Heli Väätäjä

Crowdsourced news reporting: supporting news content creation with mobile phones

As news organizations are moving towards systematically using the power of crowds in news reporting, mobile phones are potential mobile tools for reader reporters. We conducted two user studies to support the development of future mobile crowdsourcing processes and mobile tools for news reporting. In a quasi-experiment on future mobile crowdsourcing process with location-based assignments, SMS messages were experienced as an easy and handy means for news assignments. A customized mobile client prototype was preferred for submission of multimedia content (photo and video), since submission was experienced simple to use and reliable especially for videos. Based on our findings and earlier research we discuss implications for the development of mobile crowdsourcing processes with mobile news reporting assignments.

Dimensions of Context Affecting User Experience in Mobile Work

Understanding the contextual factors affecting user experience is essential in designing and evaluating mobile systems for mobile work. The aim of this paper is to explore these contextual factors through three case studies: of safety observation at construction sites, passenger transportation with taxis, and mobile news journalism. For each case study we describe the nature of the mobile work and present our findings on the contextual factors that were found to affect the user experience. Based on the results, we present and discuss five dimensions of mobile work context affecting user experience: 1) social, 2) spatial, 3) temporal, 4) infrastructural, and 5) task context. Compared to earlier frameworks of context for mobile work, the social context as well as the infrastructural context was emphasized in our findings. The presented framework elaborates the dimensions of context affecting user experience of mobile systems and services in mobile work in particular. The framework is also applicable for mobile consumer systems and services.

Ethical issues and guidelines when conducting HCI studies with animals

The number of studies in the field of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) with animals has increased in recent years. When planning and carrying out the studies with animals, it is important and necessary to take into account the welfare of the animals as well as deal with the short- and long-term effects of the developed technology and related interventions on animal welfare. This paper addresses the ethical issues, presents the key concepts and provides guidelines for carrying out studies with animals based on a literature review. The guidelines cover the phases from planning of the studies, to carrying out and reporting the studies.

Mobile Journalist Toolkit: a field study on producing news articles with a mobile device

Todays handheld mobile devices with advanced multimedia capabilities and wireless broadband connectivity have emerged as potential new tools for journalists to produce news articles. It is envisioned that they could enable faster, more authentic, and more efficient news production, and many large news producing organizations, including Reuters and BBC, have recently been experimenting with them. In this paper, we present a field study on using mobile devices to produce news articles. During the study, a group of 19 M.A.-level journalism students used the Mobile Journalist Toolkit, a lightweight set of tools for mobile journalist work built around the Nokia N82 camera phone, to produce an online news blog. Our results indicate that while the mobile device cannot completely replace the traditional tools, for some types of journalist tasks they provide major benefits over the traditional tools, and are thus a useful addition to the journalists toolbox.

Opportunities and Challenges of Designing the Service User eXperience (SUX) in Web 2.0

Developed countries are in a transition into service societies. In the past few years, there has been a significant rise in Internet services in people’s everyday lives. With the rise of the phenomenon called Web 2.0, users of the services are starting to experience new types of dynamically evolving services. New services enable user-created content and social awareness, and they are often dynamically composed of various service “mashup” components. Even though there are numerous success stories of such services, coherent design principles of user experience of these services are only starting to emerge. One significant aspect that affects the user-centered design of Web 2.0 services is the dynamic nature of service development, with the requirement of fast and continuous iteration of the services. In this chapter, we first explore the nature of Web 2.0 services from the users’ perspective. We then review the multidisciplinary nature of experience, service experience, and user experience, and summarize the essential elements of the service user experience (SUX). We then investigate the applicability of user-centered design principles to the service development life cycle and discuss users’ new roles in service development. We present a summary of SUX design opportunities and challenges. Our main conclusions are that new, agile methods to involve users in the service development process need to be developed, and that less technically advanced users should be involved in co-creation of Web 2.0 services.

Mobile Work Efficiency: Balancing Between Benefits, Costs and Sacrifices

Smartphones can be characterized as multipurpose mobile devices, or as pocket-sized mobile computers and multimedia devices. In the fieldwork of mobile journalists in news reporting, the efficiency of work could potentially be enhanced with smartphones. Smartphones equipped with mobile services and applications support various work tasks from preparing for the reporting to capturing and submitting or publishing the story or news material directly from the field. Based on ten studies on mobile news making the author discusses smartphones as enablers and characteristics that may constrain the usage and decrease the perceived work efficiency. The identified benefits of smartphones for mobile journalists are categorized as 1 temporal, 2 location, 3 convenience, 4 satisfaction, 5 informational, 6 communicational, 7 work process, and 8 monetary benefits. The costs and sacrifices are related to the ergonomics of working and lower level of working comfort, a lower perceived quality of the created news material and reporting, a feeling of loss of control over the capturing, and changes in the roles and responsibilities, for example. Balance between benefits, costs, and sacrifices of using smartphones in mobile news making seems to depend on the situation at hand as well as on the goals and objectives of news reporting.

Mobile questionnaires for user experience evaluation

As user experience studies move from laboratories to mobile context, we need tools for collecting data in natural settings. Based on the results from a pilot study, we present early guidelines for designing mobile questionnaires to be filled in on handheld, palm-sized mobile devices. We found that special attention needs to be paid to the clarity and simplicity of the structure, layout and questionnaire content, including questions, visual icons, items and scales. In addition to the requirements set by the screen size, also data entry method, interaction style and mobile context related issues need to be taken into account when designing questionnaires for mobile devices.

Journalism in virtual reality: opportunities and future research challenges

This paper presents a state-of-the-art overview of journalism and its opportunities and challenges in virtual reality (VR). First, we examine what kind of real-life journalistic experiments have been made in this field thus far, and then we analyze the research literature on journalistic VR. We discuss the emergence of virtual reality and immersive journalism explored in the latest reports in the fields of Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) and VR design. To analyze VR journalism further, we develop an early draft of an analysis model based on sample of three VR productions and four VR applications. We conclude by discussing the results of the analysis and outline a more advanced and interdisciplinary research approach for studying and designing journalistic VR productions.

Readers' motivations to participate in hyperlocal news content creation

Readers are increasingly participating to news content creation by submitting user-generated content (UGC). We studied the participation motivations of active readers who send photo content to a hyperlocal news publisher. The first results based on an online questionnaire indicate that fun, the opportunity to get a monetary reward and informing others of local issues are the strongest motivators. In addition, participation to the news making activity and self-expression are important motivations. Those who intentionally planned and searched for topics to report with photos, reported more often the opportunity for extra income and development as a photographer as participation motivations than those, who captured photos when a good topic came about.

MoJo in Action: The use of mobiles in conflict, community and cross platform Journalism

As citizen journalism and social media continue to influence and shape the global media landscape, and as smartphone technology becomes increasingly prevalent and affordable, this paper details four international smartphone-centric case studies that utilize a beta-stage editorial commissioning platform and accompanying smartphone. The study comes as increasing numbers of news organizations and citizen journalism tools harness the power of smartphones to both collect and publish editorial content. This paper examines the potential for community, student, and professional reporters to collate and transmit media via a tailored publishing platform provide and asks whether this platform can create a seamless link between smartphone content production and newsroom-based operations. It outlines considerations for future platform development and potential design methodologies to facilitate improved content capture methods, making the case for ongoing and collaborative co-design. UCLans School of Journalism, through the RCUK-funded Bespoke Project, trialled Nokia Research Centers technology with community users, professional journalists, and student reporters between 2009 and 2011.Test locations included Fort Bastion, Afghanistan, rural Kenya, and Preston and Manchester in the UK. This paper also investigates the tension created when incorporating new platforms with pre-existing newsflows, and looks forward to a newsroom ecosystem where mobile phones are integrated within standard working practices.