Digital Fashion: Wearing Your Heart on Your Sleeve
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DIGITAL FASHION: WEARING YOUR HEART ON YOUR SLEEVE Keith Syn Gin Shu B.Sc. H., Acadia University, 1998 Thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science in the School Computing Science O Keith Syn Gin Shu 2002 SIMON FRASER UNIVERSITY November 2002 All rights reserved. This work may not be reproduced in whole or in part, by photocopy or other means, without permission of the author. Approval Name: Keith Sku Syn Gin Shu Degree: MSc. Computing Science Title of thesis: Digital Fashion: Wearing your heart on your sleeve Examining Committee: Chair: Dr. Arthur Kirkpatrick Assistant Professor School of Computing Science Simon Fraser UniveP'Q 1 Dr. Kori hkpen Senior Co-Supervisor Faculty of Computing Science Dalhousie University Dr. stella Atkins Senior Co-Supervisor School of Computing Science Simon Fraser University Dr. Sidney'Fels External Examiner Department of Electrical & Computer Engineering University of British Columbia SIMON FRASER UNIVERSITY PARTIAL COPYRIGHT LICENSE I hereby grant to Simon Fraser University the right to lend my thesis, project and extended essay (the title of which is shown below) to users of the Simon Fraser University Library, and to make partial or single copies only for such users or in response to a request from the library of any other university, or other educational institution, on its own behalf or for one of its users. I further agree that permission for multiple copying of this work for scholarly purposes may be granted by me or the Dean of Graduate Studies. It is understood that copying or publication of this work for financial gain shall not be allowed without my written permission. Title of Thesis/Project/Extended Essay Digital Fashion: Wearing your Heart on your Sleeve Author: (signature) Keith Syn Gin Shu (name) (date) Abstract Clothes and fashion open a secondary i.e. non-verbal communication channel that allows individuals to make connections with each other. Our work proposes the concept of Digital Fashion, which uses technology to connect people in close proximity by enhancing a visual secondary communication channel. Non-private profile information known as shared knowledge is communicated via an online poll system that activates poll questions periodically. Our Digital Fashion implementation utilizes a handheld computer connected to a wireless radio network to drive a public wearable display worn on the user's body. The wearable display system consists of flexible electroluminescent wire and a light controller responsive to wireless communications. Shared knowledge is stored as answers to poll questions. As poll questions become active, the wearable display changes colours to reflect the wearers' answer to the active poll question. Several user studies were conducted to evaluate this technology with data from field observations, questionnaires and interviews. The results from our user studies revealed that technology could play a useful role within social settings if designed appropriately. We found the choice of fashion as a secondary communication channel very appropriate because of its unobtrusiveness. Our system did not appear to hinder interactions but rather helped to create richer social interactions. Dedication TO Papa. Acknowledgements I would like to thank my supervisors, Dr. Kori Inkpen and Dr. Stella Atkins for their guidance and encouragement. Thanks to my friends at the Edge Lab and Gruvi Lab particularly Felix Lau and Daryn Mitchell who put up with my nonsense. Colin Swindells and Kevin Stanley provided their expertise in electronics. Arman Danesh, Dr. Jason Harrison, Christina Lee, Regan Mandryk, Diego Maranan, and Melanie Tory helped with workshops. Thanks to Adrian Ally for our Tim Horton chats. Many thanks to my friends Steve, Trena and Miss Aiyanna who fed me while I wrote. Thanks to Wendy Lawson who encouraged me and kept me motivated. Thanks to Wendy Shu for all those angpows at the right times. To Sylvia, Ken and Shen who might be delighted to be mentioned. I owe my thanks to many other people and for more specific things, but nobody wants to read about that. May God bless all those who love me and all those whom I love. Table of Contents .. Approval ........................................................................................... ii ... Abstract ............................................................................................ iii Dedication ........................................................................................ iv Acknowledgements ........................................................................... v Table of Contents .............................................................................. vi List of Tables .................................................................................... x List of Figures ................................................................................... xi 1. Wearing your heart on your sleeve ............................................. 1 1.1. Fashion as a communication channel ................................. -4 1.2. Shared knowledge ............................................................... 5 1.3. The Role of Technology ........................................................ 6 1.4. Understanding the domain .................................................. 7 1.5. Goal of the work .................................................................. 7 2 . Background ............................................................................. 10 2.1. Social Computing ................................................................ 11 2.1.1. Social Translucence ...................................................... 12 2.1.2. Informal Communications .............................................-14 2.1.3. Calm Computing ............................................................ 16 2.2. Face-to-face interactions ..................................................... 18 2.3. Pervasive and ubiquitous computing ................................... 22 2.3.1. Active Badges ................................................................. 22 2.3.2. Inter-Personal Awareness Devices .................................. 23 P Hummingbird ................................................................ 24 P ProxyLady ..................................................................... 25 P Proem ........................................................................... -26 2.3.3. NTN ............................................................................... 27 2.4. Public Wearable Displays ................................................... -29 2.4.1. Meme Tags .................................................................... -29 2.4.2. Wearboy ......................................................................... 31 2.4.3. Hot Badges .................................................................... -32 2.4.4. Biometric Wearable Displays ......................................... -34 2.5. Methodology Issues For Small Group Research .................... 35 3. Designing components for Digital Fashion ................................. 39 3.1. Design requirements .......................................................... -40 3.2. System setup...................................................................... -43 3.2.1. Communication/ computing platform ............................. 46 3.2.2. Display technology choices ............................................. 47 3.3. Design methodology ........................................................... -49 3.4. Hardware Components ........................................................ 51 3.4.1. EL-wire lights ................................................................. 51 3.4.2. Light controller .............................................................. -51 3.5. Software Components .......................................................... 54 3.5.1. The Pollsrus Database ................................................... -56 3.5.2. The Pollsrus WebSite ..................................................... -57 3.5.3. The Cybiko Handheld Computer ..................................... 60 G Cybiko Client ................................................................. 61 P Cybiko Server ................................................................ 64 3.5.4. Server System Software .................................................. 66 G PC Server ......................................................................66 P Community Display ....................................................... 71 P Remote Community Display ......................................... -73 3.6. Testing and Evaluation ....................................................... -74 vii 3.7. Problems and Issues ............................................................ 76 4 . Early Explorations ..................................................................... 78 4.1. Paper-Based PollTags ......................................................... -79 4.1.1. Setup ............................................................................. 79 4.1.2. Results ........................................................................... 81 4.2. SCWIST Workshop ............................................................. -85 4.2.1. Setup ............................................................................ -86 4.2.2. Results.......................................................................... -86 4.3. Shad Valley Workshop ........................................................ -87