Sunday and Monday Workshops

Marilyn Salzman,
Genomica

Leysia Palen,
University of Colorado

Richard Harper,
Digital World Research Centre

Mobile telephony adoption is on the rise and recent technological innovations have dramatically enhanced the capabilities of the wireless telephone. Leveraging the power of these new capabilities, various business sectors are working together to offer a wide array of services. Each sector is looking for the next "killer application," yet we are still learning about people's information and communication needs while "on the go."

The goal of this two-day workshop is to bring together an international group of 10-12 practitioners and researchers from various sectors of the mobile communications industry. We will discuss the following topic areas and, prior to the workshop, invite participants to identify specific issues that they feel are particularly relevant and timely.

• Mobile User Experience: What factors influence the user experience; how do various sectors (e.g., device designers, content developers, service providers) influence the user experience; how should we work together to improve it?
• Studying the Mobile User: What are some successful techniques for studying the mobile user?
• Adoption: What factors influence adoption of wireless communications; how do these vary internationally; how can we overcome barriers to adoption?
• Design: Based on the above, what principles and heuristics we can derive for good mobile communications design?

Applicants should submit a 2-4 page position paper including a short biography and experiences with respect to these topics. Position papers should be submitted as PDF files. Criteria for selection will include the quality of the paper and originality of the position represented therein, depth of experience in the field, and area of expertise.

Contact
Send position paper to: Leysia Palen: Leysia.Palen@colorado.edu.

Charles Wiecha,
IBM TJ Watson Research Center

Pedro Szekely,
University of Southern California

Application and user interface designers face new "variety challenges" in developing, implementing, and evolving high performance solutions:

• a variety of users
• a variety of devices and channels
• a variety of roles, tasks, and functions

Many designers have begun to address these dimensions of variety through the use of transform tools such as the extensible style language (XSLT) of the web. They are addressing issues of multiple devices, navigation styles, geographic locales, and personal preferences through multiple and sequential XSLT transforms.

While this model is attractive in principle, little work has been done to understand how it is desirable and feasible to factor application and user interface design. Specific questions we plan to address are:

• Is the approach to interface design through chaining multiple transforms attractive to developers, designers, and managers?
• Is a "fixed" set of transforms desirable as a standard approach to interface design?
• What is an interesting initial set of transforms that should be prototyped and developed?
• Can the performance, security, and maintenance of this approach to interface design be made acceptable?

Both technical and policy-oriented participants (12-15 people) are invited to this two-day workshop. Technical participants will be selected based on the extent to which they demonstrate specific experience with approaches to interface design through transforms, and on the diversity of the transforms proposed. Policy-oriented participants will be selected based on the extent to which they address how transforms may impact issues such as Universal Usability and the Digital Divide.

Contact
Send position papers to Charles Wiecha: wiecha@us.ibm.com

Tom Carey,
University of Waterloo

Karel Vredenberg,
IBM Canada

Jim Bizzochi,
Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Interactive multimedia narratives can include a variety of genres, such as stories which recreate an experience, case studies which summarize 'lessons learned', and video vignettes of personal reflections. The various genres may support different models for the knowledge sharing and community development through which knowledge takes root and grows. They also provide a range of interactions for learner support and require differing approaches to learner-centred design.

The goal of this two-day workshop is to explore the 3-dimensional space mapped out by the genres of multimedia narrative, the role interactive narrative can play in knowledge communities, and the potential for interactivity to support learning and knowledge exchange.

Our workshop plan includes an analysis of existing or proposed interactive narratives, to clarify their position in this 3-dimensional space and the nature of the relations amongst these dimensions. We will draft a research agenda to link the work of researchers from various disciplinary perspectives and to serve the needs of practitioners from different knowledge communities.

Workshop participants (maximum of 16) will represent a mix of disciplinary backgrounds, including both researchers and practitioners in interaction design, knowledge management, multimedia storytelling, and learner support systems.

Your 2-4 page position paper could include a summary of your experience and perspective, an outline of critical research issues from your perspective, and suggestions for possible interactive narrative experiences which could be shared and analyzed in the workshop.

Contact
Send position papers to Karel Vredenberg: karel@ca.ibm.com

Anind K. Dey,
Georgia Institute of Technology

Peter Ljungstrand,
Interactive Institute

Albrecht Schmidt,
University of Karlsruhe

As computer interfaces merge with environments and virtually become invisible, new concepts for human-computer interaction must be developed. Instead of a single screen-based user interface (UI), humans will interact with many devices that are distributed and interconnected, and thus the design space for these UIs becomes much larger than with conventional computers. We aim to develop an understanding of how distributed and disappearing UIs in ubiquitous computing can be designed and created, and also to consider the impact they will have on everyday life.

The workshop will focus on how to:

• Reliably gather, model, and take advantage of situational context
• Appropriately choose among available output options
• Attract someone's attention without disturbing others
• Address conflicting user goals in multi-user scenarios
• Describe and model widgets in such systems
• Handle system breakdowns

We will also address privacy, design, aesthetics and expressions, trying to grasp the possible social impact of such systems. We hope to bring together researchers and practitioners who are concerned with design, development, and implementation of novel interfaces for mobile devices and environment-based appliances, as well as social issues emerging from their use. Participants will be selected based on their submissions, either a position paper (2 pages) describing their interest and experience in the field, or an extended abstract (5 pages) describing ongoing research. We expect participants to search for a common understanding of user interfaces in ubiquitous computing and we aim to define a research agenda.

Contact
Send position papers to: disUI@teco.edu.
Workshop webpage: www.teco.edu/chi2001ws/
Email: albrecht@teco.uni-karlsruhe.de

Shelly Farnham,
Microsoft Research

Marc A. Smith,
Microsoft Research

Jennifer Preece,
University of Maryland, Baltimore County

Amy Bruckman,
Georgia Institute of Technology

Douglas Schuler,
Evergreen State College

Researchers take a broad range of approaches in studying social cyberspaces, and each approach has its own theoretical underpinnings, goals, methods, advantages, and disadvantages. We intend to bring researchers from various backgrounds together, document the range of variation in this interdisciplinary area, and build connections among these practitioners. Using a survey instrument, this workshop will create a resource catalog (distributed through the web) that can be used by others in this field to guide them through the range of approaches in current use. Particular attention will be paid to the advantages and disadvantages of the different methodological approaches researchers take to understand, develop and enhance specific research topics.

Topics may include: methodological issues, ethics, the relationship between research and development, the relationship between the real world and cyberspace, identity, privacy, social support and empathy, trust and reputation, representations of space, online learning, social advocacy, and so forth.

Researchers from a variety of disciplines are invited to participate, including human factors engineers, psychologists, sociologists, political scientists, and community activists.

Contact
To apply for the workshop, please complete the workshop application at: www.research.microsoft.com/
~shellyf/workshop.asp
For information contact: Shelly Farnham: shellyf@microsoft.com or Marc Smith: masmith@microsoft.com

Ivan Poupyrev,
Sony CSL

Michael J. Lyons,
ATR MIC Labs

Sidney Fels,
University of British Columbia

Tina Blaine (Bean),
CMU

The rapid evolution of electronics, digital media, advanced materials, and other technologies, is opening up unprecedented opportunities for musical interface inventors and designers. The possibilities afforded by these technologies carry with them the challenges of a complex and often confusing array of choices for musical composers and performers. New musical technologies have prompted the explosion of new musical forms, some of which are controversial and challenge traditional definitions of music. Alternative musical controllers, currently the leading edge of the ongoing dialogue between technology and musical culture, involve many of the issues covered by CHI conferences.

This workshop will explore the impact of new interface technologies on all aspects of musical expression and exploration. We plan to bring interface experts together with musicians involved in the development and use of new musical interfaces, especially alternative controllers. In addition to identifying major issues involved in the interplay between technological change and changes in musical culture, we will focus on practical concerns involved in the design of effective interfaces which are worthy of the dedication and practice that mastery of a new instrument demands.

The workshop will consist of a highly interactive two day forum to encourage dialogue and sharing of the collective experience and wisdom of each of the participants. Participants should be either involved in research in new musical interface technology or using these technologies in musical performance or composition.

We will aim to achieve a balance of viewpoints and backgrounds in the selection of participants.

Contact
Send position papers to Michael J. Lyons: mlyons@mic.atr.co.jp