Brunel University, School of Information Systems, Computing and Mathematics
Abstract
This thesis was submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy and awarded by Brunel University.Mobile technologies, such as mobile phones, smartphones and Palmtop computers,
are in an upwards trend and earliest models of such devices are already available to
end-users to communicate and access multimedia content on-the-move. As a logical
outcome of this development in mobile technologies and devices, content provider
companies have already started investing and piloting mobile multimedia content
distribution and broadcasting technologies. Nevertheless, no matter how cutting-edge
technology is and no matter how stylish the mobile devices are, the ultimate success
of wireless communication technologies and devices are directly associated with the
user adoption and embrace of these new equipment and technologies. In this perspective, since multimedia content, for mobile or not, is ultimately
produced for the education and/or enjoyment of viewers, the user's perspective
concerning the presentation quality is surely of equal importance as objective Quality
of Service (QoS) technical parameters, to defining distributed multimedia quality. In
order to comprehensively understand user experiences whilst accessing information
using mobile devices and technologies, we investigate user-mobile device interaction
and look into the surrounding issues in a uniform manner by combining multiple
aspects: user initial device experience (Out-of-Box Experience), mobile information
access in a real-world context, device impact on user information access and
perceptually tailored multimedia content impact on user information assimilation and
satisfaction. Accordingly, an extensive experimental investigation has been
undertaken to see how user experiences varied based on device familiarity, device
type, real-world context and variable locations. The findings has shown that the
overall perception, and effectively the user information access experience, is affected
and improved when multimedia content is tailored according to user device type and
context. Thus highlights that the future of mobile computing necessitates two-faceted
research, which should combine both a user as well as a technical perspective