URBAN COMPUTING

Underground Aesthetics: Rethinking Urban Computing

An ethnographic study and a design proposal for a situated music-exchange application suggest how explicitly foregrounding the experiential qualities of urban life can help rethink urban computing design.

ecent interest in urban computing tionships between mobility and technology in grows not least out of a longer-term urban contexts. interest in mobile computing and its applications for urban navigation, First-generation applications: discovery, and interaction. This legacy Solving problems Raffects how applications are conceived. At present, We divide first-generation urban and mobile many urban applications focus on solving perceived applications into three categories. problems of disconnection, disruption, and dis- First are systems that frame mobility as a dis- location. However, a growing movement points connection from stable working situations. These toward the value of considering applications try to overcome this disconnection Arianna Bassoli a less instrumental account of either by providing remote mobile access to static London School of Economics city life. Ethnographic studies of information resources or by trying to reproduce existing relationships between static application contexts. For example, the Satchel Johanna Brewer and Paul Dourish urban mobility and technology system sought to give travelers easy access to elec- University of California, Irvine offer an alternate formulation for tronic documents, as well as the ability to share and Karen Martin applications development—one exchange them, by developing mobile digital tokens University College London based on the experiences of ur- that could be used to manipulate documents stored ban dwellers relating to one an- centrally.2 Researchers at the University of Glas- Scott Mainwaring other and to their city. gow investigated forms of “co-visiting” cities in We conducted an ethno- which static and mobile participants interacted graphic study of an existing ur- around the same physical resources.3 In attempt- ban mobility site—namely, Lon- ing to provide “anytime, anywhere” information don’s Underground—to explore a specific aspect of access,4 these applications frame urban mobility as urban life and its relation to technology. This study a problem to be overcome or eliminated. highlighted riders’ diverse, often contradictory, aes- A second category of urban applications frames thetic experiences of the Underground. In parallel mobility as a dislocation problem. These appli- with the study, we designed a music-exchange cations focus on finding your way or locating application, undersound,1 based on explicitly fore- resources. GPS navigation systems are one obvi- grounding these experiential qualities. ous example. So are guides to help people tra- In this article, through reflection on the ethno- verse unfamiliar environments, such as tourist graphic study results and the undersound design, sites,5 museums,6 and university campuses.7 Sim- we explore how an aesthetic account of urban life ilarly, applications that help people find resources might be the basis of designs that support not only as they move through an environment—whether an individual but also a collective experience of interesting restaurants or nearby friends8—also the city. reflect the idea that urban mobility often involves being “out of place” or lost. Mobile technology and urban contexts A third category focuses on disruption—the We begin by examining past and emerging rela- ways in which a mobile technology might behave

1536-1268/07/$25.00 © 2007 IEEE ■ Published by the IEEE Computer Society PERVASIVEcomputing 39 URBAN COMPUTING

inappropriately in urban settings. These This second generation of applications examined how riders interacted with context-sensitive applications include, is establishing a body of research that one another and with the space itself, for instance, a mobile telephone setting begins to frame urban mobility as an which sometimes occurred via these itself automatically to vibrate mode in a everyday fact and a new opportunity. technologies. theater or filtering out low-importance These applications present a less instru- Traveling the Underground is a nu- calls at dinner.9 Beyond mobile devices, mental account of urban living by look- anced experience. For example, many context-sensitivity also appears in public ing for inspiration not only in the avail- participants in our study recognized “so- displays that respond to movement pat- able technologies but also in the broader cietal rules” about the proper social dis- terns in public spaces.10 These systems experiences of urban life. tance between strangers, which Janey respond to a sense of rupture between the Levine and her colleagues observed in an technology and the urban setting in which Noninstrumental aspects earlier study of several American sub- it’s deployed. Although social systems of London’s Underground ways.20 For example, civil inattention is might be able to effect a contextually The London Underground represents such a convention, which acknowledges appropriate response, traditional tech- an iconic space of urban mobility. It has another’s presence in an initial show of nologies can’t recognize and respond to shaped, and been shaped by, the city’s respect and then avoids undue, and there- the wide variety of contextual cues that a development. Used by over three mil- fore threatening, attention.21 One partic- city presents. The problem, then, is to lion people every day, the Underground ipant described the conflict between main- make the technology sensitive to them. (which Londoners call “the Tube”) is a taining civil inattention while giving up a primary means of city transportation. seat to a fellow passenger: Emerging applications: Furthermore, it’s a complex system that I find it quite embarrassing to speak Interaction opportunities mediates people’s perception of the city in London. You can’t speak to any- By contrast, an emerging generation of itself, of other inhabitants, and of the body. You don’t speak to anybody, applications is viewing mobility not as a urban experience. The Tube is a single you know. And so, it is quite embar- rassing to say, “Excuse me.” That is problem to overcome but as a way to cre- infrastructure but it supports many ex- the hardest bit, touching them. I usu- ate interactive experiences that rely on or periences, highlighting the heterogene- ally just get up and they go, “Oh, exploit movement and space. For in- ity of urban life.18 Its history is well doc- thank you,” and then they sit down. I find that easier. stance, the UK’s Equator consortium has umented, and it’s been the setting for produced a series of mobile games that many stories in books and films. It’s The complex negotiation of simulta- blend physical and virtual worlds. Among also the subject of several Transport for neously seeming to be unaware of other them, Can You See Me Now,11 a game London studies, including a recent one passengers and yet still participating in played on Sheffield streets, creates a novel regarding the impact of advertisements the unspoken seat exchange is an impor- hybrid space where virtual players inter- (www.thelondoncommuter.com). tant facet of riding the Tube. Various act with players physically in the urban However, there are no contemporary media and technologies—from newspa- space. Another application, Yoshi,12 ethnographic studies describing the pers to music players—can help balance explores the “seams” in digital infra- experience of riding the Tube. Over the this tension. For example, music play- structures—for example, the boundaries summer of 2006, we conducted such a ers—apart from augmenting people’s between telephone cells or Wi-Fi hot- study to enrich our understanding of moods and perceptions of their sur- spots—on an urban scale, making them the experience’s aesthetic components roundings—can also serve as a social visible as interactive elements. Projects that would complement the under- defense. In fact, all technologies can con- such as Sonic City13 or tunA14 explore the sound application design process.19 tribute to the air of civil inattention, ways in which movement through space This study included photographic doc- helping users who want to discourage can create personal or collective audio umentation, written observations, and social interaction with nearby people. In experiences, giving an aural form to semistructured interviews with 19 rid- these situations, “users appear to movement. Finally, several projects use ers. We focused on both the individual achieve, at least subjectively, a sense of GPS movement traces to literally draw and collective Underground experience. public invisibility.”22 Our interviewees images on maps or photographs.15–17 We looked at all the mediating tech- confirmed that they often kept them- These applications provoke new ways of nologies used within the Tube, includ- selves demonstratively engaged with thinking about movement and spatial ing nondigital technologies such as technologies to avoid (or appear to practice in technology-mediated contexts. newspapers, books, and tickets. We also avoid) looking at other people:

40 PERVASIVEcomputing www.computer.org/pervasive Figure 1. In the Tube’s tight quarters at rush hour, passengers occupy themselves with many media forms: mobile phone games, books, and music players.

[Without a book, it’s] a bit more bor- ing. I just end up reading the ads or looking around. You are trying not to stare at someone and you are looking like a psycho. tell from the writing on the front they’ve finished reading them. This sub- Yet at the same time people can that it was from Thailand…. I actu- tle social gesture acts as a channel for ally went back inside and stopped become curious about one another and and said, “You have to get off,” and unspoken exchange through which rid- engage in subtle communication: she looked surprised and got off. ers can acknowledge current and future And I said, “Can I help you? Where passengers. Indeed, more than one inter- Sometimes you might have contact are you going?” And she said she with somebody or you might catch wanted to go to Harrod’s, which viewee told us that they often intention- somebody looking at them and you seemed a bit depressing, so I tried to ally left behind their copies of The do that whole kind of flirtation thing, explain [that] to her and ... I actually Guardian, a for-purchase newspaper, to but it never really comes through…. I ended up going to Harrod’s [with think a lot of the time it is curiosity. It her] and getting my picture taken. encourage other riders to read it because is people looking at each other, and they believed it to be more enriching you accept that someone has been Indeed, the objects that people carry act than the free dailies. looking at you as long as they are not holding their gaze. not only as gateways for imagination but Technology mediates collective expe- also as potential interaction points. Before rience, but it can also change the way Many of our participants told us the Underground introduced the Oyster individuals interact with their sur- about taking these small moments a bit Card, an RFID-based ticketing system, it roundings. People are exposed to or avail further. Becoming curious about people operated solely on paper tickets. Both the themselves of a multitude of media (for around you and going a bit out of your Oyster Card and paper tickets offer many example, see figure 1). Gigantic posters way to observe a stranger are far from different travel options, but the day-travel are plastered across seemingly every rare activities in the Tube: card, which allows for unlimited journeys wall; personal technologies, on the other on a given day, gave rise to a particular hand, seem to provide people with more [I will go out of my way], probably only one stop extra or something like behavior in its paper form: control of the media content they’re that, or I will just walk a bit slower. We were just standing there looking at accessing. People use mobile phones sim- Mmm. This makes me sound incredi- this huge line. I think it was at Liver- ilarly to music players, carving a bit of bly shallow. But it’s fun and it’s some- pool station. We noticed in this big personal space and keeping their eyes thing to do. Ohh. You sit there and line-up there were all these people think, “You’re cute.” I’ll sort of walk waiting to get a ticket, and we saw this from wandering around the carriage. behind you until the entrance, and one guy who was leaving the station. Because phones don’t yet receive signal we will go our separate ways and I Without exchanging words or any- coverage in the Underground, people are will fall in love again when I get back thing, he gave his ticket to this woman on the Tube. And there will be an- who was kind of near the back of the demonstratively engaged with them in other small romance later on. [Sighs]. line. It was just procedural. She just playing games, reading through and God, traveling into town I must fall kind of looked at him and took it, and deleting old text messages, or listening in love about 20 times. she left the line and just went in. to music. Indeed, sometimes interacting In the next example, something as sim- This study participant was new to with technology can be so engaging that ple as noticing the writing on another London and was surprised by this riders miss their station, as many of our passenger’s book cover can drastically unspoken exchange. Many people used participants confessed. These experi- alter the course of a day’s activity or sim- to pass along their paper day-travel cards ences all contribute to the mnemonic ply give a window into another passen- when they completed their day’s jour- narratives that each passenger develops ger’s reading taste. neys because they no longer needed the in relation to their Underground experi- 23 [The train was closing and] I was cards. However, the Oyster Card is a per- ence. Indeed, for commuters who reg- aware the girl sitting opposite wasn’t sonal, reusable ticket, so this exchange ularly use music players, these narratives moving, and everybody else got off practice is no longer feasible. can become intertwined with the mem- the train and she obviously hadn’t picked up what was going on. She It’s also common, even expected, in ories triggered by music. One of our was from Thailand, and she was the Tube for people to leave behind interviewees explained how, upon hear- reading a guidebook, and you could copies of the free daily newspapers when ing a particular song from her iPod, she

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Figure 2. Undersound is a music-sharing application designed to explore riders’ individual and collective experience of the Tube.

was instantly reminded of her train experiential. People can explore their • This same phone application lets users pulling into the station nearby her work- curiosity about fellow passengers and en- download tracks from download points place. Because she listened to the same gage in unspoken exchanges with them. on the train platforms as well as from album every day for many months on They can also engage technology to pre- other users in proximity (see figure 2). her way to work, this song came to sym- serve their social isolation. Finally, the • The phone application stores metadata bolize the moment of her arrival. specific technologies each rider carries from each music exchange, which the Finally, the Underground’s aesthetics, and the station aesthetics and maps avail- upload and download access points such as the cohesive look of every line able to all can contribute to the richness throughout the undersound network and the individual characteristics of each of personal mnemonic narratives that collect and use to drive large visual- station, together with its visual repre- make the Tube experience meaningful. izations in the ticket halls, which re- sentations, such as the Tube map, affect flect the music’s movement through the human experience of both the Tube Undersound: An alternate the network. and the city. The Underground super- technology design approach imposes—or better, underimposes—a In parallel with our study, we engaged Currently in the implementation phase, geography that constitutes an “interface in a design exercise intended to help us we’ve designed undersound to run on a between the chaotic city and its user, pre- frame our ethnographic results in tech- localized peer-to-peer communication net- senting and structuring the points of nological terms. By undertaking the work called Bionets (www.bionets.org). access and possibilities for interaction ethnographic study at the same time we We’ll deploy and evaluate the system over within the urban space…, [an] essential embarked on the design process, we the coming year. Here, we’ll consider this technology that mediates between the were able to critically engage with many application, like the ethnographic work, city and its users.”24 Places with Under- themes surfacing in the ethnographic as a lens through which to examine and ground stations become more meaning- work. The result is a form of technolog- reimagine how technology can influence ful both by the individual mnemonic ical engagement with that’s and contribute to the urban experience. narratives they trigger and by their rep- as much an ethnographic product as a By exploring the ways undersound might resentations on maps.25 For example, design proposal—and not simply a new be used, we can see how explicitly fore- one of our participants remembered a set of “implications for design.” grounding urban life’s experiential quali- panic attack in the Underground not The proposed design, undersound, is a ties can help rethink the overall approach only by going back to a particular sta- music application comprising three parts:1 to technology design for cities. tion but also by seeing its representation on the map. • A mobile phone client lets both emerg- Music sharing scenario Among other things, our ethnography ing musicians and audiophiles wire- Matt is a filmmaker in his mid-20s showed that technology’s uses aren’t lessly upload their tracks at upload who uses the Tube every weekday to get solely instrumental, like entering the tran- points inside the Underground station to work. Tonight, he’s traveling from sit system or finding a station, but also ticket halls. Soho to Angel to meet friends for drinks.

42 PERVASIVEcomputing www.computer.org/pervasive To get there, he plans to take the Victo- When people are engaged with a collec- channel for a similar behavior. Further- ria Line to Euston, where he’ll change to tively used application, they might be iso- more, an urban application that’s incor- the Northern Line toward Angel. This is lated in one sense, but they’re socially pre- porated within the surrounding envi- his first chance to try out the undersound sent in another. ronment can trigger memories that application he just installed on his mo- intertwine media and place in new ways. bile phone. Personal narratives Finally, there’s a social cost to actions in In the Oxford Circus station ticket hall, While Matt’s thoughts are wandering, both the physical and digital space. You he notices three girls with musical instru- Stephanie, a woman in her early 50s, gets can’t pick up a newspaper without other ments who are gathered around the un- on the train. She’s tired from work and people noticing. In undersound’s case, dersound upload point. Ellen, Carolina, looking at other people wondering who you can’t exchange a track in secret. So, and Alice are students and play in a band they are and where they’re going. When it’s useful to think about the relationships called Zot. They’re using undersound to she sees Matt she thinks, “That’s the that arise between these two forms of get some free publicity. At the station’s kind of guy that would be perfect for my accountability—a certain action in the entrance, Ellen browses their music on her daughter.” She notices he’s listening to digital world can have consequences in phone. They can only upload each track music with his phone, so she opens the physical one, and vice versa. once, so she chooses their best song for undersound, which her daughter re- this station, one of the Underground’s cently installed on her RAZR. She looks Shared interactions busiest. Alice suggests that they add the through the other users’ profiles to see if Steve, who just downloaded the Zot date of their next gig as a note to the track. she can guess which one is Matt. As she’s song from Matt, is on his way home While waiting for the train, a message browsing, she suddenly realizes one of from work. Although already late for pops up on Matt’s phone, asking if he the icons that she hadn’t yet had a chance dinner, he can’t resist the temptation to wants to download the latest track from to look at has disappeared. She looks up check if anyone has new undersound the station. He assumes that the girls prob- around the carriage and is disappointed songs because he’s really interested in ably uploaded the song, and he accepts the to see that Matt is gone. being one of the top collectors and dis- download. Once in the carriage, he starts In the meantime, Matt had become so tributors. Upstairs, he checks the under- listening to the song, but it’s a bit too engrossed in undersound that he missed sound public display to get an update on punky for him. So, he checks other appli- his stop at Euston and only realized it at the music traffic and recent activity cation features and discovers that he can Finsbury Park. He feels a bit strange be- hotspots around the Tube. While check- browse the playlists of people in proxim- cause he used to come to this stop all the ing the display, he notices a new message ity and download their undersound songs. time to see his ex-girlfriend, but he real- on his phone from an undersound “It’s good I have something to play izes he hasn’t returned since their breakup buddy: “Hey, are you in the station with,” Matt thinks. “Otherwise, I’d get last year. Suddenly, he sees a message on too?” It’s Clive, the friend he was sup- bored on my way to Angel because I for- his mobile phone, alerting him that some- posed to meet for dinner. By chance, he got my book.” He checks people’s profiles one is downloading the song from Zot. happened to see Steve on undersound and their songs, and notices one person He remembers how his ex always hated while he was exiting the station. It turns has a different kind of icon by their name. punk music. As the train approaches, he out they were both late. He checks him out and realizes they have looks around as he makes sure the down- When an application’s use is situated the same track. load is complete. He feels a part of the in a social space, we can consider how Curiosity about others is a fact of both undersound community already. to use digital technology’s flexibility to urban and digital life. This scenario shows Thinking about how people will use afford a variety of behaviors at once. For digital and spatial networks intertwined new situated digital technologies within example, you can use a technology that in new ways to satisfy this curiosity. Like a specific physical and social urban space keeps you demonstratively engaged to the guidebook cover we mentioned ear- lets us consider how different social prac- intentionally display something about lier, digital content can act as a window tices might begin to emerge. The ethno- your identity. Similarly, you can use a into another person’s identity. Addition- graphic work showed how someone channel of unspoken exchange as a ally, the digital content itself can generate might alter a course of action to get a means for explicit engagement. interest in another person. This adds better glimpse of someone on the Tube. Through undersound, we’ve seen how another dimension to the social-defense Likewise, we can consider how a mobile application design can engage the com- aspect of mobile phone applications. urban application might afford a new plexities of urban experience. When we

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can reflect urban experiences in technol- by creating a design that affords equal meaning are shaped in a complex dia- ogy design, we can also find ways to flexibility. Running the application on logue among users and application sites. transform the experience so that new be- your phone comes at the social cost of haviors can emerge. opening your track list for others to peruse. Users must choose how, or if, they longside the creators of second- Discussion want to present themselves. Making deci- generation mobile applications, Let’s consider how this reformulated sions like these integral to the system we’re reexamining the urban view of the urban experience might provide experience creates the opportunity for A experience and the ways tech- a different approach to urban computing. reflection on the here-and-now of urban nology can enrich it. We want to move life. So, disruption isn’t a problem but a away from framing urban mobility as a Situated understanding of the space design tactic, and the social negotiations problem and toward recognizing it as an Traveling by Underground mediates that are the starting point of urban living everyday fact that designers can leverage people’s perception of the city they in- become visible. as a new opportunity. Additionally, by ex- habit. Undersound’s design highlights ploring not only how technology affects new ways in which both individual and Emergent large-scale flows the relationship between the individual collective understandings of the Under- Current advertisement posters we and the city but also the relationships of ground’s physical, social, and techno- observed in the Underground, when individuals with one another through the logical space could emerge. The under- taken as whole, seem to present a cohe- city, our work attempts to expand the sound network is enmeshed within the sive vision of a Londoner’s lifestyle, often scope of this emerging research area. Tube, which in turn is part and parcel of hiding the city’s intrinsic contradictions. London. Likewise, urban computing On the other hand, undersound attempts ACKNOWLEDGMENTS isn’t simply about the city. It’s also part to speak to the contrast between media of the city, and its meaning and conse- that’s “pushed” onto people, sometimes The US National Science Foundation supported this work in part under awards 0133749, 0205724, quences arise not simply as informa- exposing them to new content, and per- 0326105, 0527729, and 0524033. In addition, tional accounts of urban space (directo- sonal media, which arguably affords them Intel provided a grant and a research internship. ries, maps, listings, and so on) but as sites a higher degree of control. In addition to Other support came from the EU-funded Bionets project, the UK’s Engineering and Physical Sciences for new sorts of individual and collec- this, while individuals might be motivated Research Council, and BT. tive meaning-making. In a word, urban to interact with the system for various rea- computing is situated rather than dislo- sons (purely for music listening, to pro- REFERENCES cated. Framing the city as a source of mote their band, to feed their curiosity experience rather than a source of trou- about other travelers, and so on), all their 1. A. Bassoli, J. Brewer, and K. Martin, “un- ble raises the design question: how are actions still contribute to the formation dersound: Music and Mobility under the City,” interactive poster at the Int’l Conf. information technologies implicated in of large phenomena. (Ubicomp 06), the aesthetics of everyday practice? Undersound reflects these phenomena 2006; www.ubicomp.org/ubicomp2006/ through situated visualizations, driven conference_program/posters. Localized interpersonal interactions by all the actions combined. Rather than 2. M. Lamming et al., “Satchel: Providing Ac- We’ve described a tension that exists in viewing users as disconnected from cess to Any Document, Any Time, Any- the Underground between the interest in resources, undersound explores the po- where,” ACM Trans. Computer-Human In- teraction, vol. 7, no. 3, 2000, pp. 322–352. observing fellow passengers and the desire tential for alternative forms of social to maintain the collective air of civil inat- practice to arise through the use of infor- 3. B. Brown et al., “Sharing the Square,” Proc. tention. Individuals already manage this mation technology and mobile systems. European Conf. Computer-Supported Co- operative Work (ECSCW 05), Springer, 2005, tension daily in various ways. 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44 PERVASIVEcomputing www.computer.org/pervasive the AUTHORS

Arianna Bassoli is a PhD candidate at the London School of Economics and Political Science in the Department of Media and Communications. She’s also a research as- sistant at the LSE, working on the EU-funded project Bionets, which looks into the future of wireless networks. Her research interests include interaction design, urban Computing and Networking (Mobicom computing, and the design of mobile proximity-based applications and technolo- 00), ACM Press, 2000, pp. 20–31. gies that support communication and data sharing among colocated people. She has an MSc in communication sciences from the University of Siena, Italy. Contact 6. R. Grinter et al., “Revisiting the Visit: Un- her at the Digital Ecosystems Lab, London School of Economics, Houghton St., Lon- derstanding How Technology Can Shape the don, UK WC2A 2AE; [email protected]. Museum Visit,” Proc. ACM Conf. Com- puter Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW Johanna Brewer is a PhD student in the Informatics Department at the University 02), ACM Press, 2002, pp. 146–155. of California, Irvine, working with Paul Dourish. Her research interests are in urban computing, particularly in the design of technologies that can forge new types of 7. J. Burrell et al., “Context-Aware Comput- connections between people and transform or reinforce old ones. She has an MA in ing: A Test Case,” Proc. Int’l Conf. Ubiq- computer science from Boston University. She’s a member of the ACM. Contact her uitous Computing (Ubicomp 02, Springer, at the Donald Bren School of Information and Computer Sciences, 5059 Bren Hall, 2002, pp. 1–15. Univ. of California, Irvine, CA 92697-3440; [email protected].

8. W. Griswold et al., “ActiveCampus—Ex- periments in Community-Oriented Ubiqui- Karen Martin is an EngD candidate at University College London. Her research in- tous Computing,” Computer, vol. 37, no. terests include investigating the articulation between social, spatial, and telecommu- 10, 2004, pp. 73–81. nications networks in urban environments and developing methods for mobility de- sign in the city. She has an MSc in virtual environments from the Bartlett School of 9. P. Agre, “Changing Places: Contexts of Architecture. Contact her at the Bartlett School of Graduate Studies, Univ. College Awareness in Computing,” Human-Com- London, London, UK WC1E 3BT; [email protected]. puter Interaction, vol. 16, nos. 2–4, 2001, pp. 177–192.

10. D.M. Russell and R. Gossweiler, “On the Design of Personal and Communal Large Paul Dourish is professor of informatics at the University of California, Irvine, with Information Scale Appliances,” Proc. Int’l courtesy appointments in computer science and in anthropology. His research fo- Conf. Ubiquitous Computing (Ubicomp cuses on the intersection of social and technical considerations in ubiquitous and 01), LNCS 2201, Springer, 2001, pp. urban computing. He has a PhD in computer science from University College Lon- 354–361. don. He’s a member of the IEEE, ACM, American Anthropological Assoc., and Soci- ety for the Social Studies of Science. Contact him at the Donald Bren School of In- 11. S. Benford et al., “Can You See Me Now?” formation and Computer Sciences, 5086 Bren Hall, Univ. of California, Irvine, CA ACM Trans. Computer-Human Interac- 92697-3440; [email protected]. tion, vol. 13, no. 1, 2006, pp. 100–133. Scott Mainwaring is a senior researcher in the People and Practices Research group 12. M. Bell et al., “Interweaving Mobile Games of Intel Research. His research interests include relationships between people and in- with Everyday Life,” Proc. ACM Conf. frastructures, urban mobility, design for reflection, and user-centered digital money. Human Factors in Computing Systems He has a PhD in psychology from and is a member of ACM SIGCHI. (CHI 06), ACM Press, 2006, pp. 417–426. Contact him at Intel Research, 20270 NW Amberglen Ct., AG1-110, Beaverton, OR 97006; [email protected]. 13. L. Gaye, R. Mazé, and L.E. Holmquist, “Sonic City: The Urban Environment as a Musical Interface,” Proc. 2003 Conf. New Interfaces for Musical Expression, 2003, pp. 109–115.

14. A. Bassoli, J. Moore, and S. Agamanolis, “tunA: Socialising Music Sharing on the 17. J. Wood, “Global Positioning System 22. M. Bull, Sounding Out the City: Personal Move,” Consuming Music Together: Social Drawing Project,” homepage, 2007; www. Stereos and the Management of Everyday and Collaborative Aspects of Music Con- gpsdrawing.com. Life, Berg, 2000. sumption Technologies, K. O’Hara and B. Brown, eds., Springer, 2006, pp. 151–172. 18. S. Low, “The Anthropology of Cities,” Ann. 23. M. Augè, In the Metro, Univ. Minnesota Rev. Anthropology, vol. 25, 1996, pp. Press, 2002. 15. J. Reid et al., “Magic Moments in Situated 383–409. Mediascapes,” Proc. ACM SIGCHI Int’l 24. J. Vertesi, “Mind the Gap: The Tube Map as Conf. Advances in Computer Entertain- 19. J. Brewer, S. Mainwaring, and P. Dourish, London’s User Interface,” position paper, ment Technology (ACE 05), ACM Press, “Aesthetic Journeys,” in preparation. Conf. Human Factors in Computing Systems 2005, pp. 290–293. (CHI 05) workshop on Engaging the City, 20. J. Levine, A. Vinson, and D. Wood, Subway 2005; http://hciresearch.hcii.cs.cmu.edu/ 16. V. Kostakos, E. O’Neill, and A. Penn, Behavior, Nelson, 1973. engaging_cities/Submissions/index.html. “Architectural Space, Interaction Space, and Information Spheres: Designing Urban 21. E. Goffman, Behavior in Public Places: 25. J. Scott, Seeing Like a State: How Certain Pervasive Systems,” Computer, vol. 39, no. Notes on the Social Organization of Gath- Schemes to Improve the Human Condition 9, 2006, pp. 52–59. erings, Free Press of Glencoe, 1963. Have Failed, Yale Univ. Press, 1998.

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