Neeti Gupta

A significant body of research has addressed whether fixed internet use increases, decreases or supplements the ways in which people engage in residential and workplace settings, but few stu- dies have addressed how wireless internet use in public and semi-public spaces influences social life. Ubiquitous wi-fi adds a new dimension,to the debate over how,the internet may,influence the structure of community. Will wireless internet use facilitate greater engagement,with co- located others or… Show more

A significant body of research has addressed whether fixed internet use increases, decreases or supplements the ways in which people engage in residential and workplace settings, but few stu- dies have addressed how wireless internet use in public and semi-public spaces influences social life. Ubiquitous wi-fi adds a new dimension,to the debate over how,the internet may,influence the structure of community. Will wireless internet use facilitate greater engagement,with co- located others or encourage a form of ‘public privatism’? This article reports the findings of an exploratory ethnographic study of how wi-fi was used and influenced social interactions in four different settings: paid and free wi-fi cafes in Boston, MA and Seattle, WA. This study found contrasting uses for wireless internet and competing,implications for community. Two types of practices, typified in the behaviors of ‘true mobiles’ and ‘placemakers’, offer divergent futures for how wireless internet use may influence social relationships. Show less

In this paper we introduce FishPong, an interactive system designed to stimulate informal computer-supported cooperative play (CSCP) in public spaces such as coffeehouses and cafés. FishPong consists of a tabletop tangible user interface (TUI) that allows users to control a fish-themed video game using magnetically tagged coffee cups. FishPong has been designed as an "icebreaker" technology to encourage spontaneous social interaction among coffeehouse patrons. This work serves as an example of… Show more

In this paper we introduce FishPong, an interactive system designed to stimulate informal computer-supported cooperative play (CSCP) in public spaces such as coffeehouses and cafés. FishPong consists of a tabletop tangible user interface (TUI) that allows users to control a fish-themed video game using magnetically tagged coffee cups. FishPong has been designed as an "icebreaker" technology to encourage spontaneous social interaction among coffeehouse patrons. This work serves as an example of how environments might be subtly and unobtrusively augmented in order to facilitate informal human-to-human interaction Show less

We describe the results of a field deployment of the AURA system which links online content to physical objects through machine readable tags. AURA runs on commercially available pocket computers using integrated barcode scanners, wireless networks, and web services. We conducted a real world deployment with twenty participants over five weeks. The results from our field study illustrate the importance of moving beyond demonstrations and testing system design assumptions in the real world, as… Show more

We describe the results of a field deployment of the AURA system which links online content to physical objects through machine readable tags. AURA runs on commercially available pocket computers using integrated barcode scanners, wireless networks, and web services. We conducted a real world deployment with twenty participants over five weeks. The results from our field study illustrate the importance of moving beyond demonstrations and testing system design assumptions in the real world, as our field study highlighted several places that our seemingly reasonable design assumption did not match with real usage. Our experience deploying AURA highlighted several key features for mobile object triggered information systems including handling groups of items and a robust offline experience. Show less