CIID Final project report

Eilidh

going solo on the
interaction design
pilot year

Final Year Project: “Life is an act of balance”
CIID/DKDS Pilot Year 2009
Advisor: Heather Martin

WHO IS EILIDH?

Eilidh is an energetic designer who has just graduated from the Interaction Design Pilot Year
run by Copenhagen Institute of Interaction Design.

Prior to moving to Copenhagen Eilidh had a background in Product and Service Design, where
she placed a strong emphasis on user-centered design, the value of experience prototyping and
gaining inspiration and insights from real people and the culture they live in. She is also espe-
cially interested in how the use of emerging technologies can be applied to service
orientated systems and is passionate about using her skills as a designer to help address the
complex social and environmental problems that exist in our society.

On completion of her undergraduate degree she started exploring service design within the
public sector and became fascinated with the idea of designing with - rather than for – the user,
harnessing their creativity and knowledge to co-create ideas. She has worked on projects at the
London based service design agency “thinkpublic” and ran a service improvement project at
Wigan Renal Dialysis Unit in the UK.

While at University, Eilidh spent her summers in upstate New York working as a councilor for
the Freshair Fund. This experience allowed Eilidh to work with people from all over the world
each with their own valuable contribution to give. She likes to think it helped her grow in to the
person she is today.

When she does not have design on the mind, Eilidh loves playing hockey, snowboarding and
trying new sports that involve speed and a little danger!

Area of Expertise: Interaction Design, Service Design, Design Research, Scenarios & Storytelling

Eilidh Dickson, CIID/DKDS Pilot Year 2009

I AM INTERESTED IN AND INSPIRED BY

For my final project I am investigating on how you give people the ability to change elements
of their behaviour, in order for them to feel like they have a balanced life (subjective to the
individual). This is acheived by either allowing them to become more aware and learn about
their lifestyle habits, so they can make behavioural changes themselves, or by providing them
with tools or services that will actively help them make changes to their lifestyle.

I am especially interested to see if the emerging field of Personal Informatics can play a role in
helping people achieve this. If you could track intangible information about your day-to-day
actions would it trigger people to change their behaviour? I believe this new realm has huge
potential to redefine the way in which we interact with the physical world and gain insights
about our actions that make up our daily routines. I am excited that this greater awareness has
the potential to help us to adjust and moderate our behaviour in a number of positive ways.

Currently in our everyday lives we are commonly engulfed in specific contexts, which makes
it difficult to see the bigger picture. I am curious to understand if personal informatics can
enable people to pinpoint areas of their life that bring them personal fulfillment and support
them to experience this more often.

An area I see as an underlying thread throughout the project is addressing the issue of ‘time
poverty. People need to feel connected to people, to places they live, even the food they eat.
Traditionally this was much easier to achieve, as family all lived together, you knew all your
relatives and you knew that your food had come from your back garden. These connections
have been weakened because of a fast pace of life. The advance of new labour saving
technologies has allowed us to achieve more in a shorter space of time, yet instead of using
the time we save to ‘slow’ down, we are prone to making ourselves even busier.


MAY JUNE

1 2 3 4 5
PROCESS OVERVIEW

DESK RESEARCH USER RESEARCH CONDUCTING RESEARCH DEFINING
PLANNING USER RESEARCH ANALYSIS PROBLEM/DESIGN
CHALLENGE

JULY

10 9 8 7 6
DESIGNING FINAL FURTHER SERVICE DIAGRAMS, IDEA DEVLELOPMENT, BRAINSTORMING
SERVICE TOUCHPOINTS EXPERIENCE BLUEPRINT AND SCENARIOS AND AND IDEA
AND STORYBOARDS FOR PROTOTYPING DESIGNING INITIAL INITIAL GENERATION
VIDEO PROTOTYPES TOUCHPOINTS FOR EXPERIENCE
FINAL EXECUTION OF PROTOTYPING PROTOTYPING

AUGUST

11 12 13 echo
RECORD | REFLECT | RECOGNIZE

DESIGNING FINAL EXECUTION OF
FINAL TOUCHPOINTS COMMUNICATION
AND FILMING VIDEO PIECES
PROTOTYPES

RELATED PROJECTS AND REFERENCES

At the very beginning of my final project I collected some examples around personal
informatics and mapped them out, purely to understand what was already available. Below are
some of the more successful and interesting ideas I collected. They all focus on very specific
areas of an individuals life, that helps them to monitor and control their behaviour.

Nike +

Nike + is one of the most commercial and well discussed personal informatics tools currently
available. The system is made up of a small chip that you insert into your running shoes,
combined with a personal online service. The tangible UI which is imbedded in the sole of your
shoes communicates with your Apple iPod (which has pre-loaded software) feeding it with
information about your running to help you track your training regime. The system essentially
becomes a digital personal trainer. After you have completed your training session you can
plug your iPod into your computer and log into your personal Nike + account. What I think
has greatly contributed to the success of the Nike + system is that even though you have a
personal account you are part of a community. Your web based account allows you to provide
training tips and advice to other people and recommend good running routes. By being part of
community I really believe that it makes peoples actions feel more valued.


Wattson

The Wattson is a new kind of home appliance that is networked to a sensor attached to your
home’s electric meter box. Using colours and numbers, the Wattson device displays your
energy consumption and stores it on an online database making it easy for you to manage
your electricity usage and therefore save money. Not only is the system hugely informative
and practical… the device also looks great.

Google Power Meter
How much does it cost to leave your TV on all day? Which uses more power every
month — your dishwasher or your washing machine? Is your household more or less energy
efficient than similar homes in your neighborhood? These are some of the questions you will
be able to answer with a new prototype Google are experimenting with. Google Power Meter
helps you become more energy efficient and save money by pinpointing which devices are
using specific amounts of energy. You can even have friendly competition between your
friends and neighbours.

Last Fm
Is an online web tool that monitors your music habits by connecting to your itunes or other
media software. Every track you play will tell your Last.fm profile something about what you
like. It suggests friends based on your music tastes and recommends songs from their music
collections and yours too.


Dopplr

Dopplr is an online tool used to track your traveling habits. Dopplr members can share
personal and business travel plans privately with their networks, and exchange tips on places
to stay, eat and explore in cities around the world. Each year you get an annual review of all
your traveling, including when your travel plans have overlapped with friends and how much
impact you are having on the environment. What I really like about dopplr is the flexibility it
provides, you can update your profile on your personal profile, through your mobile or on other
social networking sites, and you can sync it all to you iCAL or outlook calendar on your
computer. It appears to be very seamless.

References

Johnny Holland, The Power of Personal Infomatics
http://johnnyholland.org/magazine/2009/04/the-power-of-personal-informatics/

Addressing the issue of ‘time poverty’
http://www.slowmovement.com/

Tools for knowing more about your body and mind
http://www.kk.org/quantifiedself/


Frog Design on Personal Informatics
http://designmind.frogdesign.com/blog/greener-gadgets-saving-the-worldone-meter-at-a-time.
html

Personal Informatics, Matt Jones & Tom Coates
http://www.slideshare.net/blackbeltjones/polite-pertinent-and-pretty-designing-for-the-new-
wave-of-personal-informatics-493301

Behaviour is our Medium, Robert Fabricant (Frog Design)
http://www.slideshare.net/frogdesign/interaction-design-is-not-about-computing-
technology?type=presentation

TED talk on meta data
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e6t1JxElEVw&eurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2
Finbox%2F%3Fref%3Dmb&feature=player_embedded

Pervasive Design article
http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/009745.html

MY STARTING POINT

My starting point was a curiosity to investigate how design can be used to change people’s
behaviour especially within the context of life balance. This interest was very much
inspired by our TUI project at CIID that focused on using RFID technology to create an
awareness of the environmental impact caused by certain food products transportation. On
completion of this project I further investigated it by writing an article on personal
Informatics for an online Interaction Design magazine called Johnny Holland. During this I
found out that there are currently a number of personal informatics tools on the market to
help people balance their lives, mainly focusing around health, finances and energy
consumption. Some of these have been a great success while others are just a waste of time.
When looking at these examples I was disappointed by the lack of imagination that was driving
this emphasis on data displays and was very skeptical that any bar chart on a screen would
actually motivate anyone to change his or her behaviour. I was interested in how to trigger an
emotional experience to motivate behavioural change and find a more specialized area that
could be addressed by personal informatics to help people feel more balanced.


INITIAL EXPLORATIONS

After conducting some initial desk research on personal informatics and existing tools to help
people balance their lives, the majority of my time was spent on planning (1 week) conducting
(1 week) and analyzing user research (1 week)

Research Objective

My objective for my user research was to gain an understanding of what it means for people to
live a balanced life, what are people’s personal values, what do they need to feel comfortable
in their lifestyle, how does this change depending on what stage of their life they are at and do
they use any tools or strategies to achieve this?

To understand how people’s values change at different stages of their lives I conducted
research with three different user groups; students, couples working and families. Within these
categories there were also some extreme users that included an avid sportsman, someone
with diabetes and two people that were away from home frequently due to work. I was
interested in hearing if people who had more extreme lifestyles had different strategies to keep
themselves feeling balanced.

Mapping Research Candidates
STUDENT

EXTREME USER

HAS CHILDREN

ERIC
PERNILLE RUNE

LIVING WITH
LIVING ALONE PARTNER/HUSBAND

AMANDA KRISTIAN
MARTIN
FRANCESSCA

JON

LAURA RUNE. P
KATE
DAVID

WORKING

Reasearch Candidates

Amanda Bligh, USA David Kearford, UK Eric Stevenson, USA

Francessca Mustaffi, Italy Jon Wettersen, USA Kate Pilkington, UK

Kristian Kørrup, Denmark Martin Wøldik, Denmark Laura Ceriol, Italy

Pernille Christoffersen, Rune Bottzauw, Denmark Rune Dittmer, Denmark
Denmark


Research Planning

Out of 12 people I conducted nine 2 hour research sessions in person, 2 Skype interviews to the
US and one remote experiment in Italy. During the research sessions I used a number of
reflection tools I had designed to help facilitate the session and provoke conversation. I also
had a set of questions on more specific areas, that I adapted depending on how the discussion
evolved. These questions covered areas such as typical daily routines and habits, enjoyable
parts of their day, things they don’t have time to achieve and why, how they manage their
time to meet all their priorities, use of labour saving technology, triggers that make them feel
stressed, how they deal with conflicts in their time, what their ‘feel good’ activities are, and
how their priorities have changed as their responsibilities have changed.

Conducting Research

Figure 1: Rune using the mapping tool

I used a Card sorting activity where I got people to choose from a list of things they do either
on a daily, weekly or random basis. This was used as a warm-up activity, to get people starting
to think about what was important to them. It was a great conversation starter, as you could
then question them on their answers.


Figure 2: Mapping tool

I also designed a mapping tool to get people to think about more specific values they need to
achieve to feel in control and what really brings them meaning in life. This exercise was very
valuable as it forced people to take a moment and reflect on what was really important to
them. People found the exercise difficult, especially when they started to realize that they were
achieving very few of the things that were important and a priority to them. Although the task
was challenging almost everyone I interviewed found it beneficial to have a moment of

Figure 3: Diaries

During my research a few people also kept a diary so i could gain insight into their routines,
sleeping and eating habits. After completing the diary I questioned them to see if they had
gained any value from writing in it each day. People responded with saying that they felt like
they wanted to be more productive throughout their day so they had something positive and
interesting to write in it. This shows that actively logging your activities can lead to increased
motivation to do well.


Figure 4: Emotional timelines

During some of the interview sessions I got people to draw an emotional time line map of a
certain period of time that they decided upon. The peaks in the diagram are when they are
feeling out of balance. This allowed me to see that periods of inbalance are often due to a
change or transition in their lifestyle. This often included moving to a new city, leaving home or
starting a new job. Although these are not negative situations to be in, the uncertainty and the
anxiety of starting something new can make people feel out of balance.

The remote exercise in Italy involved an extreme user (Laura, who is rarely at home due to
work related travel). I asked her to keep a detailed diary for one week. Here she recorded her
day-to-day
activities and routines, including eating and sleeping habits. I also asked her to reflect on how
she felt throughout the day and in the moment while she was doing certain tasks. If anything
made her feel stressed she had record it and the same goes for if she was happy. She also took
photographs of the following:

1. Things that you do on a regular basis that make you feel comfortable and content.
2. Any tools or strategies that help you meet your priorities.
3. Things that you make you feel uncomfortable or unbalanced in your life.

The result of this exercise provided detailed and rich information, with a number of key
insights to what it is like when you are continually on the move.


Figure 5: A sample of photographs from Laura’s photo diary

Research Analysis

On completion of my user research I created character boards for each person, writing down
key quotes and observations from their session. At this point, I then filtered the information
again and selected the most intriguing and surprising quotes from each respondent. Within
these insights three underlying themes were formed. These were:

1. Communication with Family and Friends
2. Food and Eating Habits
3. Personal Prioritising and Planning


Figure 6: Transcription of Interviews

Figure 7: Character board

Figure 8: Mapping out my insights


Figure 9: Understanding what each quote means

Figure 10: Creating How might we statements

Figure 11: Voting on the most interesting insights


Within each of these themes I used the IDEO method of asking what does each insight mean,
and then writing “How might we statements” for them all. At this point there were still a num-
ber of areas I could choose to develop, but I decided to focus on personal prioritizing as this is
where I felt most challenged, excited and saw potential to apply personal informatics to. Some
of the key insights in this theme were:

“I transfer work trips to our calendar at home, but only a few weeks before, mainly so Mas
[husband] can’t see what’s ahead of him!” (Kate, UK)
Meaning: People only really use a ‘public’ calendar for really important events that are
necessary to share.

“I don’t currently write in a diary as I imagine someone reading it, so I won’t put anything
personal in it…….I like the approach of this diary, I actually find that I want to be more
productive just so u can write something positive in it, kind of indirect motivation”(Eric, USA)
Meaning: Having to actively record you activities allows you to reflect and become
motivated to do well.

“I would love to be able to schedule time for reading…….but it sounds kind of dorky….so I would
love to be able to track some of these things I would like to be able to do without having to
actually track it” (Amanda, USA)
Meaning: People feel silly scheduling ‘me time’ but are interested to understand what they
spend their time on and when.

“I keep a personal to-do list, I prioritise everything, so when I have been neglecting something I
move it up the list, I keep it on my desktop so I can always see it” (Jon, USA)
Meaning: People need to have a constant reminder of what it important to do otherwise
they will ignore it.

“Hobbies are great when they are built into your life, I love it, but when you don’t do it for a
while you forget how much you enjoy it until you do it again” (Pernille, Denmark)
Meaning: People easily forget how important something is and how much they enjoy it when
they stop doing it.

“Prioritizing is difficult, it would be good to have ground rules, or a rule of thumb to follow”
(Francesca, Italy)
Meaning: People like to be guided in some way when it comes to making personal decisions.

“I found writing in a diary can be really helpful, as it gave me a very good chance of stopping
to have a deeper insight into my thoughts and feelings” (Laura, Italy)
Meaning: Periods of reflection are a positive thing!


DESIGN CHALLENGE

Due to an increased pace of life and personal competition with ones self to become ‘someone
better’ people are continually busy, going from one task to the next. This has been heightened
by a more prominent use of technology in our lives, which has resulted in lifestyle barriers
that used to exist have been broken; people can now work anywhere, contact anyone anytime
and achieve much more on the move. The result of having this fast pace of life is that people
become absorbed in ‘achieving more’ and detached from what their day-to-day life looks like
and what brings them a real sense of enjoyment. Within their busy lives, people find it hard
to prioritize when making decisions in their own life and would often like to be guided in some
way. Some people use diaries and calendars to schedule (make time for) ‘practical
appointments’ but very rarely for personal activities. Yet they are interested to understand
what they spend their time on, especially for things they enjoy doing, but rarely have time to
do. In order for people to have a balanced life on a bigger scale, they have to first reconnect to
themselves, and focus on what they need to be content rather than everything that is possible.
The design challenge is:

How might we create a flexible and customizable platform that will help people to reconnect
to themselves, enabling them to prioritize in their lives by keeping track of and reminding
them of past experiences that they can then use as a reference point to make more
informed decisions?

Other Questions to probe for brainstorming

1. How can we create a greater awareness of elements of our lives that bring us enjoyment?

2. How much time we actually spend on these activities?

3. How might we compare what your day actually looks like with what you would ideally like it
to be?

4. How can the act of recording these experiences be seamlessly integrated into your lifestyle?


FURTHER EXPLORATIONS

Brainstorming and Idea Generation

After I had formulated my design challenge that I felt was the correct combination of being
open enough to generate lots of wild idea’s, but not so open that I would have no theme
running through them, it was time to start brainstorming.

I facilitated a brainstorming session to generate ideas surrounding my design challenge. This
was a huge success!! A lot of creative ideas were generated that proved to be great inspiration
and triggered new thinking. After completing the brainstorm I spent a little time clustering my
ideas before going through them. Some the clusters that formed were goal orientated tracking,
tracking with sensors and using tangible objects to visualize behaviour.

Figure 12: Clustering brainstorming ideas

Initial Seed

Out of all the drawings and post-its that were filtered I picked 5 and sketched them out further,
thinking of possible solutions of how they could be implemented into people’s lives. By the
end of this short exercise there was already one idea that was stuck in my mind. The idea was
based around tracking your happiness at different locations through GPS and inputing who you
were with and what you were doing to add a specific context.


Figure 13: Initial Seed of an idea (tracking happiness to your location)

Experience Prototype #1

At this point I decided to do an initial experience prototype to test the basis of my idea. For the
experiment I recruited 4 people and on a map of Copenhagen I got got them to plot their
weekends activities, after giving them step-by- step instructions to. These were:

Step 1: Write a list of priorities you like to do on (i) a daily basis (ii) a weekly basis.

Step 2: On different coloured post-its categorize these priorities, how do you divide up your
time.

Step 3: On the map of Copenhagen mark where you live and work.

Step 4: Plot your weekend activities by writing individual activities you did, at what time and
with who. Write these activities on coloured post-its corresponding to one of the categories
you already defined (use the color code you set).

Step 5: Place the post-it on the map at the location of where the activity took place

Step 6: Give the activity a rating out of 5, of how satisfying it was (writing on the post it as
well) 1 being low and 5 being high.


Figure 14: Ujjval completing the map experiment

Figure 15: Comparing different peoples maps


Experience Prototype #1 learnings

1. People are unaware of how much they actually do, or how busy they are, until they actually
sit down and think about it.

2. People have very different approaches about how they categorize their time.

3. Using colour to show different categories, very quickly enables you to see patterns in
behaviour, especially related to the home and workplace.

4. Putting priorities into categories allows you to see what areas you spend most time on in
your life, and then you can go to a deeper layer of data to find out specific activity etc.

5. The people who you are with often has a huge influence on the satisfaction of the activity
you are doing.

To learn more about these patterns and behaviours I decided to test the experience prototype
on myself as well. But instead of putting a few days on a map, I recorded everything I did each
day on a new map. This way I was able to compare each day individually, and see the patterns
and routines that occured.

Scenarios

After these initial experience prototypes I could see that there was potential in my idea,
especially by the reactions of the people I had tested it on. My next step was to develop the
idea further, for this I first created a simple system diagram of the service and then started on
a detailed scenario, showing how the system would work, the user experience and the
critical touchpoints. During this time I thought of the different stages of the service, how the
data would be recorded, any feedback the user would get, how would the user review their
data and reflect on it and how the service could be expanded in the future. The result was a
very detailed and slightly overwhelming scenario!


Figure 16: Detailed scenario

Figure 17: Detailed scenario turned into a book for midway reviews


Service Blueprint

After the scenario was produced, i decided to look at the service on a more generic level, and
created an initial service blueprint. This allowed me to focus and establish the key user
interactions, the role of the service provider and the touch points of the service that need to
be designed for my experience prototyping and my end communication. I have also come up
with a name for the service (“echo”) and started working on the branding at this point, as i felt
this was an important factor to make my service appear believable! Throughout this process
of mapping out my service i was able to continually develop the idea, seeing where there were
holes that needed to be thought out and coming up with new touchpoints that could add to the
over all experience. I was very focused on creating tangible touchpoints throughout the
service, so it wasn’t purely screen based.

Figure 18: Paper based service blueprint


Experience prototype #2

When I felt I had my service mapped out fully, I wanted to start doing more experience
prototyping, to test different elements of the service. I conducted a quick experience prototype
to test of few questions I had about my idea. From my first prototyping session I wanted to
learn:

1. How much effort is it to log your daily activities and the goals you want to achieve? Do you
gain something from doing so?

2. What is it like to have to quantify your happiness after doing certain tasks, and what is the
the most natural way to do it?

3. What does it feel like to receive friendly nudges of encouragement and motivation from the
service? Do they work or does it just become irritating receiving them?

During the experiment I asked Sarah to track specific tasks she wanted to achieve by sending
an SMS to the service (my mobile phone) when she had completed it. At this point, she also
had to quantify her happiness and satisfaction by using a set of cards I had given her. These
asked her to illustrate how she was feeling in a variety of ways i.e with words, colour, icons.
While all this was going on, the service was also sending her prompts and motivation by SMS’s
to encourage her to complete her goals!

Figure 19: Experience prototyping pack

Eilidh Dickson, CIID/DKDS Pilot Year, 9th June 2009

Figure 20: Experience prototyping instructions

Figure 21: Everything needed to get started!


Figure 22: SMS sent to the Echo “service” during the experience prototype

After the experiment was complete I interview Sarah to get her feedback on the experience.


1. Receiving messages and reminders worked as a good support line.

2. By recoding what she was doing, it brought things to her focus, she started to realise why
she was or wasn’t doing something.

3. She liked that the service was personal, so she felt more commitment towards it and
responsibility for her actions, as it was something that was helping her.

4. It was easiest to quantify how she was feeling with a number or slider, or sometimes using
words to describe it.

5. Seeing what you have achieve is very motivating, and remembering how good you felt when
you did it is encouraging to do it again.

6. Knowing it was a person on the end of the phone and not an automated message made her
feel more motivated and responsible. So how can the service be personal to each user and
seem like a buddy or friend?


Experience prototype #3

During my third experience prototypeI wanted to question what motivates people to stick to a
program and how would people react if they are rewarded for it? During this experiment, like
the previous one I got Mimi to track certain tasks she wanted to complete, and alert the service
(me!) when she had done so through either an SMS or by leaving a physical note on my desk.
When Mimi was doing well I would give her rewards in different ways…these included:

1. An email with a reward voucher attached to it that she had to print out and bring to me to
then exchange it for a gift.

2. A surprise gift and note left on her desk one morning.

3. simple “well done” messages to her mobile phone.

Figure 23: The activity sheet that Mimi filled in (what she wanted to achieve)


Figure 24: Some of the rewards Mimi recieved


1. The system has to be flexible enough to deal with changes in people’s schedules and
spontaneous events that may happen.

2. When a gift was a complete surprise, it was better than knowing you were about to receive
something in advance.

3. Big rewards were not expected as part of the service, but it was nice when the little surprises
were personal and tailored to the individual as it makes you feel like the service knows you.

After conducting these prototyping sessions and consolidating these learnings, I made some
small changes to some of the feedback mechanisms that would be used in the service. I then
started to think about the final communication of the service. I created a storyboard for my
final scenario, this allowed me to imagine a real person using the echo service as well as see
how many props and service touchpoints I needed to design and produce to communicate the
idea in my video. From this point on the focus of my work was producing the final interfaces
and physical artifacts.

Eilidh Dickson, CIID/DKDS Pilot Year, 9th June 2009

Figure 24: Paper based service touchpoints needed for the video

Figure 25: Interface shot of Echo software


MY CONCEPT

Who Is it for?

Anyone who know that they have an unbalanced life and are unhappy about it. They want to
become more aware of their habits and understand their behaviour so they know where to
make changes. It is for people that currently live a busy lifestyle and find it hard to prioritize,
often sacrificing the things they really enjoy doing, so they can achieve more in other areas of
their life. These people are motivated to do well and want to change!

What is the idea?

Echo is a service that provides a platform for people to self reflect and become more aware of
their lifestyle patterns by helping them pinpoint areas of their life that bring them personal
enjoyment and supporting them to experience it more often.

How does it work?

It works by using GPS tracking and direct reporting (data input) through the users mobile
phone to build up a map of how they spend their time, with who and how happy they are. The
data that is tracked and recorded is then transformed into different visualizations that the
person can interact with, reflect on and see opportunities for change in their behaviour.

What is the Value?

Giving people a tool to reflect, allows them to reconnect to what their day-to-day life looks
like and understand what they spend their time on, with who and how happy they are. In turn
this allows them to pinpoint areas of their life that bring them personal enjoyment. By giving
people the platform to see these trends and patterns in their behaviour and opportunities for
change they might normally miss, it can help people moderate their behaviour in a number of
positive ways. The service is not designed to control behaviour, but to monitor and display ac-
tions in a way that will raise questions with the person.


SERVICE STAGES

Sign Up
Before the user can start using the service they need to log onto the echo website and decide
which subscription they would like. At this point they will commit to the service and make a
payment. Shortly after they will receive a confirmation email to reassure them that their order
has been processed.

Implementation: set-up and sync
A few days later the customer will receive the echo start up pack in the post. The pack contains
everything needed to get started including a welcome letter, a URL link and serial number for
the smart phone application and offline software, a membership card and a set of instructions.
The user will input where they live and work on a geographical map of their town or city. They
will also make a list of activities they want to achieve on a daily, weekly and occasional basis
and then place these in customized categories, for example ‘me time’, work time and play time.
The last stage is to create an address book of friends, family and people they spend time with
on a regular basis. Once this has been done, they can then sync their phone and computer,
so they are ready to start logging their behaviour. At any point the user can go back to their
profile and edit their personal settings.

Use: Recording Data
Through the echo application, the smart phone’s GPS will be activated, seamlessly tracking
their location and storing the information. When the user completes one of their priorities,
they can capture their activity by using a simple user interface, entering what activity they are
doing and who they are with from the database of information they have already
created - alternatively they can choose to enter a new activity or person on the move.

Reflection in the moment, and on the go feedback
When the user has completed the activity they then have the opportunity to reflect in the mo-
ment. They can rate their happiness on a scale from happy to sad and can add another level
of context by either recording a voice clip or by tagging the location and event. They can also
receive gentle feedback nudges and motivational messages to inform them of how might they
can change their behaviour in real time. These include friendly prompts about activities they
haven’t completed, well done messages, reminders of past happy experiences via MMS when
they walk past locations they have previously tagged and a monthly personal review of their
actions.


View data and reflection over time
At any point the user can view their interactive data visualizations through the echo software,
seeing how they have been spending their time, either on a specific day or on a weekly basis.
The data can also be filtered to ‘happiness mode’ so they can pin point when and what they
were doing when they are happiest. More specific data on how well they are meeting their pri-
orities, when the last did an activity, or spent time with a certain person is also available. This
tool for reflection aims to provide information that is actionable, helping people see patterns in
their behavior and therefore able to make more informed decisions.

Expanding: Building a community and international travel
As the echo service grows there are potential opportunities for people to share their data
with friends they trust through an online platform. This could lead to exchange of advice and
suggestions based common interests, or even finding similar interests with friends, that they
didn’t know they had. The service could also be expanded so subscribers to the service could
receive customised maps based on their personal priorities for travel abroad, helping them to
carry out their ‘happy activities’ while in another city or country.

To view my project demo video or user scenario video that will visually demonstrate the
concept please go to http://www.eilidhdickson.co.uk/thesis.html


FEEDBACK

Figure 26: Kate (original user) viewing my concept videos

At the end of my project I was lucky enough to have time to go back to one of my original
users to get feedback on my idea. I let Kate see both my videos I then waited for a response!
Originally kate had told me that she “missed time just to do stuff, like making phone calls to
friends and going to the cinema” Hearing her feedback after she watched the video was one of
the best moments of the project:

“the more I watch it the more i want to use it.... I really like the idea of having reminders about
non everyday things....and knowing when you last spent time with someone. It’s also good that
is doesn’t control your life!”

The fact that she completely understood the concept with no further explanation was
fantastic! It was even better that she saw potential in the idea and could see herself using it,
especially as the solution was based around one of her intial problems I established during my
user research.


web: www.eilidhdickson.co.uk
mail: cosies_rule@hotmail.com
ph: +[44] 7845822854

CIID Final project report

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CIID Final project report