Tag: #interactiondesign

Event: World Interaction Day hosted by IxDA

Interaction Design Association (IxDA) celebrated World Interaction day on September 24, 2019. World Interaction Day is an annual event hosted at various locations around the globe where designers come together to show how interaction design improves the human condition. Presented in partnership with Adobe, the theme for this year was Trust and Responsibility. I attended this annual event hosted by IxDA in New York.

The event kicked off with an introduction by Scott Belsky, the Chief Product Officer at Adobe. He spoke about how good interactions build trust. As designers, we get to influence a crucial part of the user’s experience therefore when we design we need to take responsibility for the interface we create. Users trust the design. Whenever you click a button on a website you expect a result but when you don’t obtain what you expect, you feel deceived. People are more likely to determine the trustworthiness of a website based on its design than reading the website’s privacy policy. How likely are you to close a website because of the number of click baits on the home screen? Have you ever felt cheated when an ad doesn’t look like an ad? Belsky says that as designers our core obligation is to be the voice of the users. Designers should understand their users well especially their needs and concerns and create interfaces that fulfill these needs and concerns. 

Mark Webster the Director of Product at Adobe spoke about Trust and Responsibility in Voice Design. The adoption of voice technology in virtual assistants is rapidly growing, especially with the emergence of Alexa and Google Home. Most users of voice enhanced technology claim that voice improves their quality of life( 94%). Although more than half of them (around 49%) find using voice technology unintuitive. This reminded me of the last time I used Alexa and asked her to find the English equivalent of ‘dhania’ and she responded with “I don’t understand”. Did I not articulate enough or was she unable to find what I asked? Webster talked about how designers can play an important role in eliminating problems like these. Voice technology can improve the human lifestyle in many ways. It is an opportunity to allow illiterate people access information, it can help the aged and most of all help people with motor disabilities with their day-to-day activities. The only issue is because voice interaction is so unintuitive it results in uncertainty about all of these things. How is voice going to help people with motor disabilities if the user doesn’t know what the virtual assistant has understood? Voice processing works in three parts – The technology senses speech, the speech is processed according to the various algorithms(natural processing) and then and output is delivered. Current technology has been able to implement the first and last part pretty efficiently but ‘natural processing’ still has a lot of limitations. This is where the role of a designer would be crucial as the designer can understand these limitations, combined with the knowledge of the user’s intent, decide on how to make the experience more intuitive thus enable users to build trust with these technologies. 

What do we really mean when we say ethics? Dr. Molly Wright Steenson, Senior Associate Dean for Research in the College of Fine Arts at Carnegie Mellon University elaborates on how designers can incorporate ethics in their design process. Since designers are good at investigating the context of the problem and use human-centric methods to understand the needs of the users and stakeholders, they should be directly involved with data. Framing the design problem is not the only task of the designer but how and what data to collect and use is also a design question. Dr. Steenson emphasizes how the ethics framework should stop looking like a checklist and be a vital part of the product life cycle. This reminded me of the PERCS chart we read earlier which talked about the ethics of fieldwork which according to me can be applied to the design process. Even Costanza-Chock and Sasha’s reading Design Justice talks about how designers should warrant a more equitable distribution of the design’s benefits and burdens and be aware of the cultural and traditional implications of designs.

This talk was followed by Milena Pribic the Advisory Designer of Artificial Intelligence Design at IBM who addressed the issues of ethics in AI. She talked about what it means to build a healthy relationship between two people when one of them is AI. She defined a framework for AI ethics used at IBM that can be incorporated by designers while designing interactions for AI. Trust and transparency are important when it comes to designing for AI. She provides a guideline on how to handle client data and insights to ensure they are protected. They include: 

  • The purpose of AI is to augment human intelligence
  • Data and insights belong to their creator
  • New technology, including AI systems, must be transparent and explainable

The event concluded with questions from the audience regarding the topics discussed. This was an eye-opening event for me because I realized as a designer there are numerous factors I should consider when I create my design. Design is not just about solving a problem but also considering its impact. Am I protecting my client/user information? Am I being inclusive of the different communities affected by my design? Am I able to build trust with the users of my design? As a designer have I successfully addressed the needs as well as the concerns of my users? This event made me realize what my responsibility is as a designer and what measures I should take to ensure my designs are trustworthy. 

REFERENCES

  1. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, & Costanza-Chock, S. (2018, June 28). Design Justice: Towards an intersectional feminist framework for design theory and practice. Presented at the Design Research Society Conference 2018. https://doi.org/10.21606/drs.2018.679
  2. Pribić, M. (2018, September 6). Everyday Ethics for Artificial Intelligence. Retrieved October 15, 2019, from Medium website: https://medium.com/design-ibm/everyday-ethics-for-artificial-intelligence-75e173a9d8e8
  3. What We Really Mean When We Say “Ethics”—Molly Wright Steenson | Open Transcripts. (n.d.). Retrieved October 11, 2019, from http://opentranscripts.org/transcript/what-we-really-mean-when-we-say-ethics/
  4. How Good Interaction Design Builds Trust. (2019, September 18). Retrieved October 11, 2019, from Adobe Blog website: https://theblog.adobe.com/how-good-interaction-design-builds-trust/
  5. IBM’S Principles for Data Trust and Transparency. (2018, May 30). Retrieved October 15, 2019, from THINKPolicy website: https://www.ibm.com/blogs/policy/trust-principles/
  6. Voice Assistant Statistics & Trends, 2019—UX Survey. (2019, July 22). Retrieved October 11, 2019, from Adobe Blog website: https://theblog.adobe.com/voice-assistant-statistics-trends-2019

Posted on by Tinu Thomas 0

NYC Subway and Human Interaction

New York City’s Subway is one of the oldest and most efficient public transit systems that the world has seen. It started operating in the year 1904 and runs 24 hours on every day of the year. The Subway transit is also the most used metro system of the world, by a countless and diverse population. 

The Subway lines run through Manhattan and branch out into the boroughs of Brooklyn, Queens, and Bronx. It is a network of extensive structures and many junctions, of which I have made observation of one – Times Square 42nd Street/Port Authority Bus Terminal(PABT). 

This Subway station complex is located under PABT and Times Square at the intersection of 42nd Street, 7th and 8th avenues, and Broadway. Every train has a distinct color and number or alphabet associated with it. The 42nd Street Times Square station offers access to multiple lines. 

42ndTrainStation-trains

All the lines are bi-directional, running towards uptown and downtown. There are local lines which stop at every station, and there are express lines that make stops at fewer stations. Most lines, except a few, run 24 hours with higher frequency on weekdays.

NAVIGATION AND TECHNOLOGY 

The Subway system has a very well designed way-finding system which poses hardly any challenge to its users. It uses consistent visual language, universally accepted icons, and smart placement to make navigation through the enormous space easy. All signages are on non-reflective black surfaces with white legible sans serif text. The signages mark uptown and downtown trains with their specific icon. Use of icons and text together reinforces information, the “S” with “Shuttle” for instance. While the train icons are invariably placed on the right of the text, icons for ramps and wheelchairs go consistently on the left. 

A user’s initial point of contact with the Subway system’s technology is at the entrance where he finds a Metrocard vending machine. The machine accepts cash, debit or credit cards and is effortless with touch screen and comprehensible instructions. The system is quick and economical with $1 for the Metrocard itself, and preset values that the user can choose from to put charge on the card. Moving further the commuter enters the station through turnstiles which use a card reading technology. 

Metrocard-vending-machines

Throughout the Subway premises Customer Assistance Intercoms and Emergency Intercoms are easily accessible. The smart positioning of speakers allow system announcements to be audible all over, without any hindrance from the commotion. The station has Subway maps at frequent spots and Neighbourhood maps and entrances/exits. 

Maps-at-Subway-entrance-exit

Moreover, a recent addition of interactive touchscreens has augmented navigation. These all-in-one customer information devices allow one to select a destination station, in response to which the screens display possible routes with time estimates. Aside from information on train schedules these screens also offer recommendations for points of interest at select locations, information about escalators and elevators, outages and train delays, or if planned work is coming up. However, commuters don’t seem to use this technology as often. 

Interactive-screen-at-Subway-platform

All platforms have digital screens displaying ETA for their respective trains. 

Screen-displaying-trains-ETA
S

There are multiple apps designed specifically to aid Subway navigation, for example MTA Subway Time.

The 42nd Street Station, as all Subway stations, has several entry/exit points spanning across surrounding blocks with supplemental northwest, southwest, northeast and southeast corners, marked “NW”, “SW”, “NE” and “SE” respectively. There are two underground passageways to PABT allowing easy transfer to interstate buses.

CONVENIENCE AND EXPERIENCE

ATMs, convenience stores and trashcans are easy to locate. The subway is safe, and well monitored by surveillance cameras and police. Several posters advertising tv shows, web series and brands among other things, offer a sense of familiarity and make the experience less daunting. Also serving the same purpose are the artworks on the walls. Musical performances are a regular affair at the station, which also becomes a platform for artists to showcase and sell art. This makes the Subways less monotonous and more entertaining. Yellow strips at the edge of the platforms mark a safe distance from the rail tracks. These strips are embossed to prevent slipping. A set of benches are placed at the platforms for senior citizens and physically challenged.

Advertising-posters
Musical-performances
Artworks

An attempt to incorporate inclusive design has been made through the use of braille, ramps and elevators, but it fails to be efficient. 

inefficient-inclusive-design

ON THE TRAIN 

Every train’s icon, number/alphabet and route is visible on it. Red bulbs light up on both sides of the automatic doors when they are open. Many advertising posters on the insides of the trains offer comfort and interaction. There are poles and railings for standing commuters to hold onto. Newer trains have digital display of the trains route with current and next station highlighted, but the old trains only have a poster of the trains’ routes. To complement this, system announcements alert the passengers of the upcoming and current stations. There is priority seating for disabled and senior passengers. Clear instructions for events of emergency are displayed with assistance intercoms and emergency brakes.  

Posters-in-train

OBSTACLES AND SUGGESTIONS

The Subway system is extremely well planned and functional, and given its technological structure manned stations are barely needed. Although, a considerable number of users are not tech-savvy. There is a lost and found unit, but without relevant assistance chances of items being turned in are slim. There could be a dedicated station for a personnel within the premises for further help. Nonetheless, NYC Subway system is an exemplary public space design with minimum room for errors.

References:

NYC Subway 101
Posted on by agreya gandhi 0