The Light-touch Japanese Experience
Japan has never had SMS, as DoCoMo was intelligent enough to see the similarity between email and shorter text messages early on. However, it does have a seperate type of e-mail it seems, which blurs the line a bit. Most Japanese will have two email addresses. One for their computer (i.e. gmail or hotmail) and one for their phone, and frequently they don't check the computer one often. My pre-paid phone has two options when you send a mail "sky mail" and "long mail". The first is similar to SMS. It has a 128 character limit and can include smileys. I think it is cheap or free to send these short messages to other japan mobile addresses. This is what most friends use to chat, gossip and meet up. This only works for other japanese mobile phones I think. There is also the option of long mail, where you plug in a normal e-mail address and have the full length options. This is more expensive, but not prohibitvely so.
Now, to get on with the topic of light-touch communications: the idea behind it is subtle ways of interacting with the user which convey information to them without distractng them much. Many devices induce high cognitive load and use many of the perceptual facilities of the user when they interact with the user. An example is a mobile phone ringing, which requires you to pull it out, look at who is calling and then engage in conversation - which can be impossible while trying to get on a bus or other complex situations. Light-touch is about supporting multi-tasking, being peripheral, and designing for politeness. The user ideally would be informed without really realising they were paying attention to the interface.
So why is this relevant? Light-touch systems are hard to design, and hard to evaluate without working prototypes. And it just so happens that my mobile email system in Japan is a form of light touch communication. All of my e-mail forwards from my gmail account to my phone. Since it is often required to have a silent phone here, I just leave it in "manner mode". When new mail arrives, it just buzzes in my pocket. But, for some reason about half the emails I receive show only the sender, but not the content (an error is occurring). My guess is that they are html formatted, or too long, and are being rejected by the Vodafone service. This results in me being aware of who wants to communicate with me, and about what topic, but not the content.
What this boils down to in terms of a mobile experience is interesting. I am travelling, and have basically been alone for 3 weeks in a very foreign environment where I don't speak the language. Having a soft buzz in the pocket whenever a friend or discussion list has mailed me is a bit comforting. It gives me an excuse to check my phone and feel connected to my home culture. It also provides a form of mail pre-processing. I can't always read the content of the messages (sometimes it is cut off after a few lines) but I still have an idea of what people have contacted me about. I can tell what is spam, what is critical and if good friends have sent a note. I gain the ability to judge the urgency of making it to an internet cafe. If my advisor has mailed me about a paper we are preparing for a conference, then I know I need to make it to a cafe in the next day. If only spam and discussion lists have arrived, then its not a priority.
This interface isn't as peripheral as I would like. The buzz for the incoming mail and the buzz for an incoming call are too similar, and I have missed a few incoming calls this way. More could be done with haptic feedback to indicate what kind of communication, and who has contacted you. Also, something in the way of a watch based display, or a ring, would work well for giving a rough idea of incoming messages, without having to drag the phone out of your pocket. The nice thing about this type of awareness is that it typically happens when you're in dead time such as sitting on a train (or if not then you ignore it until you are.) Thus you haven't wasted any critical time staying informed about your social and professional networks.
Now, to get on with the topic of light-touch communications: the idea behind it is subtle ways of interacting with the user which convey information to them without distractng them much. Many devices induce high cognitive load and use many of the perceptual facilities of the user when they interact with the user. An example is a mobile phone ringing, which requires you to pull it out, look at who is calling and then engage in conversation - which can be impossible while trying to get on a bus or other complex situations. Light-touch is about supporting multi-tasking, being peripheral, and designing for politeness. The user ideally would be informed without really realising they were paying attention to the interface.
So why is this relevant? Light-touch systems are hard to design, and hard to evaluate without working prototypes. And it just so happens that my mobile email system in Japan is a form of light touch communication. All of my e-mail forwards from my gmail account to my phone. Since it is often required to have a silent phone here, I just leave it in "manner mode". When new mail arrives, it just buzzes in my pocket. But, for some reason about half the emails I receive show only the sender, but not the content (an error is occurring). My guess is that they are html formatted, or too long, and are being rejected by the Vodafone service. This results in me being aware of who wants to communicate with me, and about what topic, but not the content.
What this boils down to in terms of a mobile experience is interesting. I am travelling, and have basically been alone for 3 weeks in a very foreign environment where I don't speak the language. Having a soft buzz in the pocket whenever a friend or discussion list has mailed me is a bit comforting. It gives me an excuse to check my phone and feel connected to my home culture. It also provides a form of mail pre-processing. I can't always read the content of the messages (sometimes it is cut off after a few lines) but I still have an idea of what people have contacted me about. I can tell what is spam, what is critical and if good friends have sent a note. I gain the ability to judge the urgency of making it to an internet cafe. If my advisor has mailed me about a paper we are preparing for a conference, then I know I need to make it to a cafe in the next day. If only spam and discussion lists have arrived, then its not a priority.
This interface isn't as peripheral as I would like. The buzz for the incoming mail and the buzz for an incoming call are too similar, and I have missed a few incoming calls this way. More could be done with haptic feedback to indicate what kind of communication, and who has contacted you. Also, something in the way of a watch based display, or a ring, would work well for giving a rough idea of incoming messages, without having to drag the phone out of your pocket. The nice thing about this type of awareness is that it typically happens when you're in dead time such as sitting on a train (or if not then you ignore it until you are.) Thus you haven't wasted any critical time staying informed about your social and professional networks.
posted by axup at 12:33 AM
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