The MIT Press Frankfurt Book Fair 2017 DESIGN design | computer-human interaction The Materiality of Interaction Notes on the Materials of Interaction Design Mikael Wiberg Smart watches, smart cars, the Internet of things, 3D printing: all signal a trend toward combining digital and analog materials in design. Interac- tion with these new hybrid forms is increasingly mediated through physi- cal materials, and therefore interaction design is increasingly a material concern. In this book, Mikael Wiberg describes the shift in interaction design toward material interactions. He argues that the “material turn” in human-computer interaction has moved beyond a representation- driven paradigm, and he proposes “material-centered interaction design” as a new approach to interaction design and its materials. He calls for interaction design to abandon its narrow focus on what the computer can do and embrace a broader view of interaction design as a practice of imagining and designing interaction through material manifestations. A material-centered approach to interaction design enables a fundamental design method for working across digital, physical, and even immaterial materials in interaction design projects. Wiberg looks at the history of material configurations in comput- ing and traces the shift from metaphors in the design of graphical user interfaces to materiality in tangible user interfaces. He examines interac- tion through a material lens; suggests a new method and foundation for interaction design that accepts the digital as a design material and A new approach to focuses on interaction itself as the form being designed; considers design interaction design that across substrates; introduces the idea of “interactive compositions”; and moves beyond representation argues that the focus on materiality transcends any distinction between and metaphor to focus on the physical and digital. the material manifestations of interaction. Mikael Wiberg is Professor of Informatics and Associate Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences at Umeå University, Sweden. March 6 x 9, 200 pp. 32 illus. $35.00S/£27.95 cloth 978-0-262-03751-8 82 SPRING 2018 | MITPRESS.MIT.EDU ARCHITECTURE | URBANISM PROFESSIONAL architecture | urbanism Site Planning International Practice Gary Hack Cities are built site by site. Site planning—the art and science of design- ing settlements on the land—encompasses a range of activities under- taken by architects, planners, urban designers, landscape architects, and engineers. This book offers a comprehensive, up-to-date guide to site planning that is global in scope. It covers planning processes and standards, new technologies, sustainability, and cultural context, address- ing the roles of all participants and stakeholders and offering extensive treatment of practices in rapidly urbanizing countries. Kevin Lynch and Gary Hack wrote the classic text on the subject, and this book takes up where the earlier book left off. It can be used as a textbook and will be an essential reference for practitioners. Site Planning consists of forty self-contained modules, organized into five parts: The Art of Site Planning, which presents site planning as a shared enterprise; Understanding Sites, covering the components of site analysis; Planning Sites, covering the processes involved; Site Infra- structure, from transit to waste systems; and Site Prototypes, including housing, recreation, and mixed use. Each module offers a brief introduc- tion, covers standards or approaches, provides examples, and presents in- novative practices in sidebars. The book is lavishly illustrated with 1350 photographs, diagrams, and examples of practice. A comprehensive, Gary Hack has studied, taught, and practiced site planning for more than forty state-of-the-art guide years in the United States, Canada, and other countries. He is Professor Emeri- to site planning, covering tus of Urban Design at MIT, where he headed the Department of Urban Studies planning processes, new and Planning, Professor Emeritus and former Dean of the School of Design at technologies, and the University of Pennsylvania, and Visiting Professor at Tsinghua and Chongq- sustainability, with ing Universities. extensive treatment of practices in rapidly urbanizing countries. April 8 x 10, 800 pp. 1,317 illus. $80.00X/£66.95 paper 978-0-262-53485-7 $120.00X/£99.95 cloth 978-0-262-03738-9 MITPRESS.MIT.EDU | SPRING 2018 77 ART | MEDIA COGNITIVE SCIENCE art | media cognitive science The Metainterface Efficient Cognition The Art of Platforms, Cities, and Clouds The Evolution of Representational Decision Making Christian Ulrik Andersen and Søren Bro Pold Armin W. Schulz The computer interface is both omnipresent and invisible, at Many organisms (including humans) make decisions by relying once embedded in everyday objects and characterized by hid- on mental representations. Not simply a reaction triggered by den exchanges of informa- perception, representational How the interface has tion between objects. The An argument that decision making employs moved from the office interface has moved from representational decision high-level, non-perceptual into culture, as seen in office into culture, with making is more cognitively mental states with content a series of works of net devices, apps, the cloud, and efficient, allowing an to manage interactions with art, software art and data streams as new cultural organism to adjust the environment. A person electronic literature. platforms. In The Metainter- more easily to changes making a decision based on face, Christian Ulrik Ander- in the environment. mental representations, for sen and Søren Bro Pold examine the relationships between art example, takes a step back and interfaces, tracing the interface’s disruption of everyday from her perceptions at the time to assess the nature of the cultural practices. They present a new interface paradigm of world she lives in. But why would organisms rely on represen- cloud services, smart phones, and data capture, and examine tational decision making, and what evolutionary benefits does how particular art forms—including net art, software art and this reliance provide to the decision maker? In Efficient Cognition, electronic literature—seek to reflect and explore this paradigm. Armin Schulz argues that representational decision making can Andersen and Pold argue that despite attempts to make the be more cognitively efficient than non-representational decision interface disappear into smooth access and smart interaction, making. Specifically, he shows that a key driver in the evolution it gradually resurfaces; there is a metainterface to the dis- of representational decision making is that mental representa- placed interface. Art can help us see this; the interface can be tions can enable an organism to save cognitive resources and an important outlet for aesthetic critique. Andersen and Pold adjust more efficiently to changed environments. describe the “semantic capitalism” of a metainterface industry After laying out the foundations of his argument—clarify- that captures user behavior; the metainterface industry’s dis- ing the central questions, the characterization of representa- ruption of everyday urban life, changing how the city is read, tional decision making, and the relevance of an evidential form inhabited, and organized; the ways that the material displace- of evolutionary psychology—Schulz presents his account of ment of the cloud affects the experience of the interface; and the evolution of representational decision making and critically the potential of designing with an awareness of the language considers some of the existing accounts of the subject. He and grammar of interfaces. then applies his account to three open questions concerning the nature of representational decision making: the extended- Christian Ulrik Andersen teaches and researches software and ness of decision making, and when we should expect cognition computer interfaces in the School of Communication and Culture at to extend into the environment; the specialization of decision Aarhus University. Søren Bro Pold is Associate Professor of Digital making and the use of simple heuristics; and the psychological Aesthetics in the School of Communication and Culture at Aarhus University. sources of altruistic behaviors. June | 7 x 9, 240 pp. | 39 illus. Armin W. Schulz is Associate Professor of Philosophy at the Univer- sity of Kansas. $30.00X/£24.95 cloth 978-0-262-03794-5 March | 6 x 9, 288 pp. | 9 illus. $45.00S/£37.95 cloth 978-0-262-03760-0 78 SPRING 2018 | MITPRESS.MIT.EDU COGNITIVE SCIENCE COMPUTER SCIENCE cognitive science | psychology computer science The Illusion of Conscious Will Data Stream Mining NEW EDITION with Practical Examples in MOA Daniel M. Wegner Albert Bifet, Ricard Gavaldà, Geoffrey Holmes, and Bernhard Pfahringer foreword by Daniel Gilbert introduction by Thalia Wheatley Today many information sources—including sensor networks, financial markets, social networks, and healthcare monitor- Do we consciously cause our actions, or do they happen to us? ing—are so-called data Philosophers, psychologists, neuroscientists, theologians, and A hands-on approach streams, arriving sequentially lawyers have long debated to tasks and techniques A new edition of Wegner’s and at high speed. Analy- the existence of free will in data stream mining classic and controversial sis must take place in real versus determinism. With the and real-time analytics, time, with partial data and work, arguing that publication of The