In a slide by Steffen Waltz, I found a very nice list of place often referred to as game archetypes & rhetorical figures: Arena - Board / Stadium - Bridge - Castle - Cave - Caroussel - Cellar - Chamber - Church - Colosseum - Control room - Dungeon - Elevator - Factory - Forest - Fortress - Garage -...
Paper about ubiquitous computing examination in natural settings
Salembier, P., Kahn, J., Calvet, G., Zouinar, M. & Relieu, M.(2005). “Just follow me”. Examining the use of a multimodal mobile device in natural settings (.pdf). In Proceedings of the HCI International Conference, July 22-27, Las Vegas. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. This paper describes a method an...
Mobile learning is so mobile sometimes
Ran across this Mobile Learning Labs website. It's impressive! It is a "fully equipped Technology Learning Centre available for training whenever you need it, wherever you need it". Our mobile labs are completely self contained, with their own power, climate control and broadband access. Labs can b...
About independent research
I think I already mentioned here my interest towards independent researchers or non-institutional researchers (here or here). When it comes about this very topic, appears the needs for resources, as described by rashmi: in recent years, the internet has enabled the rise of a new type of internet en...
After-PLAN notes by Marc Tuters
Just skimmed through Marc Tuters's follow up to open plan. Marc gives a great summary of what has being said + some other comments about his chat with conference-goers; which is nice since it adds some stuff to the huge amount of material I gathered from there. I particularly agree with his take ab...
Self-service technologies, in which human interaction seems a relic of the past
A very relevant column in the International Herald Tribune about "self-service technologies", this recent trend in service consumption. It deals with the potential damage to customer relationships. Of course, the author mentions automated phone system which are often a pain ("nine out of 10 consume...
Douglas Coupland about meanings, patterns and combinations
I like this quote taken from "Miss Wyoming" by Douglas Coupland: "That's what Vanessa does for a living," Ryan said. "At RAND. She finds meanings and patterns. Combinations" "What's your speciality?" asked John. "Like Ryan said, I'm a finder" "A finder?" "Just what it sounds like. Ever since I was ...
Turn you cell phone into a portable scanner
According to NYT, researchers at Xerox Research Center Europe (located in Grenoble, France) are working on the means to transform the diminutive camera in your cellphone into a portable document scanner. "When we give it to test users, they appreciate it easily," said Christopher Dance, senior sci...
About ETH World
I recently discovered ETH World: is a strategic program to establish a virtual space for communication and cooperation independent of time and place. The program aims to make this space widely used and accessible to all stakeholders of ETH Zurich. ETH World supports all members of ETH in their core...
A phenomenon called pseudo-A.D.D.
A paper in the NYT about the ever-present and enticing potential distractions while seated at a computer. "It's so hard, because of the incredible possibilities we have that we've never had before, such as the Internet," said John Ratey, an associate professor at Harvard Medical School who speciali...