PlayRightNow - Designing a media player experience for PlayNow arena

This paper discusses the process of designing a media player tailored for PlayNowTM arena with the purpose of enhancing the user experience of this media portal. The design process is divided into two main stages, the first consisting on gathering information to inform the design of a media player and the second stage involving a low-fidelity prototype of a media player. In the first stage, three main activities are carried out to inform the design of the interface: a literary review of relevant research and studies related to the way people use digital media and its effect on society; an evaluation of the interfaces and features offered by some of the existing popular media players in the market today from an interaction design point of view; and user observations and interviews on people’s relation to digital media. Based on the information and data collected from the first stage, an iterative process of design of interfaces was adapted, whereby potential users and design experts were consulted with their opinions and suggestions that influenced the sketching of various possible interfaces. Finally, a design of a media player for PlayNowTM arena is proposed, which is believed to have the potential of providing its users with a better experience in relation to digital content, as well as attracting new customers and increasing the revenue of this media portal

Multimedia Chinese Web Search Engines: A Survey

The objective of this paper is to explore the state of multimedia search functionality on major general and dedicated Web search engines in Chinese language. The authors studied: a) how many Chinese Web search engines presently make use of multimedia searching, and b) the type of multimedia search functionality available. Specifically, the following were examined: a) multimedia features - features allowing multimedia search; and b) extent of personalization - the extent to which a search engine Web site allows users to control multimedia search. Overall, Chinese Web search engines offer limited multimedia searching functionality. The significance of the study is based on two factors: a) little research has been conducted on Chinese Web search engines, and b) the instrument used in the study and the results obtained by this research could help users, Web designers, and Web search engine developers. By large, general Web search engines support more multimedia features than specialized one

The Communicating Home - Definition, Evaluation and Business Opportunities for TeliaSonera in a 3-5 years perspective

The communicating home concept has been defined by identifying the dominating communication technologies to/from and in the homes, the most important customer behavior and user needs, the dominating products and the dominating actors of the industry. The evaluation of the communicating home industry has been performed with a five forces framework analysis and theories regarding value migration and value structures of industries. It has been concluded that actors of communication technologies, goods and access services will compete fiercely. The barriers of entry will however be high. When it comes to content services the situation is completely different. These actors will, to the largest extent, meet lower competition and low barriers of entry. As a consequence a value migration from communication technologies, goods and access services to content services will occur. TeliaSonera is suggested to develop a content service portal. It should, in its first version, contain IPTV, music on demand, video on demand, data security, online storing and online gaming in the first place. The TeliaSonera group has the right prerequisites to implement and capitalize on a content service portal. In addition to the content service portal some other business opportunities have also been addressed in the business model

Is there a net generation coming to university?

This paper reports the first phase of an ESRC funded research project to investigate first year students' use of technology in relation to the idea of young people born after 1983 forming a distinct age cohort described variously as the Net generation or Digital Natives. The research took place in five English universities in the spring of 2008. The research found a far more complex picture than that suggested by the rhetoric with student use of new technologies varying between different universities and courses. Some of the more discussed new technologies such as blogs, wikis and virtual worlds were shown to be less used by students than might have been expected. The Net generation appears if anything to be a collection of minorities with a small number of technophobic students and larger numbers of others making use of new technologies but in ways that did not fully correspond with many of the expectations built into the Net generation and Digital Natives theses