PHD. PROJECT

Personal Affective Media Technologies
Theorizing the Emergent Digital Augmentation of Everyday Life

…what contemporary humans in the technological developed countries experience is obviously and saturatedly textured by technology. There are virtually no human activities today which not implicate technologies…
(Don Ihde, 1986)

Hypothesis:
The broad proliferation and the apparent ubiquity of information and communication technologies into everyday life settings, is a historical significant radicalization of the human-technology relation.

By attending to a cultural theoretical/phenomenological discussion and by establishing the notion of “affective media technologiesâ€Â� – Technologies that incorporate or facilitate the capturing, storing and sharing of everyday life experiences, the thesis offers a theoretical and critical in-depth discussion of the current interest in understanding the proliferated embedding of IT in everyday life settings, With special attention to how the ubiquitous computing paradigm and the proliferated use of mobile technology, in particular radicalize and challenge previous assumptions about why and how technology is employed by users. And the thesis aim at locating which new use motifs and use domains are emerging with mobile technologies.

Motivation
IT distinguish it self from other technological radicalizations or saturations, by both being the code, the technology and a media for its use domain. IT thus has, within a very short period of time, moved radically into the center of our everyday life. This has challenged the traditional notion of computers and IT, as transparent and discretely confined to work contexts, and makes the use- and design-ideals defined to ensure this traditional notion, subject of scrutiny.
Moreover this radicalization generally challenges the very role of technology in the life world of humans; it radicalizes the role and the values attributed to technology in general, and reforms the way technology is represented and appropriated beyond the traditional.
Hence the design of information technology is facing a new post-traditional design space, that is no longer aiming at fixed routines, but also design for the messy culture and social interactions.

The interrelation between Information technology and culture has radically become a centripetal process and has increasingly speeding up the transformation of culture. Therefore the traditional boundaries between the cultural spaces of everyday life and the technical domain are blurring as technology also is rapidly is becoming part of the experiences in everyday life – if not a platform for experiences as such.
Therefore it becomes important to critically locate and define the theoretical implications of these emerging new use domains, i.e. found in the context of the home and many facets of the public spaces. The thesis therefore involve it self in the elucidation of the affective and aesthetics properties in, with and around technology, and strive to define the emergent new use motifs such as dwelling, moving, resting, having fun, keeping close contact, surprising some one, sharing experiences across place and time etc. etc, arising together with the emerging technological possibilities.

Contribution:
By critical and analytically isolating and by theoretically discussing the notion of radicalization, the thesis will offer a defining concept of “affective media technologiesâ€Â� to understand in particular the radical and emerging use of mobile technologies, and consider closely the use of emerging information technology, in relation to affect, experience and aesthetics of everyday life – by drawing on a theoretical synthesis (to name a few..!) of phenomenology (Martin Heidegger, Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Paul Ricaeur), Late modern sociology (Anthony Giddens, Ulrich Beck, Scott Lash, Zygmunt Bauman), cultural theory (Henri Lefebvre, DeCerteu, Paul Willis,) philosophy of technology (Albert Borgmannn, Don Idhe, Mike Michaels) and cultural critical perspectives (Walter Benjamin, Roland Barthes, Paul virilio).

Particularly the thesis will contribute to understanding how the use of mobile technologies forms a radical “messy� use space for fahtic communication, perpetual contact, minute-to-minute life/time planning, instant messaging, social interaction etc. embed radically into the human space, getting closer to us. In short we see “affective� shaped domains more adhered to technology.

The contribution falls into 4 areas:

Theory building on technology and or as experience
The thesis sees itself as part of the theory building on how to understand human experience, affect and perception in relation to the role and the use of information technology in everyday life settings – and envisions drawing synthesis around the parallel discussions currently unfolding with in HCI, CSCW, interaction design and in New Media Studies.

Elucidate the notion of user experience
The thesis seeks to elucidate the current much-discussed notions of user experience, by going beyond the interfacial interactive paradigm, towards a notion experience of technology as asustained and persistent part of everyday life.

Motivation for a more reflective approach to use of technology in new domains
The thesis will serve also as a motivation for looking into to the vivid and often messy cultural domain of technology in the everyday life world. The thesis will do so, by drawing on a number of examples, pointing at a number new domains in where human technology relationships, is going beyond the traditional ends using technology, particular the thesis looks at how mobile technologies are radically changing material cultural settings of for instance young people.

Towards a Foundation of Technological Everyday life design theory
And finally, the thesis aim at discussing the challenges that arises with the expanding role of technology towards being a cultural and ever-present. And thereby defining new use motifs and design ideals that can inform a deeper understanding of the design space for ubiquitous and mobile technology in everyday life setting

Keywords and topics of interest:

ubiqtious computing, new media and digtial culture, aesthetics, user experience/affect, interaction and communication design, beyond usability, new topics and challenges where HCI meets Humanities

Publications/papers

2004


Introducing Excitability in Aesthetic Approaches to Human-Computer Interaction, workshop proceedings of the NordiChi 2004 Workshop, Tampere, Finland, October 24, 2004 Issn 0105-8517 (POSITION PAPER)

As We May Feel – Foundations for designing towards Excitability In Designer, User, Meaning Maker: Rethinking Relationships for a more Creative HCI, Proceedings of the 18th British HCIGroup Annual Conference Leeds Metropolitan University, UK 6-10 September 2004 (Forthcoming) (POSITION PAPER)



2003

Usability and beyond – the challenge of understanding aesthetics and affect in HCI, in proceedings of the Third Danish Human -Computer Interaction Research Symposium. (FULL PAPER)

Trust in the networked society – AOIR conference, Toronto, Canada, 1-3 November 2003 (FULL PAPER)

Understanding affective design in a late-modernity perspective – in ACM proceedings of the DPPI03 (Designing Pleasurable Products and Interfaces) conference, Pittsburgh 23-26 june 2003 (SHORT PAPER)



other publications

Det gennemtrængte menneske: en beskrivelse af den informationsteknologiske påvirkning af menneske og samfund under moderniteten Master thesis (2002) (THESIS)


Billedekrystallet og boldøjet, In: I billedet er alt muligt ed. by Bent Fausing og Eva Novrup Redvall, Tiderne Skifter (2000) (BOOK)

PhD Courses taken:


2006

Political communication in the media. Phd course funded by the research school for journalism, communication and the media. February 22-24rd 2006, copenhagen business school, Prof. Daniel Dayan, CNRS, Assoc. Prof. Lene Hansen, University of Copenhagen, Assoc. Prof. Lilie Chouliaraki, Copenhagen Business School

2005

Mundane Technologies: The Structures and Practice of Everyday Use, In co-operation with FMKJ Graduate School, IT University of Copenhagen, June 2-4. T.L. Taylor, Lucy Suchman and Nina Wakeford

2004


Media and Reality – A Nordic research course on latent and explicit use of the media concept in the humanities and in the social science. IT University of Copenhagen, 3 – 6 May 2004.

Qualitative Design and Method part I and II, 2-4 + 22 Marts 2004 LPF, Copenhagen Business School, professor Tomas Hellström, Finn Hansson, Professor Thomas Schwandt and professor Kurt Aagaard Nielsen


2003


Game Analysis Methodology, IT University of Copenhagen
3 December to 6 December, 2003 Espen Aarseth, Dr. Art.

Digital Aesthetics in Theory and Practice. The Danish Research School of Media, Communication and Journalism, Hotel Nyborg Strand. April 29. –may 2. 2003. Dr. Lev Manovich, Professor Lars Qvortrup.

Research projects involvment

The Ghost project: Delca
Mobile Content lab: MIL

Member of:


FMKJ research association: FMKJ
SIGCHI interaktiondesign i Danmark: SIGCHI

Supervision, teaching

Co-teaching Digital Aesthetics and Communication in fall 2003