructure. This service application further allows the implementation of the so called pay-as-you-go concept. This allows customers to anonymously consume mobile services that are offered by third party application providers similarly to buying physical goods with cash. Finally, we demonstrate the implementation of a service platform that allows us to illustrate the operation of the pseudonym mechanism and the interworking of the system architecture’s components that are tailored for the realization of location-based applications