Candid Interaction: Revealing Hidden Mobile and Wearable Computing Activities

Barrett Ens, Tovi Grossman, Fraser Anderson, Justin Matejka, George Fitzmaurice

January 2015 · Proceedings of the 28th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software & Technology (UIST)

Abstract

The growth of mobile and wearable technologies has made it often difficult to understand what people in our surroundings are doing with their technology. In this paper, we introduce the concept of candid interaction: techniques for providing awareness about our mobile and wearable device usage to others in the vicinity. We motivate and ground this exploration through a survey on current attitudes toward device usage during interpersonal encounters. We then explore a design space for candid interaction through seven prototypes that leverage a wide range of technological enhancements, such as Augmented Reality, shape memory muscle wire, and wearable projection. Preliminary user feedback of our prototypes highlights the trade-offs between the benefits of sharing device activity and the need to protect user privacy.

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Figures

Figure 1. a) People often use mobile and wearable devices in the presence of others. b-e) We explore Candid Interaction through several prototypes for sharing device activity using a range of technolo

Figure 2. Relationship of candid interaction to other types of social interaction in dimensions of Reeves et al. [35].

Figure 3. Participant responses on difficulty of determining device activity. According to perceptions, difficulty is related to the size and visibility of the display.

Figure 4. Correlation between Likert Scale responses on how often participants use technology during interpersonal encounters and whether it is appropriate to do so. Colours represent responses on the

Figure 5. Likert Scale responses about how much information participants are willing to share in various contexts.

Figure 6. Design space for candid interaction.

Figure 7. Our homogeneous platform has a similar look and feel on the (a) smartphone, (b) smart watch, and (c) smart glasses. (d) Feedthrough sliders control the extent of information sent and receive

Figure 8. The candid interaction ecosystem links mobile and wearable devices to a laptop, which operates micorocontrollers and projectors in our prototypes.

Figure 9. Grounding Notifications show a user’s device activity on a (a) smartphone, (b) smartwatch, or smart glasses.

Figure 10. Lockscreen Stripes encode app usage history (a) into stripes displayed when a smartphone is laid at rest (b).

Figure 11. Semantic Focus. a, b) A physical knob controls the clarity of the projected image. c-f) The image gradually transitions from a blurred icon to a clear graphical display.

Figure 12. The Status Band apparatus (a) communicates device activity while the hand interacts with a device (b).

Figure 13. Light pattern representations of device events. Light colours match the associated app unless specified.

Figure 14. Iconic Jewellery reveals activity in an associated app (a) via motion. When the associated app is used, the jewellery moves from a relaxed (b) to contracted (c) state.

Figure 15. Proxemic AR augments the user’s image with their device activity on a smartphone (a-c) or smart glasses (d-f). Granularity increases as the observer moves from far (a, d) through intermedia

Figure 16. (a, b) The Fog Hat projects a graphical display above the device user’s head. (c, d) The content of the display can be further obfuscated by turbulence from a fan.

Figure 17. Perceived usability of each prototype. Participants were asked if they could easily use the method as an actor and whether they could interpret information as an observer.

BibTeX

@inproceedings{10.1145/2807442.2807449,
 abstract = {The growth of mobile and wearable technologies has made it often difficult to understand what people in our surroundings are doing with their technology. In this paper, we introduce the concept of candid interaction: techniques for providing awareness about our mobile and wearable device usage to others in the vicinity. We motivate and ground this exploration through a survey on current attitudes toward device usage during interpersonal encounters. We then explore a design space for candid interaction through seven prototypes that leverage a wide range of technological enhancements, such as Augmented Reality, shape memory muscle wire, and wearable projection. Preliminary user feedback of our prototypes highlights the trade-offs between the benefits of sharing device activity and the need to protect user privacy.},
 address = {New York, NY, USA},
 author = {Ens, Barrett and Grossman, Tovi and Anderson, Fraser and Matejka, Justin and Fitzmaurice, George},
 booktitle = {Proceedings of the 28th Annual ACM Symposium on User Interface Software &amp; Technology},
 doi = {10.1145/2807442.2807449},
 isbn = {9781450337793},
 keywords = {awareness, wearable devices, social acceptance, candid interaction},
 location = {Charlotte, NC, USA},
 numpages = {10},
 pages = {467–476},
 publisher = {Association for Computing Machinery},
 series = {UIST '15},
 title = {Candid Interaction: Revealing Hidden Mobile and Wearable Computing Activities},
 url = {https://doi.org/10.1145/2807442.2807449},
 year = {2015}
}