1.
- "a seen but unnoticed feature of everyday life"
- Ethnography is considered a ubiquitous feature of everyday life. It is something you would regularly do througout life, but never notice, or think of as unordinary.
2.
i. Can You See Me Now
- Can You See Me Now is a uniquitous game in which online players, logged on over the internet, are chased by a virtual model of a city by professional performers.
- Online players can communicate through text messaging, while performers can communicate using walkie-talkies.
- Performers were equipped with handheld computers, GPS receivers and Wifi to help catch them
- It was not easy to record and monitor everything that was happening because the participants were extremely mobile and were not close together.
ii. Savannah
- Savannah is an educational game in which children learn about the ecology of the African savannha, specifically about the behaviour of lions
- Groups of children role play being lions and exploring a virtual savannah that appears to be overlaid on an empty school playing field
- The children are given handheld computers with WiFi networking and GPS location sensing.
- The children could move around the terrain, and discover the resources that lions would need to survive.
- Camera's were set up to monitor what was happening, but the screens of the handheld computers were not visible
iii. Treasure
- Treasure is a team and location based, mobile game played by 4 people over a small area
- The game exploits the use of a 802.11 wireless network, and encourages players to learn about and the boundaries of there ability to communicate with a server.
- Coins are dropped on a map around the outside of a network, and players must carry GPS enabled handheld computers to the points indicated on the map to retrieve the coins, then carry them into an area of wireless network coverage and upload them to a server to receive points.
- Within the network coverage opposing players can steal coins that have been picked-up but not uploaded
3.
ii. Savannah
- Since Savannah was kept within certain ranges of space and time, it was possible to capture video to most of the experience. Each camera followed one player and always kept them in shot.
- Wireless microphones were used to record conversations with other players
- System logs of all game actions were captured at a central server.
- Afterwards a dedicated game replay interface was developed, which enabled an analyst to view the system logs in a range of ways. Complete game status information was displayed for all players.
- These replays were used to support a 'fine-grained' analysis of GPS sensing and location based interaction
4. For my assignment I am studying the problems people have with the interactive turnstiles and the 'cashless system' at the Ricoh Arena, for football matches.
- Methods discussed that could be used would be, having cameras to show what people are doing and what problems they are having.
- Wireless microphones, incase there is any helpful sounds tha could be used
- GPS sensors in the cards(season tickets) to sense things such as, how long it takes to get through the turnstiles, or whether the cashless system does in fact reduce queueing.
- The main problem with this would be the cost. Installing camera's in each and every turnstile would be very expenisve, and there could be other problems such as vandalism. It would be much cheaper and effecient to have stewards monitor what was happening.
- Another problem with is that people don't like being watched. If they know they are being recorded or watched, it can make them change there actions and this could make it harder to learn about the problems people have.
- GPS sensors would also be hard to deploy, expensive and it is hard to tell how succesful it would be because there would be a lot of active users, in a small confined space.
