Revisiting “Hole in the Wall” Computing

Robinson, Simon; Pearson, Jennifer; Ahire, Shashank; Ahirwar, Rini; Bhikne, Bhakti; Maravi, Nimish; Jones, Matt

doi:10.1145/3173574.3174072

Cited by 30 publications

(8 citation statements)

References 38 publications

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“…The inertia and selective nonuse of the Looking up Technology-in-Practice by women observed in our study expands on earlier studies that have Facilities,e.g. highlighted the privacy implications of voice user interfaces in public spaces (Robinson et al 2018;Easwara Moorthy and Vu 2015). What we find is the complex interaction between users' choices and preferences, social and cultural norms of behaviour as well as a layered understanding of space of use.…”

Section: Looking Upmentioning

confidence: 77%

“…Furthermore, the potential for voice technologies to support inclusion is complicated by both digital literacy in general as well as issues of space and privacy (Easwara Moorthy and Vu 2015). Robinson et al (2018) has deployed an early-stage conversational speech probe in public space in a Mumbai slum. Their study brings out some interesting findings.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Understanding Technology as Situated Practice: Everyday use of Voice User Interfaces Among Diverse Groups of Users in Urban India

2020

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As smartphones have become ubiquitous across urban India, voice user interfaces (VUIs) are increasingly becoming part of diverse groups of users' daily experiences. These technologies are now generally accessible as a result of improvements in mobile Internet access, [-8.5pc]Biography is Required. Please provide. introduction of low-cost smartphones and the ongoing process of their localisation into Indian languages. However, when people engage with technologies in their everyday lives, they not only enact the material attributes of the artifact but also draw on their skills, social positions, prior experience and societal norms and expectations to make use of the artifact. Drawing on Orlikowski's analytical framework of "technologies-in-practice" we engage in an interview-based exploratory study among diverse groups of users in urban India to understand use of VUIs as situated practice. We identify three technologies-in-practice emerging through enactment of VUIs on users' smartphones: looking up, learning and leisure. We argue that -instead of asking why and how users appropriate VUIs -identifying different kinds of enactments of VUIs present researchers and practitioners with a more nuanced understanding of existing and potential use of VUIs across varied contexts.

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Section: Looking Upmentioning

confidence: 77%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Understanding Technology as Situated Practice: Everyday use of Voice User Interfaces Among Diverse Groups of Users in Urban India

2020

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“…More recently, advances in AI, natural language processing (NLP) and conversational agents (CA) have created new technological possibility to (dis)solve the problem of Dēvanāgarī input and search for emergent users. In previous work, we reported on design workshops and technology walks in Dharavi, where residents identified opportunities for providing smart speaker services in public areas [30]. Deploying a simple Wizard-of-Oz probe that allowed passers-by to ask and receive answers to Hindi and Marathi language questions, the research demonstrated the value of experimenting with publicly accessible smart speakers, which in turn promote awareness and community learning about speech interaction.…”

Section: Voice User Interfaces In Resource-constrained Settingsmentioning

confidence: 96%

“…For the studies described here, as in our prior work, we chose to deploy and longitudinally evaluate prototypes in Dharavi, precisely because its residents have been engaged in envisaging how public speech-based systems could be useful in their contexts, and have already experimented with prototype devices of different capability and fidelity (e.g., [26,30]). We are of course conscious of comments that "HCI might have become too concerned with use in new places at the very time when a revolutionary technology is altering the basis of computing" [17].…”

Section: Design Processmentioning

confidence: 99%

An Honest Conversation: Transparently Combining Machine and Human Speech Assistance in Public Spaces

Reitmaier

Robinson

Pearson

et al. 2020

Proceedings of the 2020 CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems

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There is widespread concern over the ways speech assistant providers currently use humans to listen to users' queries without their knowledge. We report two iterations of the Talk-Back smart speaker, which transparently combines machine and human assistance. In the first, we created a prototype to investigate whether people would choose to forward their questions to a human answerer if the machine was unable to help. Longitudinal deployment revealed that most users would do so when given the explicit choice. In the second iteration we extended the prototype to draw upon spoken answers from previous deployments, combining machine efficiency with human richness. Deployment of this second iteration shows that this corpus can help provide relevant, human-created instant responses. We distil lessons learned for those developing conversational agents or other AI-infused systems about how to appropriately enlist human-in-the-loop information services to benefit users, task workers and system performance.

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“…It should be noted that the other scenarios also stimulated prototypes and deployments (not reported here) with evidence of their value to users and communities. For example, the Audioliser led us to consider the use of speech systems in public settings [33,36]; and, a Google Physical Web trial emerged from the Shopping Beacon scenario [34]. Figure 8 shows the further stages in the continued development, evaluation, refinement and deployment of the Safety Pod scenario.…”

Section: Completing the Cyclementioning

confidence: 99%

Diversifying Future-Making Through Itinerative Design

Pearson

Robinson

Reitmaier

et al. 2019

ACM Trans. Comput.-Hum. Interact.

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Designed in California" is a brand statement used by high-tech manufacturers to denote provenance and cachet of digital innovation and modernity. In this article we explore philosophically alternate design perspectives to those this statement embodies, reporting and reflecting on a long-term multi-sited project that seeks to diversify future-making by engaging communities of "emergent" users in "developing" regions. We argue that digital technologies are typically created with a design lens firmly focused on "first world" populations, assuming a base set of cultural norms, resource availabilities and technological experience levels that do not strongly align with those of emergent users. We discuss and argue for inclusive technology design methods, present our approach, and detail indicative results and case studies as an example of the potential of these perspectives in uncovering radical innovations. Distilling findings and lessons learned, we present a methodology-itinerative design-that pivots between emergent user communities across multiple regions, driving digital innovation through the periphery of mainstream design's current remit. CCS Concepts: • Human-centered computing → HCI design and evaluation methods; User studies; Interaction paradigms; Ubiquitous and mobile computing design and evaluation methods.

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Revisiting “Hole in the Wall” Computing

Cited by 30 publications

References 38 publications

Understanding Technology as Situated Practice: Everyday use of Voice User Interfaces Among Diverse Groups of Users in Urban India

Understanding Technology as Situated Practice: Everyday use of Voice User Interfaces Among Diverse Groups of Users in Urban India

An Honest Conversation: Transparently Combining Machine and Human Speech Assistance in Public Spaces

Diversifying Future-Making Through Itinerative Design

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