Kate's Final Project, Spring 2011

[kate2011finalproject]

Nixle

This is interesting. I don't think the technology is all that interesting, but I like hearing about people's responses to it.

[kate2011finalproject]

the Guardian Project

Last week, Tap pointed out to us an organization that's focusing on developing apps that make cell phones running Android more secure - they're designed to help activists and journalists but could be used for anyone who's concerned about the privacy and security of cell phones.

A variety of tools are being developed - secure chat, remote wipes, firewalls among others. Check them out!

[kate2011finalproject]

While doing research on Oakland neighborhoods, I found an article from a couple of years ago about the tensions between police and youth. It's a fascinating piece, focusing on the young men's perspectives and stories.

Part 1

Part 2

[kate2011finalproject]

Congrats!

Youth Radio wins a Peabody Award for its coverage for Trafficked - congrats everyone!

[kate2011finalproject]

Cell phone search without a warrant

An idea that we've been throwing around is an app that responds to a recent Californian ruling that allows police to search the cell phones of people who are arrested - even without a warrant. Apparently, they've decided that defendants lose their rights to privacy for any items that they're carrying when they've been taken into custody.

The ruling applies to any data stored on the phone - photos, web and search history, data stored in apps, voicemail, address book, text messages, location history etc.

However, if your phone is locked, the police can't compel you to unlock the phone - they can ask you, but you don't have to comply.

How many people know their rights with regard to this new ruling? And what implications will it have? I'm looking forward to seeing this law challenged.

Read the ruling here.

[kate2011finalproject]

Back in February, Laura asked for my picture and to write a few sentences about why I was involved with Youth Radio. I knew that they had put it all the pictures together, but I hadn't seen the final result until I stumbled across it tonight.

Take a look at it! (and at the rest of the Mobile App Lab blog as well)

[kate2011finalproject]

Getting ready for our session last week at Youth Radio, I spotted this on their Twitter feed - it's great to know that they're looking forward to meeting with us and figuring out what we're going to do!

[kate2011finalproject]

FearSquare

Interesting new service: Fearsquare. UK only, unfortunately, or I'd have to go try it out right now. 

It takes your Foursquare checkin data and cross references it with a crime statistics database to tell you your "FearPoints". This is a research study to see how this kind of personalized data could change user behavior, but it's an interesting approach, reminiscent of "PleaseRobMe".

Read more about it here.

[kate2011finalproject]

Some controversial apps in the Apple App Store are getting attention from some US Senators because they aren't happy that there's an app that encourages people to avoid DUI checkpoints.

I'm not sure what the exact guidelines are but last year, Apple revised its review guidelines and clearly stated that they would not accept apps that "encourage excessive consumption of alcohol or illegal substances, or encourage minors to consume alcohol or smoke cigarettes." 

We'll try to avoid that!

read more about it here.

[kate2011finalproject]

Later this week, we’re going to interview 3-4 students as a group so I suppose it’s more of a focus group. I should have developed the interview guide this weekend, but I guess it’ll happen later today.

However, we won’t be able to ask any questions about crime, so I’m trying to figure out what kind of questions to ask that will help us out. The reason that we can’t ask any questions about crime is that, for the first time, we’ll be interviewing youths who are not directly involved with this project. And not only that, but they’re all currently within the criminal justice system.

I’ve got some concerns, to put it mildly. This will be very interesting.

[kate2011finalproject]

Stop and Search is an Android app that was developed by a couple of students in the UK that's designed to help people after they've been stopped by the police. The instructions are picture based and allow users to follow a checklist to know that the correct procedure was followed by the police.

I first came upon on it when we were doing research on what other related apps were out there. The app was developed through a program called Apps for Good in the Center for Digital Inclusion, a non-profit organization.

I'm not entirely sure how it happened, but Youth Radio has gotten in touch with them, and we're scheduling a meeting to talk about the app and how it's been received and used! I just worked on a few questions for them, and I'm really looking forward to hearing their answers.

[kate2011finalproject]

ok, I admit it. I'm a terrible procrastinator. I know that I need to transcribe another couple of interviews - but I just haven't started yet.

My foot pedal has been great - it's just that I'm on Spring Break, I've only had one cup of tea, and the sun is out for the first time in what feels like forever! I much prefer to go for a hike in the Oakland hills, but since I know that I can't...

Anyway, I've been reading the internets before I start transcribing (didn't I already tell you that I was a terrible procrastinator?!), and I found this interesting site via Everyday UX that might come in handy for us later on: Android Patterns. I know that there are a few design pattern libraries out there and since I'm an iPhone user, I'll need to spend some time getting more familiar with them.

Ok, my procrastination is over; off to start working!

[kate2011finalproject]

Decision Making

These articles don't involve our project, but I found them fascinating. They're about decision making and how people give value to an item, depending on the context. The repercussions of how that item is placed within a contest is huge.

There are three articles on this subject - The Power of Comparison: How It Affects Decision Making, The Nature of Choice Sets and Their Effect on Decision Making, and How Anchoring, Ordering, Framing, and Loss Aversion Affect Decision Making.

One of the examples that I found most intriguing was from The Nature of Choice Sets and Their Effect on Decision Making:

"We’ve seen how people avoid comparing things that are not easy to compare and like to compare things that are easy to compare. But what happens when you present very similar options to people? How do they decide between them?

Let’s look at a research study that examined two different scenarios in which doctors made choices regarding how to handle a particular medical condition. In the first scenario, they could choose either to take the patient directly to surgery or prescribe medication X as a precursor to surgery. Results showed that 72% of the doctors opted to prescribe the medication prior to sending the patient to surgery.

In the second scenario, doctors still had the option to send the patient directly to surgery, but they could also choose between two equally effective medications—X and Y—as a precursor to surgery. What did they do? You might want to brace yourself for the answer. Most of them elected to prescribe neither medication, but instead, to send the patient directly to surgery. [2] In many ways, this behavior seems counterintuitive. After all, if both medications were equally effective, there was no downside to prescribing either one of them.However, it’s important to understand people’s typical rationale in this type of situation. When people have two options that are equally attractive, they feel conflicted, because there is no compelling reason to choose one option over the other. Choosing between two options that are essentially equal makes it very difficult to justify a decision. Neither option is clearly superior to the other. So given another, more clearly differentiated option, they’ll choose it—just to avoid the conflict inherent in having to choose between two options that are too similar. As you’ve seen in our example, the doctors opted simply to send the patient to surgery."

[kate2011finalproject]

George and I didn't make it to Youth Radio today, but we knew that they were going to keep busy by doing interviews on their own. I'm looking forward to discovering what they found out!

Meanwhile, it's St Patrick's Day, and I'm going to go celebrate a friend's birthday and have a beer or two...

[kate2011finalproject]

Subject-Matter Experts

The interviews that we did last week were with subject-matter experts. So, of course, this week, I find an interesting article about interviewing subject-matter experts. I found this quote to be applicable in trying to describe why we were interviewing these people:

"Expert interviews are very common and, typically, the simplest way to understand your user population at a more intimate level when you need design input. Expert interviews are extremely valuable because they present an opportunity for you to ask targeted questions regarding users’ routines, needs, desires, and struggles. Such interviews typically include behavioral routines and subjective feedback on currently available solutions versus new design ideas. The downfall of this approach is that it involves self-reporting. What people say is not always what they do. We have a saying at our office: “behavior never lies.” Expert interviews do not let you evaluate behavior."

And finally, to remember later on in the project: 

"Finally, be objective, and take what SMEs tell you—whether verbally or nonverbally—very seriously. We’ve found that, when people get married to their ideas or design concepts, they stop listening to their SMEs. It is important to give structure to your meetings and SME evaluations by defining how SMEs can contribute to product design. We’ve found it’s very helpful to establish these guidelines right away, at the very beginning of a project—as well as to re-evaluate them a few days later. The process of gathering and applying expert feedback is iterative and, although it can be tiring at times, the final product will be better for it."

[kate2011finalproject]

So, knowing that I have a bunch of transcribing coming up, I decided to splurge and bought myself a foot pedal. I've been doing a lot of transcription over the past couple of months, and while I actually enjoy it, it does take an awful amount of time. I thought that if this helped me - even a little - it would be totally worth it. 

It arrived today! I need to set it up and start transcribing my first interview. I'm looking forward to seeing how well it works.

[kate2011finalproject]

We had a great meeting at Youth Radio yesterday!

George and I started out by going over the basics of user interviews, and as a group, we had a great discussion about the differences between user interviews and journalism interviews. My slides worked great!

We thought that we were going to be doing user interviews today (as in, people who would be potential users), but it turned out that they had scheduled some stakeholder/subject-matter expert interviews – in this case, people who were involved with kids and knew things that would be relevant to us, but wouldn’t be our target users.  I passed around the interview guide that I had written up last week (oops, didn’t post that – look for it later this week) and we went over the questions to discuss what kind of things that we were looking for and why we were asking each question, modifying them as needed based on who we were going to interview.

We also had a great discussion about the word “victim” and what it meant to ask someone about their experience with crime. Honestly, I had written my questions without too much thought about that (not a great idea, I know!), and I was really glad that the kids had picked up on that. Ultimately, we decided not to ask the question that used the word “victim”, and to make sure that we were very clear that our interviewees could answer as much or as little as they wanted to.  Plus, this is going to be an app about reporting crime – we need to hear about what people want to share! It’s important to get this kind of information early.

For the second half, we split up. There were three kids there that day and three interviews. Each kid took one interview – George, Lissa and the interviewer went to the conference room to conduct the interview while I stayed behind with Laura and the other two kids. While we waited,  I had them interview each other so that they could practice their skills and be more comfortable with the questions. It’s always important to do a pilot interview so you can solve problems before the real thing – in this case, we reworded some of the questions and rearranged the order.

Even though I wasn’t able to observe the interviews, I heard that all three kids did a great job and that we got some great information. I should get the audio file later this week so that I can start transcribing it.

George and I were there for almost three hours, and I feel like we got a lot done – I feel like we’ve been spinning our wheels for the past couple of weeks, and I’m so glad that we’re finally moving forward!