Theme 5: Reflection

One, in my opinion, interesting aspect of research in the media technology field is that of a new technology’s application of usability by the public on a broad scale isn’t entirely determined by the producers/researchers, making it hard to predict the “correct” direction to go during the design process (unlike, for example in the field of medical research, where people tend to use products according to directions). Obviously this doesn’t necessarily apply to all cases, but it’s nevertheless a possibility.

Twitter is one example of what I mean. It was initially developed and launched primarily as a tool to let friends and family up to date of your thoughts and what is going on. Even early on there were internal disagreements whether the focus should be on the tweeting individual (i.e. “Drinking Coffee at Starbucks” and such) or on his/her surroundings (i.e. “There’s a fire at Starbucks on Central Station” and such). The Arab Spring, where Twitter was used as a channel for the protesters to make themselves heard, showed that it was much greater that both of the previously mentioned focuses. The hashtag was dismissed early on as too “geeky” for the average Twitter user, but can today be seen everywhere in social media. Companies have taken to this technology as a tool to strengthen their relationships with their customers and make the brand feel more alive (one of my favourite examples of this is Oreo’s tweet during Superbowl 2013, who during the infamous blackout tweeted a picture of an Oreo accompanied by a text saying “You can still dunk in the dark”).

Perhaps this uncertainty may be solved in the future with new design methods. The development in the design process started with participatory design, which integrated end-users into the prototyping phase at the end of the whole project. This later led to a user-centered design, where the user experience was in focus and the end-user’s participation was moved to earlier stages in the design process. Further down the road, service design emerged, which focused on how the product of the research would fit into the end-user’s life rather than on the isolated interaction with the said product. Finally, we have the human-centered design, which makes the switch to a societal view instead of an individual one when designing the product in question.

Or perhaps it’s something that can’t be solved thanks to the unpredictability that is human nature.