Semiotics without Phenomenology?

So I asked this in class, but I wanted to open it up on the forums.

“Can we do semiotics, can we talk about it, without using phenomenology to explain our understanding of the text?”

Jeff’s comment was that’s how they thought about it in the 60’s but they realized there was a missing piece is assuming the signifier connected directly to the signified in an obvious way. But we now know that way is not so obvious. Yet, I believe there were some people who maybe disagree and that there is a bit of separation. If that’s true, please let me know because I’m having an impossible time of separating the two ideas in my head. I feel like at this point semiotics is just a way of looking at phenomenology, you know: things as symbols or representation that connect meaning and message from a supplier to a receiver. Like how UPS delivers my birthday ( november 12th ) cookies from my mom to my house.

..jaMEs

Quadriplegic Elite WoW Player

Here is something you don’t see every day: a quadriplegic WoW player who’s among the elite (progression raiding is sort of the top of the food chain in WoW–it takes months if not years to get to the point where you can even start doing it; RL issues notwithstanding, this guy is good).

Besides its human interest and inspiration for all of us, this kind of computing at the extremes can be a very informative case study. Obviously, this is a great example of emergent uses of technology.

But from a phenomenological standpoint, it is really amazing how similar this player’s experience of WoW is to any other elite player’s. I mean, other than the physical mechanics of how he plays, he talks about raids like I do. That says something not just about him, but it also says something about WoW as a technological environment: it is able to create similar–and very successful–interactive experiences for an incredibly diverse base of users. And phenomenological theory can help us explore and articulate the characteristics of those felt experiences in rich ways.

10/GUI critique outline(updated)

My phenomenology account of critique is on this concept design called 10/GUI, reinvent desktop human-computer interaction design.

I found it interesting that there are already many critiques going on in the comment area, and someone even wrote a post to exclusively critique this concept. I think it would be better to write my own before taking a look at others’ critiques, which will be an interesting read.

This video contains both the design and design rationale. So I guess I am going to critique both, but focused on the design. I have so much to say about this proposed new interaction, but I feel I am not there yet. Just post this as a place holder and will come back later.

Here are the clusters I came up from watching the interaction and reading one of the comments regarding to the video. I am not sure if they are good clusters or not. You don’t have to look at the video to tell me that, so here they are,

with ten fingers rest on the pad, the design let me think of playing piano, and I did feel a sense of freedom of operation

but with further examination, I found this design asks a high requirement for the hand/fingers (branches listed below)
• full use of fingers, I cannot as eating as operating for some tasks (ignore the accessibility issue)
• the fingers have to be clean and dry, but my hands (and the commentator’s) are most of the time sweaty, so worried about the pointer “jump” issue
• it could not meet the gamer’s need,
• it is good at general target but bad at small/precise target
• since ten fingers are on the pad, there could possibly be unexpected use (i.e. different finger position, finger joints touch…).

Instead of free, the design restrict the hands (explain)
when use a mouse, the hands stay separate, the design throw the mouse away but also sacrifice the hands position. It bring two hands together in a restricted manner(and it doesn’t have to be that way), to feel naturally, I see “break” the pad while still keep the function would be a better choice.

These are some of the first clusters, and I have some more clusters regarding to the software solution. I know it is too much for now, but there must be some that are not good clusters,

Using ‘clickers’ as an interaction critique

Turning Technologies Student Response System

Evaluating the most effective and efficient ways technologies can be integrated into classrooms to promote learning is an essential responsibility of any instructional technologist designer. A relatively new technology I am particularly interested in is the Student Response Systems (aka clickers). As you may know, Indiana University ended the contract with the clicker company eInstruction on August 31, 2009 and started a new contract with Turning Technologies just last month. It seems that one of the main reasons for switching clicker providers was the integration of this technology with Oncourse, which means that professors now have the potential to easily grade participation and attendance of big groups through the click of a button.

For the phenomenological aspect of the critique, I am planning to use a similar approach to Kickasola about focusing on a feeling or emotion to explore the interaction design. I plan to use the feeling of “social inclusion” which is purportedly experienced by students using clickers, especially in big groups.

Unfortunately I do not have any experience using these devices and I was wondering if some of you might have already used them either as a professor or as a student. Even though I will particularly focus in the Turning Technologies brand to write the critique outline, I will greatly appreciate any ideas, insights or suggestions about any other phenomenological approaches that could be applied when using clickers of any brand.

By the way, now that I think about it, I’m not sure if my critique should be from the student’s point of view or the professors’ or both… hhhmmm

Activity theory and context

“Activity theory cautions us that any tool has the potential to transform the activity in which it is used and, reciprocally, that tools have the potential to be transformed as they are used.”  pg. 13

This made me start thinking in circles about how the context of something is constantly changing.  It makes it very difficult to ever truly understand a situation on top of the different lifeworld problem within design of never being able to understand something the exact same way as someone else understands it.  If the context is always changing, then it’s impossible to design for a context.  There is always  more to learn and more to understand.  No wonder design is so difficult and the strategy of working with the ultimate particular was developed.  At least at that level there is a smaller net of things to understand because the focus is narrow.

Then there’s the thought here of user interpretation.  If the context of design understanding is always changing based on an ever changing context, interpretation of the both the user and the designer is influenced by context, context is influenced by interpretation, and the addition of a new design causes new interpretations and new context… no wonder design = HARD; design = WICKED.

understanding things outside our lifeworlds

after class on Tuesday Ben and I were talking about an idea: what if a child was raised in a gravity-less world. they were never told about gravity. they never read about gravity. gravity does not exist in their life world. later in the boy’s life he is brought to Earth (with gravity enabled). what happens to the boy? Ben’s comment was “I think he will float away”.

i doubt he will float away, but how do we explain what will happen to him. or will he not even realize the effects. i remember reading somewhere that the native americans didn’t even see the ships coming because it was such a foreign object they weren’t able to process the ships were there until they were on the shore. could be a lie.

i guess my point is that we can all agree that the tiny specks on light in the sky are actually objects hurling through space at crazy speeds and are actually (for the most part) quite enormous in size. we’ve never seen that. and things like that do not exist in our life world.

does this phenomenon happen in design? i tried to think of an example of something like that that was created, but i feel like as designers we are restricted. can we actually design something that doesn’t exist in our life worlds? or are all designs somehow a continuation of something we already know and understand (like the radio -> cd player -> ipod)?

btw, i don’t know if you know this or not, but i love space…

..jaMEs

Is Link Involved in Activity Theory?

So I took a look at the activity theory reading for this week, and it’s figures were very reminiscent of something I’ve seen before: the triforce from The Legend of Zelda. There are three pieces of the triforce: the triforce of power (top), the triforce of wisdom (bottom left), and the triforce of courage (bottom right). Let’s compare this to the activity theory diagram, and let’s see what we can get and gain insights about this little exercise (I don’t know this in advance):

The top triangle in activity theory (paralleling the triforce of power): so the top triangle represents the relationship between the instruments, subject, and object. If this relationship were to mimic Zelda, then power comes through the relationships between these three aspects. Hmmm… by knowing these relationships, we are getting to know the people, and how they will become transformed by the object and the objects in their lives. OK… so how does the instrument come into play? Well, I guess by knowing what types of instruments are available to the designer to create the objects and the transformation of people, as that will affect what and how we can design. I guess that does create some sort of power, in the same sense power is used in the meta-analysis of this heuristic aid. It is the power to really know how you will change the people through what you design, possibly subjugating them, or freeing them.

The bottom left triangle (paralleling the triforce of wisdom): this triangle represents the relationships among subject, rules, and community. Well, wisdom to me is the utilization of prudence in crafting knowledge for others to be able to use at a later time. So… if we take a look at how rules affect people, we can be able to learn what type of world they live in. By knowing what type of world people live in, we can gain some insights on how their world is built and maybe what will happen if we change it. This will also help us to see how each subject fits into the community at large, and how rules play a part in the community, and also for the subject in that community. So far me, taking wise design decisions means that one studies these aspects of the people we are designing for, such that we don’t introduce any “planned” evils into their community, and also having a healthy knowledge of the rules they like to follow and live by. So I guess then being able to articulate activity theory in this light is kind of like the wisdom designers must be able to have in creating and executing on their designs.

And let’s take a look at the bottom right triangle (paralleling the triforce of courage): this relationship takes a look at the object made, the division of labor among people, and the community at large. As a designer, this area connotates to me to taking a look at how our design affects the system of the world at large. It is through the object that we create that we affect the world. Whether it is software or an artifact, this thing ends up changing how people work: from simply the people who have to build the thing, to seeing how that object potentially changes how much work each person in the workforce has to end up doing to get their job done (this can be for good or for bad) – and it also reminds me of the consequences of design Erik talks about. We need to be able to take the courage to live with our consequences of how this object will change how people will work (even play is considered work by some), and how this ends up affecting the community at large. Even something as “simple” as Photoshop has completely changed the amount of “courage” out there, as now it is a pre-req in order to do many things in the creative industry, which has transformed what objects that industry makes and whom can be involved in that industry as well. So I guess this analogy holds as well, which is epic, as I didn’t think this was going to semantically happen (just thought the lines would be the only thing that would hold).

So then this begs the question: was Link (and by Link, I mean the creators of The Legend of Zelda) knowledgeable on this topic when they were creating the triforce. Were the original makers of activity theory psychic enough to see the power behind this symbol to many gamers in life down the road. I guess the obvious answer is that this is a simple coincidence, but it would be cool if this had any impact whatsoever. And just like when all three parts come together, the goddesses of Zelda created the world and all of its people, design creates the world we end up living in when we put the triforces of activity theory together (after all, it’s just another tool we can use to help us design the world we live in). That’s some creative powers there!

I guess maybe a flip side of this is necessary, but I’m going to leave that open to the rest of the class.

Embodied Jet Force Gemini and RE4

Talking about game semiotics last thursday, along with the new readings on embodied interaction made me think of one of my favorite games ever, Jet Force Gemini. I’ll try and explain some of the tacit knowledge of being a gamer that semiotics has given me, along with trying to briefly being able to describe the embodiment I find in this game.

Quick Backstory

This game is about three space travelers who are fighting against the evil bug-robot Mizar. Our protagonists are Juno, Vela, and Lupus, and this game was originally on the N64. The story so far is that they have seen the evil Mizar enslave a happy set of bear-people, called the Tribals, into doing his evil bidding. The video here places the player at the first “level” of Vela, on the starship Sekhmet. The video also starts halfway through the level, as well.

The Tacit Knowledge

So here’s where the gamer and the tacit knowledge take part. The first room the video takes place in is a “safe room”, as there are no baddies. This is due to the fact there is someone the player has to talk to in order to get a key and some important weapon pickups in there. It’s also a plain square room that doesn’t feature that much else as well, which communicates that the room is just to be used quickly and just for the items (even though the player needs to come back here).

Then the player goes back through some small tunnels to get back to a large room (the tunnel’s purpose is just a connector, and some fighting occurs here). This large room was the scene of a lot of fighting, as the different walls in the room afford cover for the player and the baddies. This room also is a springboard to other areas of the level, but only if the player has the jetpack accumulated later in the game. This is communicated through the small tunnels at the very top and back of the screen, which tells the player: “haha – I’m here but you can’t get to me yet!”.

The next room affords a lot of information for not only the player, but the viewer. A ton of baddies come flying in from the top of the screen and from in front of the player. This speaks to the player that they need to enter first person mode and shoot them all. When this happens, the player moves the targeting crosshairs over the targets, which then make a sound every time. This indicates to the player that he/she is locked on to a target and can begin to fire. When the player successfully removes a target, the baddie makes a sound, whether it be an explosion or a death scream. This indicates to the player that he/she can move on. When all the baddies are removed, the door at the end opens (because it’s green, and the camera centers on it, and it has been a mechanic the player has gotten used to by now).

Once done, the player moves into the next area, which has a maze on top of the boiling lava. This immediately tells the player that not only a physical challenge is needed to traverse this lava, but also that there might be more trouble ahead, since there are almost always baddies in every room, unless the music changes or there is an NPC in the room. Once completed, the player moves in the next room, which has a walkway. This immediately connotates to the player that it is meant to be walked on and followed through the whole time to get to the next area, even though there are jumps to complete and elevators to use as well. Other cues in this puzzle are from Floyd, your robot friend, who alerts you to baddies in the area – he makes a sound and glows red (and is accompanied by red arrows on the side of the screen to tell you where the baddies are). All of these help to make the challenge easier.

Also, I didn’t mention that the elevators move up and down, which also tell the player you are meant to use them in that fashion. The tribals in this room on unreachable platforms also tell the player that he/she needs to come back with something that will make this area accessible. There is also the usage of a blue glowing corridor to help point out to the player where the goal to get to is. Without the color, it makes it a little harder to figure out where to go. The music also spurs the player on, since it is epic and awesome, that action is needed to keep the story and the action going, too.

Then there’s another small room again where the player has to destroy a lot of baddies to move on, but this time they move faster and shoot back a lot more, which tells the player that this type of challenge will have to involve accuracy and sidestepping/strafing. But the player also sees the cue that if this challenge is completed well, this is actually a rewarding encounter, as there is a lot of life (the pink gems) and ammo boxes around. The next areas also feature the same type of cues (long hallways full of baddies, and small rooms full of items and respite). These are the types of cues gamers can pick up on, and really utilize them in crafting an experience that will let them be a better player.

For me, this type of reading makes for me a full embodied interaction with the game, as not only am I literally in the game, but I am also reading it and making a conversation about it. I may be talking to the designers through the game, or with other people about the game, but I just really like how these things can truly “get me into the game”. And that’s the embodied experience I go for.

Epic Rant

Unlike the following:

This is the much hated and loathed Krauser fight in Resident Evil 4. (Start at around 2:20, and this is not the GameCube version that I know, but it’s still roughly the same game). Heidegger has finally given me the words I needed to explain why I hate this:

He argues that the mouse exists for us as an entity only because of the way in which it can become present-at-hand, and becomes equipment … only — through the way in which- it can be ready-to-hand.

Resident Evil 4 is a game through which all of the action looks like a cutscene. It is in letterbox, a long time cue to the player to take a break and enjoy the story. This game takes the opposite view, and makes all of the action only available through this type of view. The fight that you see is the hardest in the game, in my opinion, as the player is not only being exposed to story, but has to have lightning-fast reflexes to get through the 6 or 7 challenges to press buttons in order to survive and see the story (and also, why does a knife kill him instantly, but zombies can’t?). The point here is that the cutsene makes me think it is time to take a rest, the present at hand view of gaming that I have. But, no, they like to force me to realize the story IS the game, and then the game forces me to take it as ready to hand (hope i got that right). Anyway, the combination of being forced to do this challenge, while transforming the current notion of story as (instead of) being present at hand, where I can enjoy it, to something as ready-to-hand, where I have to confront it in a way that makes me really really really really really really angry. I will always try to skip by and pray I get through this part due to this type of change in the game and the style of gaming.

Looks like it’s time for another post to be done.

a quick thought on HCI design phenomenological-approach critique

Barnard mentioned in his book that when the designers are anonymous, besides approaches other than hermeneutics, reconstruction of intentions is required in order to understand in a hermeneutic way.

As for HCI design, it is often the case that too many people are involved in the process of design, or designers are anonymous.  Does it mean that when we do critique in a hermeneutic way, we need to often reconstruct the intentions, life-world and horizons of the designers like what we did to the French song in class?  If so, do you guys have any tips how to reconstruct this in terms of HCI design so that the reconstruction can be more helpful for critique?

Another quick question: are hermeneutics and phenomenology just two terms for the same thing? Are structuralism and semiotics the same thing?

“What The Foucault” series: Author

So I was trying to understand the works of Michel Foucault and came across one of his essays titled “What is an Author?” You can get the text here.

I think what Foucault has to say about the notion of an author is very important and is key to our class discussion about authors, architects, musicians, film directors, ciritcs and ultimately designers.

The Title:
Foucault did not make a grammatical mistake when he titled his essay as “What is an Author”. Rather it sets the tone for his entire discourse. He views the author not as a person but as an idea or a concept.