WEBVTT 00:00:11.460 --> 00:00:16.920 PROFESSOR: We're going to start with the discussion portion, 00:00:16.920 --> 00:00:20.968 just to give a little context to the reading 00:00:20.968 --> 00:00:21.885 that we've been doing. 00:00:25.290 --> 00:00:35.580 I am a big fan of having designers think about artifacts 00:00:35.580 --> 00:00:41.370 through the lens of criticism every now and then, 00:00:41.370 --> 00:00:50.310 and I have a background in games criticism. 00:00:50.310 --> 00:00:54.060 I did that for about 10 years in parallel 00:00:54.060 --> 00:00:58.380 with my illustrious academic career 00:00:58.380 --> 00:01:01.050 when I was still in Sweden. 00:01:01.050 --> 00:01:08.970 So I also teach games criticism to unrelated students 00:01:08.970 --> 00:01:10.950 here at MIT. 00:01:10.950 --> 00:01:18.900 And when it comes how to do critiques 00:01:18.900 --> 00:01:24.000 of interactive artifacts, there's 00:01:24.000 --> 00:01:29.880 still a lot of uncertainty about how to best do it, 00:01:29.880 --> 00:01:35.490 and how and why it needs to be different from criticism 00:01:35.490 --> 00:01:38.610 of film or literature, or any of these things 00:01:38.610 --> 00:01:46.140 that we've been doing analysis of since for it. 00:01:46.140 --> 00:01:49.380 And one of the approaches is a method 00:01:49.380 --> 00:01:51.840 called interaction criticism. 00:01:51.840 --> 00:01:57.780 It's not specifically designed for games 00:01:57.780 --> 00:02:00.400 or playful interactive experiences, 00:02:00.400 --> 00:02:11.280 but just interactive, non-production-related 00:02:11.280 --> 00:02:14.820 artifacts in general. 00:02:14.820 --> 00:02:18.720 And the things we've been reading today 00:02:18.720 --> 00:02:24.370 is, one, from the originator himself, Jeff Bardzell. 00:02:24.370 --> 00:02:29.400 So we're trying to give an introduction to the method 00:02:29.400 --> 00:02:31.440 and the theory behind it. 00:02:31.440 --> 00:02:38.550 And the other one is him and two other interaction design 00:02:38.550 --> 00:02:41.280 and media studies scholars trying 00:02:41.280 --> 00:02:47.010 to apply interaction criticism to a particular cultural 00:02:47.010 --> 00:02:52.230 artifact, and through different senses 00:02:52.230 --> 00:02:53.850 and seeing what they come up with, 00:02:53.850 --> 00:02:56.790 and whether that's interesting and fruitful. 00:02:56.790 --> 00:02:59.970 So with that said, let's start with the one 00:02:59.970 --> 00:03:02.910 called Interaction Criticism, an Introduction to the Practice, 00:03:02.910 --> 00:03:05.150 and put keywords on the whiteboard. 00:03:10.060 --> 00:03:21.730 OK, so maybe we want to start with-- 00:03:21.730 --> 00:03:23.620 it doesn't matter which one of these-- 00:03:23.620 --> 00:03:27.190 but subjective. 00:03:27.190 --> 00:03:28.353 Who put that there? 00:03:28.353 --> 00:03:29.020 AUDIENCE: Hello. 00:03:29.020 --> 00:03:30.265 PROFESSOR: OK, hello. 00:03:30.265 --> 00:03:35.050 AUDIENCE: OK, so one of the interesting things 00:03:35.050 --> 00:03:37.360 from this paper I noticed is that when 00:03:37.360 --> 00:03:40.810 you talk about criticism, it's someone's judgment on a thing, 00:03:40.810 --> 00:03:43.060 and that judgment can often be subjective. 00:03:43.060 --> 00:03:45.280 And so a lot of the discussion in this paper 00:03:45.280 --> 00:03:50.080 is reconciling the clearly subjective nature of criticism, 00:03:50.080 --> 00:03:54.910 but in a way that, they say, is judgments 00:03:54.910 --> 00:03:57.115 that are subjective, but non-perspectival. 00:04:00.040 --> 00:04:02.260 Is that how you pronounce that? 00:04:02.260 --> 00:04:04.840 PROFESSOR: I think they probably just made up the word, 00:04:04.840 --> 00:04:07.750 so it's your call. 00:04:07.750 --> 00:04:11.870 AUDIENCE: I know what they mean, which ties into perspectives. 00:04:11.870 --> 00:04:14.500 But the idea is that the judgment 00:04:14.500 --> 00:04:20.620 itself comes from, they focus on critics that are experts 00:04:20.620 --> 00:04:23.530 in their fields, and the judgments themselves come 00:04:23.530 --> 00:04:37.420 from experts who know about many similar types of interaction, I 00:04:37.420 --> 00:04:37.920 would say. 00:04:37.920 --> 00:04:40.800 I don't want to say games, because it doesn't say games. 00:04:40.800 --> 00:04:45.150 PROFESSOR: Yeah, no, it clearly sort of skirts. 00:04:45.150 --> 00:04:50.610 So just to interrupt a little bit. 00:04:50.610 --> 00:04:53.280 Specifically, [INAUDIBLE] is one of the people who 00:04:53.280 --> 00:04:55.500 are applying it in the second paper, 00:04:55.500 --> 00:05:00.270 has said that the only professional practice 00:05:00.270 --> 00:05:04.410 of interaction criticism is games criticism. 00:05:04.410 --> 00:05:10.230 We don't have any other sort of interactive art form that's 00:05:10.230 --> 00:05:14.580 sort of strong enough to have people get paid 00:05:14.580 --> 00:05:16.380 to do this kind of criticism. 00:05:16.380 --> 00:05:19.710 So for better or worse, that's kind 00:05:19.710 --> 00:05:22.800 of what we have to look to as an example. 00:05:22.800 --> 00:05:27.300 But especially Bardzell, I think, 00:05:27.300 --> 00:05:32.010 it's very critical to how games criticism is currently done, 00:05:32.010 --> 00:05:33.930 and thinks that there's a lot to learn 00:05:33.930 --> 00:05:36.210 from other critical practices, and he 00:05:36.210 --> 00:05:42.740 comes from a background in those areas. 00:05:42.740 --> 00:05:48.240 So yeah, he's not going to talk about games, 00:05:48.240 --> 00:05:50.383 but they're sort of hovering in there. 00:05:50.383 --> 00:05:52.050 AUDIENCE: And he also mentions, I guess, 00:05:52.050 --> 00:05:55.530 also that they're not talking about amateur critics, 00:05:55.530 --> 00:05:59.370 like the people who go on Amazon or on Steam and rate whatever 00:05:59.370 --> 00:06:00.840 they want to rate. 00:06:00.840 --> 00:06:03.930 Because that could be subjective but very 00:06:03.930 --> 00:06:07.860 based on that person's own experience 00:06:07.860 --> 00:06:12.200 without trying to see things in a broader context. 00:06:12.200 --> 00:06:13.730 PROFESSOR: So to begin with, what 00:06:13.730 --> 00:06:20.060 do we think of this idea of a somehow 00:06:20.060 --> 00:06:22.354 more rigorous objectivity? 00:06:22.354 --> 00:06:23.854 AUDIENCE: Yeah, that's [INAUDIBLE].. 00:06:26.720 --> 00:06:28.340 PROFESSOR: Reflections on that? 00:06:34.500 --> 00:06:36.030 Yes? 00:06:36.030 --> 00:06:37.200 AUDIENCE: I put aesthetics. 00:06:37.200 --> 00:06:41.530 And so it's very similar to what we're talking about right now, 00:06:41.530 --> 00:06:46.320 which I find that, throughout the readings that we've 00:06:46.320 --> 00:06:51.390 been doing, design is in the middle of science and art. 00:06:51.390 --> 00:06:54.960 So a lot of times there's a temptation 00:06:54.960 --> 00:06:56.400 to do things very scientifically, 00:06:56.400 --> 00:06:59.280 but that fails when aesthetics come into play, because they're 00:06:59.280 --> 00:07:01.110 very subjective. 00:07:01.110 --> 00:07:05.400 And so that's why we need criticism. 00:07:05.400 --> 00:07:08.940 That's what they're kind of saying. 00:07:08.940 --> 00:07:12.870 PROFESSOR: Right, so we don't have a choice but to rely 00:07:12.870 --> 00:07:18.210 on our subjectivity , because there's no other rules given 00:07:18.210 --> 00:07:23.130 to us for how to evaluate this kind of stuff. 00:07:23.130 --> 00:07:27.430 It's not just describable. 00:07:27.430 --> 00:07:30.310 That misses some important point. 00:07:30.310 --> 00:07:34.450 By the way, I would say that Bardzell doesn't 00:07:34.450 --> 00:07:39.520 think of design as something in between science and art, 00:07:39.520 --> 00:07:43.570 but rather something distinctly different from both. 00:07:43.570 --> 00:07:47.920 So he wants it to be its own thing. 00:07:47.920 --> 00:07:51.820 But yes, clearly, all the sources that he 00:07:51.820 --> 00:07:53.680 is borrowing on when he's creating 00:07:53.680 --> 00:07:59.620 this method coming from one or the other, so there's that. 00:08:03.020 --> 00:08:09.040 But yes, and those were the word pair I was thinking of, 00:08:09.040 --> 00:08:10.790 when I said we could start in either end. 00:08:10.790 --> 00:08:19.960 But then what goes into this expertise 00:08:19.960 --> 00:08:21.400 that he talks about how? 00:08:21.400 --> 00:08:26.260 Do we justify that someone's subjective opinion of something 00:08:26.260 --> 00:08:30.610 is more, weighs heavier than someone else's? 00:08:30.610 --> 00:08:36.549 What makes up for the difference between a critic 00:08:36.549 --> 00:08:39.580 and someone on Amazon? 00:08:39.580 --> 00:08:41.799 AUDIENCE: Well, knowledge about the field 00:08:41.799 --> 00:08:45.430 and having a very broad experience, 00:08:45.430 --> 00:08:48.300 and I guess the people who you are critiquing, 00:08:48.300 --> 00:08:49.720 or who are reading the critiques, 00:08:49.720 --> 00:08:51.880 knowing that you have that broad experience. 00:08:51.880 --> 00:08:55.600 Someone that got an espresso machine off Amazon 00:08:55.600 --> 00:08:57.580 might leave a terrible review being like, oh, 00:08:57.580 --> 00:09:00.640 it didn't just instantly make me coffee, one star, 00:09:00.640 --> 00:09:03.610 because they don't understand how the espresso machine works, 00:09:03.610 --> 00:09:05.980 or what the different grades might be, 00:09:05.980 --> 00:09:08.320 or how any of the different pieces of the process work. 00:09:08.320 --> 00:09:11.590 Whereas the critic who will have value behind what they say 00:09:11.590 --> 00:09:14.290 understands the whole field, and how this helps, 00:09:14.290 --> 00:09:16.210 and what place it has, and what the context 00:09:16.210 --> 00:09:19.690 of it, and like other good works in the field are. 00:09:19.690 --> 00:09:20.920 PROFESSOR: Right. 00:09:20.920 --> 00:09:23.110 So a good example, so this is one 00:09:23.110 --> 00:09:27.310 of those things that are often highlighted in design 00:09:27.310 --> 00:09:30.310 educations, and I probably have said the word a couple of times 00:09:30.310 --> 00:09:31.760 during the semester as well. 00:09:31.760 --> 00:09:35.950 So the way we educate ourselves in design 00:09:35.950 --> 00:09:38.500 is often looking at what has been 00:09:38.500 --> 00:09:41.230 established as good examples. 00:09:41.230 --> 00:09:44.530 And they're good just because someone decided they were good. 00:09:44.530 --> 00:09:47.170 There's nothing in nature determining 00:09:47.170 --> 00:09:50.740 that they're good other than ourselves and our community, 00:09:50.740 --> 00:09:55.330 but that has an important role, I would say, 00:09:55.330 --> 00:09:59.110 within games criticism. 00:09:59.110 --> 00:10:03.460 There's nothing that speaks as loud as having 00:10:03.460 --> 00:10:08.030 this almost data-based knowledge of the history of video games 00:10:08.030 --> 00:10:09.700 when you get interviewed for writing 00:10:09.700 --> 00:10:14.290 for a website or a journal, or something, magazine, 00:10:14.290 --> 00:10:15.820 I should say. 00:10:15.820 --> 00:10:18.100 That's what they question you on, 00:10:18.100 --> 00:10:21.130 do you know about this and that, and that 00:10:21.130 --> 00:10:24.970 is the most important criteria for whether you're 00:10:24.970 --> 00:10:26.762 going to get the job or not. 00:10:26.762 --> 00:10:28.750 AUDIENCE: It's, do you know the history? 00:10:28.750 --> 00:10:29.950 PROFESSOR: Yes. 00:10:29.950 --> 00:10:34.120 And that is one of the things that Bardzell would say 00:10:34.120 --> 00:10:36.280 is the problem with games criticism. 00:10:36.280 --> 00:10:38.950 What do you think could be potentially 00:10:38.950 --> 00:10:42.490 an issue with that kind of filter 00:10:42.490 --> 00:10:44.736 for who gets to be a critic? 00:10:44.736 --> 00:10:48.172 AUDIENCE: I'm not playing games to know the history of games. 00:10:48.172 --> 00:10:48.880 PROFESSOR: Right. 00:10:48.880 --> 00:10:51.850 But yeah, they actually expect you to not just know it, 00:10:51.850 --> 00:10:52.870 but have played it. 00:10:52.870 --> 00:10:57.940 So the most well-played, if we can make up a word 00:10:57.940 --> 00:11:02.620 based on well-read, so the most well-played people 00:11:02.620 --> 00:11:05.440 tend to get the jobs as critics. 00:11:05.440 --> 00:11:09.190 But is there a problem with that? 00:11:09.190 --> 00:11:10.800 And what would that-- 00:11:10.800 --> 00:11:13.480 and now we're sort of off the paper already, 00:11:13.480 --> 00:11:15.430 but we'll get back to it. 00:11:15.430 --> 00:11:17.710 AUDIENCE: There's sort of a disconnect between someone 00:11:17.710 --> 00:11:19.750 who has played a lot of games, with someone 00:11:19.750 --> 00:11:23.060 who has played no games. 00:11:23.060 --> 00:11:25.870 PROFESSOR: Yes. 00:11:25.870 --> 00:11:26.927 But, yes. 00:11:26.927 --> 00:11:28.760 AUDIENCE: Well, I mean, it was a good point. 00:11:28.760 --> 00:11:33.850 It would be difficult for the folks who played a lot of games 00:11:33.850 --> 00:11:38.350 to be able to even translate their thoughts to someone who's 00:11:38.350 --> 00:11:40.370 never played those games. 00:11:40.370 --> 00:11:43.810 PROFESSOR: Oh, that's what you were saying. 00:11:43.810 --> 00:11:50.200 So yes, you will be a little bit like, let's say, a jazz 00:11:50.200 --> 00:11:53.680 critic that just listens to-- 00:11:53.680 --> 00:11:54.685 AUDIENCE: Coltrane. 00:11:54.685 --> 00:11:55.810 PROFESSOR: Well, not even-- 00:11:55.810 --> 00:11:58.180 Coltrane is for the masses. 00:11:58.180 --> 00:12:01.180 They're beyond Coltrane. 00:12:01.180 --> 00:12:05.390 They might be talking above the heads of most people, 00:12:05.390 --> 00:12:08.800 so there's a disconnect with the audience. 00:12:08.800 --> 00:12:13.960 So that might just make the criticism very insular 00:12:13.960 --> 00:12:18.610 and not really sort of reach the audience 00:12:18.610 --> 00:12:21.980 who might be interested in evaluation 00:12:21.980 --> 00:12:23.455 of these cultural artifacts. 00:12:23.455 --> 00:12:28.060 So that, I think, is a very good point. 00:12:28.060 --> 00:12:31.010 Anything else along those lines? 00:12:31.010 --> 00:12:35.320 AUDIENCE: So what a fix to accommodate 00:12:35.320 --> 00:12:38.530 for that be to ask for a writing sample 00:12:38.530 --> 00:12:40.540 and actually judge whether or not 00:12:40.540 --> 00:12:46.600 that person can communicate at multiple levels of an audience? 00:12:46.600 --> 00:12:48.550 PROFESSOR: Actually, the most important skill 00:12:48.550 --> 00:12:52.120 is not being a very knowledgeable gamer, 00:12:52.120 --> 00:12:53.320 but being a good writer. 00:12:53.320 --> 00:12:59.010 Because without that skill, you get nowhere. 00:12:59.010 --> 00:13:01.870 And no one's going to read you, basically, 00:13:01.870 --> 00:13:05.310 because you write like a robot, or something. 00:13:05.310 --> 00:13:09.550 AUDIENCE: Actually, I want to say even the converse might 00:13:09.550 --> 00:13:12.820 actually be true, of trying to look for people who don't sort 00:13:12.820 --> 00:13:16.030 of toe the line of traditional game criticism 00:13:16.030 --> 00:13:20.290 and become a lot more sought after and invited now. 00:13:20.290 --> 00:13:26.590 So folks who are expressly stating opinions 00:13:26.590 --> 00:13:31.630 from or analyzing games are coming up 00:13:31.630 --> 00:13:33.310 from the lens of something that's 00:13:33.310 --> 00:13:35.480 not like traditional games criticism. 00:13:35.480 --> 00:13:40.060 It seems, in this click-hungry media 00:13:40.060 --> 00:13:44.080 landscape, seemed actually to be a lot more interesting to read. 00:13:44.080 --> 00:13:45.580 So they're good writers, and they're 00:13:45.580 --> 00:13:47.140 bringing a new perspective. 00:13:47.140 --> 00:13:51.820 PROFESSOR: And I think for, among other things, 00:13:51.820 --> 00:13:56.890 one important reason is that there is an existing 00:13:56.890 --> 00:14:03.520 hegemony around the field of what a good game is and should 00:14:03.520 --> 00:14:10.840 be that may be based on assumptions about gender 00:14:10.840 --> 00:14:14.380 and culture that should be questioned. 00:14:14.380 --> 00:14:18.430 It might be white men writing for white men, basically, 00:14:18.430 --> 00:14:20.390 of a certain age. 00:14:20.390 --> 00:14:24.820 And if we think, especially back in time, 00:14:24.820 --> 00:14:27.520 playing video games, having grown up 00:14:27.520 --> 00:14:30.940 playing all these games on all these consoles 00:14:30.940 --> 00:14:34.840 implies a very strong privilege when 00:14:34.840 --> 00:14:38.980 it comes to finance, your family's finances, 00:14:38.980 --> 00:14:40.090 for instance. 00:14:40.090 --> 00:14:42.520 Consoles used to be, I mean, they 00:14:42.520 --> 00:14:44.620 used to cost the same as they cost today. 00:14:44.620 --> 00:14:46.780 Games used to cost the same as they cost today, 00:14:46.780 --> 00:14:50.920 but that was a lot more money in the '80s and '90s 00:14:50.920 --> 00:14:51.860 than it is now. 00:14:51.860 --> 00:14:58.030 So someone who had access to all of the existing home consoles 00:14:58.030 --> 00:15:00.340 was probably a rich kid. 00:15:00.340 --> 00:15:04.150 So those were the ones who became reviewers and decided 00:15:04.150 --> 00:15:05.300 what a good game is. 00:15:05.300 --> 00:15:09.640 So there's something about looking to those good examples 00:15:09.640 --> 00:15:14.290 that could also need some questioning, and we might need 00:15:14.290 --> 00:15:17.800 to break with those traditions and look 00:15:17.800 --> 00:15:22.690 at other potential values in interactive artifacts 00:15:22.690 --> 00:15:24.910 as the ones that we are creating, 00:15:24.910 --> 00:15:26.710 those that are maybe more inclusive, 00:15:26.710 --> 00:15:30.850 or taking other skillsets to heart, 00:15:30.850 --> 00:15:34.750 rather than just excellent hand-eye coordination, 00:15:34.750 --> 00:15:39.970 or whatever it is that makes a good gamer. 00:15:39.970 --> 00:15:42.340 AUDIENCE: Before we leave this, just one more angle 00:15:42.340 --> 00:15:46.480 I want to bring up, which is, even if you were expressly 00:15:46.480 --> 00:15:49.150 looking for people who state that they 00:15:49.150 --> 00:15:57.550 have a long history with games and can bring up this catalog, 00:15:57.550 --> 00:15:59.290 which history, right? 00:15:59.290 --> 00:16:04.200 Because in games, or even digital games, 00:16:04.200 --> 00:16:07.020 and extend it out to non-digital games, 00:16:07.020 --> 00:16:09.030 to board games or tabletop and sports, 00:16:09.030 --> 00:16:12.900 then it's like each country, each region 00:16:12.900 --> 00:16:15.360 has its own history, and people consider 00:16:15.360 --> 00:16:18.220 different things canonical. 00:16:18.220 --> 00:16:24.820 So a lot of American white men writing for white boys 00:16:24.820 --> 00:16:29.620 pretty much have a fairly lacking experience 00:16:29.620 --> 00:16:33.950 of Eastern Bloc games, even games 00:16:33.950 --> 00:16:37.040 that were released in Asia, for instance. 00:16:37.040 --> 00:16:42.500 Only a few Japanese games are sort of re-released in America. 00:16:42.500 --> 00:16:44.340 And they think that's all of Japan, right? 00:16:44.340 --> 00:16:46.850 And it's like, no, that's not-- 00:16:46.850 --> 00:16:50.210 that's part of Japan, and not even all of Asia. 00:16:50.210 --> 00:16:51.650 So that would be an example. 00:16:51.650 --> 00:16:53.358 That will be another problem, is that you 00:16:53.358 --> 00:16:55.520 assume that a long history implies 00:16:55.520 --> 00:16:56.870 a comprehensive history. 00:16:56.870 --> 00:17:00.920 But no one really has a comprehensive specific history 00:17:00.920 --> 00:17:04.730 with the entire world's history of games. 00:17:04.730 --> 00:17:08.000 PROFESSOR: And that criticism has 00:17:08.000 --> 00:17:14.900 been put towards design studies, as well. 00:17:14.900 --> 00:17:17.569 I mean, we are reading three white men 00:17:17.569 --> 00:17:21.150 of a somewhat certain age here today. 00:17:21.150 --> 00:17:26.780 So they are, to some extent, myopic, as well, 00:17:26.780 --> 00:17:33.890 when it comes to cultural values in these artifacts. 00:17:33.890 --> 00:17:37.850 And I was thinking maybe we can get back on track 00:17:37.850 --> 00:17:44.290 by inviting whoever put perspectives on there. 00:17:44.290 --> 00:17:46.370 AUDIENCE: It was me. 00:17:46.370 --> 00:17:50.060 They were talking in this article about the four 00:17:50.060 --> 00:17:54.740 perspectives of, was it the designer, 00:17:54.740 --> 00:17:58.700 the user, where they, like the-- 00:17:58.700 --> 00:18:00.920 AUDIENCE: Artifact and society? 00:18:00.920 --> 00:18:02.580 Artifact and society? 00:18:02.580 --> 00:18:03.802 AUDIENCE: Yeah. 00:18:03.802 --> 00:18:05.760 It was sort of what I was talking about before. 00:18:05.760 --> 00:18:08.450 It's like someone who is very well-played 00:18:08.450 --> 00:18:14.580 is going to have a different interaction with the artifact, 00:18:14.580 --> 00:18:17.220 compared to someone who does not play a lot of games. 00:18:17.220 --> 00:18:20.200 You have to consider a lot of different perspectives, 00:18:20.200 --> 00:18:21.990 and it's very easy to get stuck. 00:18:21.990 --> 00:18:27.210 And the idea is, you get stuck in one. 00:18:27.210 --> 00:18:30.300 A creator can't see their own problems, 00:18:30.300 --> 00:18:33.170 a lot of the time, which is why you need criticism. 00:18:33.170 --> 00:18:36.620 And the criticiser doesn't have the perspective 00:18:36.620 --> 00:18:40.670 that the creator does. 00:18:40.670 --> 00:18:42.380 PROFESSOR: So that's, I mean, one 00:18:42.380 --> 00:18:44.030 of the reason we have criticism is 00:18:44.030 --> 00:18:47.450 to try to improve whatever field we are critiquing. 00:18:47.450 --> 00:18:50.990 So it's supposed to be a help for the designers 00:18:50.990 --> 00:18:54.090 to see things that they can't see themselves, as well. 00:18:54.090 --> 00:18:58.860 And what I would do, if this was a longer class, 00:18:58.860 --> 00:19:01.640 I would have you write up critiques of each other's work. 00:19:01.640 --> 00:19:05.240 But we're just, we have so much work to do, 00:19:05.240 --> 00:19:07.260 so we don't quite have time for it. 00:19:07.260 --> 00:19:10.830 So I don't want to sort of burden you with that. 00:19:10.830 --> 00:19:15.410 But it is a very interesting exercise, because you instantly 00:19:15.410 --> 00:19:18.428 see that people see things in the thing you've been making 00:19:18.428 --> 00:19:19.970 that you didn't see yourself, and you 00:19:19.970 --> 00:19:22.850 thought you saw all of it, because you're 00:19:22.850 --> 00:19:24.040 so engaged with it. 00:19:27.630 --> 00:19:33.230 This is also something that breaks with tradition 00:19:33.230 --> 00:19:39.410 of old-school literary theory, which 00:19:39.410 --> 00:19:42.840 used to be very heavily focused on artifacts. 00:19:42.840 --> 00:19:48.380 So you wanted to just look at the text 00:19:48.380 --> 00:19:52.490 and see what the meaning of the text really is. 00:19:52.490 --> 00:19:54.920 It comes from religious studies of trying 00:19:54.920 --> 00:19:57.740 to figure out what the Bible is telling us to do, 00:19:57.740 --> 00:19:59.790 or something like that. 00:19:59.790 --> 00:20:02.750 But that was what the academic study of literature 00:20:02.750 --> 00:20:08.000 used to be, as well, what is the author's 00:20:08.000 --> 00:20:11.150 intentions with this text, and try to sort 00:20:11.150 --> 00:20:13.940 of just reverse engineer. 00:20:13.940 --> 00:20:20.120 Nowadays, we read, and we can talk about all kinds 00:20:20.120 --> 00:20:21.740 of artifacts as texts. 00:20:21.740 --> 00:20:24.650 It seems a little weird to do that, call a game 00:20:24.650 --> 00:20:26.100 a text, for instance. 00:20:26.100 --> 00:20:31.220 But if you think of the Latin origin of the word, which 00:20:31.220 --> 00:20:34.670 textera basically means more like a texture, 00:20:34.670 --> 00:20:37.310 like something that's woven together, 00:20:37.310 --> 00:20:39.980 then it's easier to think, talk and think 00:20:39.980 --> 00:20:44.250 about things as texts other than written words on a page. 00:20:44.250 --> 00:20:52.730 So when we interpret texts, now, through interaction criticism, 00:20:52.730 --> 00:20:56.750 for instance, we very much take into account 00:20:56.750 --> 00:21:00.800 the context it is used in. 00:21:00.800 --> 00:21:03.230 Because we think that there isn't just 00:21:03.230 --> 00:21:05.720 one meaning of a cultural artifact. 00:21:05.720 --> 00:21:08.330 It actually changes meaning depending 00:21:08.330 --> 00:21:12.376 on who is interacting with it, and under which circumstances. 00:21:14.930 --> 00:21:19.880 And that is something that has changed literature studies, as 00:21:19.880 --> 00:21:28.010 well, the idea of it being someone encountering 00:21:28.010 --> 00:21:32.180 the text, which you can hear in the name of reader response 00:21:32.180 --> 00:21:34.400 theory for instance, which is, it's 00:21:34.400 --> 00:21:40.250 not just about what Shakespeare meant when he wrote the text. 00:21:40.250 --> 00:21:45.320 It's about how a reader now can respond to a text like Hamlet 00:21:45.320 --> 00:21:46.560 that is of interest. 00:21:46.560 --> 00:21:52.730 So this is very much based on that tradition of, 00:21:52.730 --> 00:21:58.670 we are doing a reading not just of the artifact itself, 00:21:58.670 --> 00:22:04.550 but the context of use and the identity of the user, 00:22:04.550 --> 00:22:07.300 and so forth. 00:22:07.300 --> 00:22:12.250 OK, so what you have left, let's talk about a little bit 00:22:12.250 --> 00:22:13.015 about balance. 00:22:15.705 --> 00:22:17.080 AUDIENCE: So I put that up there, 00:22:17.080 --> 00:22:19.810 and it was mostly about, he was talking 00:22:19.810 --> 00:22:24.700 about how, with the criticisms, there's somewhat 00:22:24.700 --> 00:22:31.360 trying to strike this balance between historical context, 00:22:31.360 --> 00:22:34.540 cultural significance, and technical descriptions, 00:22:34.540 --> 00:22:40.210 and how do you, so how do you balance the different elements 00:22:40.210 --> 00:22:41.590 that you should be looking at? 00:22:41.590 --> 00:22:43.450 Because these are all different lenses 00:22:43.450 --> 00:22:45.908 that a different person might evaluate through differently, 00:22:45.908 --> 00:22:47.860 especially based on what field they're 00:22:47.860 --> 00:22:51.520 in that is not interaction design, or interaction 00:22:51.520 --> 00:22:53.440 criticism for design. 00:22:53.440 --> 00:22:56.920 But scientific design is very much of the, how this was done, 00:22:56.920 --> 00:22:59.560 or [INAUDIBLE],, how was this done, empirical facts. 00:23:02.380 --> 00:23:05.590 And so there's a lot about different ways 00:23:05.590 --> 00:23:10.570 to focus those designs, to focus the criticism based 00:23:10.570 --> 00:23:17.830 on the different aspects that you can 00:23:17.830 --> 00:23:20.470 be trying to evaluate through. 00:23:20.470 --> 00:23:24.550 PROFESSOR: And that is what, I think, for Bardzell, 00:23:24.550 --> 00:23:27.400 that is one of the things that creates 00:23:27.400 --> 00:23:29.830 the need for interaction criticism. 00:23:29.830 --> 00:23:34.480 Because that's somewhat alien to someone who is doing criticism 00:23:34.480 --> 00:23:37.060 of movies or literature. 00:23:37.060 --> 00:23:44.140 To them, it's perfectly fine to look at it as just 00:23:44.140 --> 00:23:51.700 something that is being evaluated for its aesthetics, 00:23:51.700 --> 00:23:53.050 end of story. 00:23:53.050 --> 00:23:56.500 Well, when we evaluate a game, let's say 00:23:56.500 --> 00:23:58.060 you're driving a car in the game, 00:23:58.060 --> 00:24:00.290 and the steering works very poorly. 00:24:00.290 --> 00:24:03.160 It's just, there's a usability issue there 00:24:03.160 --> 00:24:06.880 that's very similar to when we evaluate cars. 00:24:09.460 --> 00:24:13.960 So if the steering is bad, that's 00:24:13.960 --> 00:24:18.070 going to affect the quality of this kind of artwork thing, 00:24:18.070 --> 00:24:21.440 but it's a very sort of usability-centered thing. 00:24:21.440 --> 00:24:25.750 So games and interactive artifacts 00:24:25.750 --> 00:24:31.000 live in this weird space where these things come together, 00:24:31.000 --> 00:24:32.420 and all of them matter. 00:24:32.420 --> 00:24:36.280 So some of it is just matter-of-factly, 00:24:36.280 --> 00:24:43.120 this steering wheel is bad, while some of it is like, 00:24:43.120 --> 00:24:47.800 the scenery of the car ride in this game 00:24:47.800 --> 00:24:51.160 evokes emotions, a lot of that. 00:24:51.160 --> 00:24:57.100 So to me, it's what makes interaction design cool, 00:24:57.100 --> 00:25:02.830 because it has all of these very different qualities to it, 00:25:02.830 --> 00:25:08.530 and they can be foregrounded or sort of 00:25:08.530 --> 00:25:10.630 be more part of the periphery. 00:25:10.630 --> 00:25:16.300 But they all have to work in concert for an interaction 00:25:16.300 --> 00:25:21.310 design for the unity, or organic unity of it, as Bardzell says, 00:25:21.310 --> 00:25:25.150 to click. 00:25:25.150 --> 00:25:28.730 OK, so I guess we just have framework. 00:25:28.730 --> 00:25:31.290 So let's do that one as well, so you don't feel left out. 00:25:35.305 --> 00:25:35.930 AUDIENCE: Yeah. 00:25:35.930 --> 00:25:39.620 I put framework, because this article 00:25:39.620 --> 00:25:45.952 is a lot about developing a way to criticize 00:25:45.952 --> 00:25:47.100 interactive material. 00:25:47.100 --> 00:25:55.800 And I think it mentions how it's about developing skills that 00:25:55.800 --> 00:26:01.334 enable people to think about interaction. 00:26:01.334 --> 00:26:04.740 And so that's why I thought framework was a good word. 00:26:04.740 --> 00:26:06.150 PROFESSOR: Right. 00:26:06.150 --> 00:26:10.000 I mean, that's what he's doing here. 00:26:10.000 --> 00:26:13.440 So it's a somewhat ambitious project 00:26:13.440 --> 00:26:18.930 to sort of establish, starting the establishment 00:26:18.930 --> 00:26:24.240 of a framework that goes outside of the tradition of HCI, which 00:26:24.240 --> 00:26:29.130 is much more usability-focused, on and without losing 00:26:29.130 --> 00:26:34.080 those qualities, still capturing the things that sort of fall 00:26:34.080 --> 00:26:40.320 through the net of what that type of criticism 00:26:40.320 --> 00:26:45.210 or that type of evaluation captures in an experience. 00:26:45.210 --> 00:26:48.930 OK, are we ready for paper number 00:26:48.930 --> 00:26:51.570 two, looking at the actual application 00:26:51.570 --> 00:26:52.920 of interaction criticism? 00:26:52.920 --> 00:26:54.330 AUDIENCE: I've got a question. 00:26:54.330 --> 00:26:54.955 PROFESSOR: Yes. 00:26:54.955 --> 00:26:56.440 AUDIENCE: What's the difference-- 00:26:56.440 --> 00:27:00.310 so there are-- correct me if I'm wrong-- there are car critics, 00:27:00.310 --> 00:27:00.810 right? 00:27:00.810 --> 00:27:01.050 PROFESSOR: Yes. 00:27:01.050 --> 00:27:03.480 AUDIENCE: There are people who review cars professionally. 00:27:03.480 --> 00:27:04.290 PROFESSOR: Yes. 00:27:04.290 --> 00:27:06.240 AUDIENCE: What's the difference, would that 00:27:06.240 --> 00:27:11.100 be considered a form of interaction criticism 00:27:11.100 --> 00:27:11.970 of design? 00:27:11.970 --> 00:27:12.678 PROFESSOR: Right. 00:27:12.678 --> 00:27:18.438 So I think that, to Bardzell, it doesn't. 00:27:18.438 --> 00:27:19.440 AUDIENCE: It's not. 00:27:19.440 --> 00:27:20.880 PROFESSOR: No. 00:27:20.880 --> 00:27:26.610 Because the focus is so much on the usability aspects. 00:27:26.610 --> 00:27:29.652 AUDIENCE: Not on, like, the interior. 00:27:29.652 --> 00:27:30.360 PROFESSOR: Right. 00:27:30.360 --> 00:27:36.280 I mean, we do sometimes see that kind of approach, 00:27:36.280 --> 00:27:38.940 where someone is sort of trying to focus more 00:27:38.940 --> 00:27:43.090 on the experience of a car, or something like that. 00:27:43.090 --> 00:27:47.430 And that's when it starts coming closer to that line. 00:27:47.430 --> 00:27:51.570 So he talks about, not in this paper 00:27:51.570 --> 00:27:55.560 but in another sort of parallel paper, 00:27:55.560 --> 00:27:59.260 he talks about interior design and things like that, 00:27:59.260 --> 00:28:02.440 that there's definitely touch points. 00:28:02.440 --> 00:28:07.590 And when we start talking about stuff like the sound design, 00:28:07.590 --> 00:28:12.360 what sound a car door makes when it closes, 00:28:12.360 --> 00:28:15.120 that's very carefully designed nowadays. 00:28:15.120 --> 00:28:18.250 And that is part of the aesthetic experience 00:28:18.250 --> 00:28:19.140 of the car. 00:28:19.140 --> 00:28:24.430 AUDIENCE: So just going back to balance, there could be a-- 00:28:24.430 --> 00:28:26.430 one-dimensional, might be two, three dimensions, 00:28:26.430 --> 00:28:27.888 but there's aesthetics on one side, 00:28:27.888 --> 00:28:31.570 and usability, technical details on the other. 00:28:31.570 --> 00:28:35.940 And car critics fall much closer to the technical usability 00:28:35.940 --> 00:28:36.510 side. 00:28:36.510 --> 00:28:40.410 Interior design falls much more towards the aesthetic side. 00:28:40.410 --> 00:28:41.580 PROFESSOR: Right. 00:28:41.580 --> 00:28:44.760 But interior design, so maybe it's not a line. 00:28:44.760 --> 00:28:50.190 Because interior design, interior design critique 00:28:50.190 --> 00:28:55.980 is still very far from traditional literary theory. 00:28:55.980 --> 00:29:00.340 So maybe it's some kind of weird polygon. 00:29:00.340 --> 00:29:03.150 I don't think it's even a triangle. 00:29:03.150 --> 00:29:07.800 But yeah, it's a field where he sort of tries 00:29:07.800 --> 00:29:14.580 to visualize some of the-- 00:29:14.580 --> 00:29:16.350 AUDIENCE: Oh, yeah, the seven values. 00:29:16.350 --> 00:29:22.240 PROFESSOR: Right, but maybe not necessarily all of them. 00:29:22.240 --> 00:29:25.680 I don't think he tries to be comprehensive of what 00:29:25.680 --> 00:29:27.360 that space looks like. 00:29:27.360 --> 00:29:31.710 But I feel like the paper is still written 00:29:31.710 --> 00:29:33.450 as a critique of HCI study. 00:29:33.450 --> 00:29:36.590 So that's the one he wants to focus on, 00:29:36.590 --> 00:29:41.790 like you guys are missing things when you decide what gets 00:29:41.790 --> 00:29:43.075 accepted to Chi, or something. 00:29:43.075 --> 00:29:44.700 AUDIENCE: But that's the context of why 00:29:44.700 --> 00:29:47.610 he's publishing it, right, is interacting with computers, 00:29:47.610 --> 00:29:51.930 in part, is the magazine, or is the journal. 00:29:51.930 --> 00:29:54.097 And I'm curious about that other people 00:29:54.097 --> 00:29:55.680 that you're describing, because you're 00:29:55.680 --> 00:29:56.930 talking about interior design. 00:29:56.930 --> 00:30:00.480 I'm thinking there's got to be architectural criticism that's 00:30:00.480 --> 00:30:05.100 a fairly well-established field, and the only difference 00:30:05.100 --> 00:30:08.520 that I see between what he's arguing in architectural design 00:30:08.520 --> 00:30:12.630 is the use of computers in his what he's describing. 00:30:12.630 --> 00:30:15.540 We're talking about concrete, and steel, and wood, 00:30:15.540 --> 00:30:18.870 and other kinds of materials, but everything else, 00:30:18.870 --> 00:30:21.745 architecture is just as interactive as anything 00:30:21.745 --> 00:30:22.620 built by interaction. 00:30:22.620 --> 00:30:24.930 PROFESSOR: Right. 00:30:24.930 --> 00:30:29.640 The outside of academia professional core 00:30:29.640 --> 00:30:33.730 of architectural critics is very small. 00:30:33.730 --> 00:30:35.610 So I don't think it reaches-- 00:30:35.610 --> 00:30:39.750 so [INAUDIBLE] said it's only the games that really 00:30:39.750 --> 00:30:43.230 have an established core of professional critics outside 00:30:43.230 --> 00:30:44.920 of academia. 00:30:44.920 --> 00:30:47.490 And I think it means he's thinking 00:30:47.490 --> 00:30:50.730 that the architectural critics are [INAUDIBLE].. 00:30:50.730 --> 00:30:54.008 AUDIENCE: I mean, that's perfectly fine to argue that it 00:30:54.008 --> 00:30:55.050 should be a larger thing. 00:30:55.050 --> 00:30:56.400 PROFESSOR: Right. 00:30:56.400 --> 00:31:01.920 And I also think that, when we look towards architecture, 00:31:01.920 --> 00:31:05.910 we're also seeing this transition where 00:31:05.910 --> 00:31:10.080 they try to focus more on experience 00:31:10.080 --> 00:31:15.060 and different perspectives, rather than saying 00:31:15.060 --> 00:31:18.270 that the quality of the architecture is in the artifact 00:31:18.270 --> 00:31:19.200 itself. 00:31:19.200 --> 00:31:23.250 It used to be, if you look at architecture education, 00:31:23.250 --> 00:31:25.740 the good examples was very much about, 00:31:25.740 --> 00:31:28.890 like, this is good because this and this 00:31:28.890 --> 00:31:30.510 and this, rather than talking about, 00:31:30.510 --> 00:31:33.810 it's good from this perspective, because this and that. 00:31:33.810 --> 00:31:39.330 So there is that movement within architectural criticism, 00:31:39.330 --> 00:31:41.850 as well, to go, maybe-- 00:31:45.290 --> 00:31:48.750 I usually have architecture students in the other classes, 00:31:48.750 --> 00:31:51.030 and they always giggle when I mention Gary. 00:31:51.030 --> 00:31:56.610 Because within architecture, he's seen as kind of a fad, 00:31:56.610 --> 00:32:01.995 and we have a big wonky example of that here on campus. 00:32:05.590 --> 00:32:09.030 So that sort of focus on the beautiful shapes 00:32:09.030 --> 00:32:13.120 and all of that, it's a little old school now in architecture, 00:32:13.120 --> 00:32:16.530 and now it's more about, how livable is this, 00:32:16.530 --> 00:32:23.250 or how well can you work in that weird bubble. 00:32:23.250 --> 00:32:27.420 And it turns out not very well. 00:32:27.420 --> 00:32:29.580 AUDIENCE: Just as literary criticism and, no doubt, 00:32:29.580 --> 00:32:31.122 interactive design criticism is going 00:32:31.122 --> 00:32:35.790 to go through these waves of different styles of criticism, 00:32:35.790 --> 00:32:38.190 and they don't invalidate the old ones. 00:32:38.190 --> 00:32:41.250 They just add to how we look at the same thing. 00:32:41.250 --> 00:32:44.370 PROFESSOR: Right, but they might invalidate decisions 00:32:44.370 --> 00:32:48.590 to hire certain architects to do certain flagship 00:32:48.590 --> 00:32:50.900 buildings on campus, or something like that. 00:32:50.900 --> 00:32:53.692 I don't think that choice would be made-- 00:32:53.692 --> 00:32:54.900 AUDIENCE: Based on criticism? 00:32:54.900 --> 00:32:59.340 PROFESSOR: Yeah, well based on, oh, yeah, 00:32:59.340 --> 00:33:04.710 that was maybe cool because the methods were new, 00:33:04.710 --> 00:33:06.660 and they're not so new anymore. 00:33:06.660 --> 00:33:10.890 So yeah, it's a little bit of that hype thing has done away 00:33:10.890 --> 00:33:16.230 from, oh, we can actually have computers design curves 00:33:16.230 --> 00:33:19.020 that we couldn't calculate before 00:33:19.020 --> 00:33:22.490 if they would be load-bearing. 00:33:22.490 --> 00:33:24.990 AUDIENCE: Certainly, at MIT, because we have an architecture 00:33:24.990 --> 00:33:27.450 department and architecture faculty, 00:33:27.450 --> 00:33:31.483 criticism must influence the choice of architects. 00:33:31.483 --> 00:33:32.400 PROFESSOR: Yeah, yeah. 00:33:32.400 --> 00:33:36.810 I mean, I think for one thing, the MIT campus has 00:33:36.810 --> 00:33:43.770 a lot more examples of high-profile architectural 00:33:43.770 --> 00:33:46.110 buildings than almost any other campus, 00:33:46.110 --> 00:33:51.780 because we have such a prominent architecture department, 00:33:51.780 --> 00:33:56.790 and through a series of styles that don't necessarily 00:33:56.790 --> 00:33:58.320 always fit together. 00:33:58.320 --> 00:33:59.265 AUDIENCE: They don't. 00:34:02.530 --> 00:34:03.580 A scrapbook. 00:34:03.580 --> 00:34:06.438 PROFESSOR: Yeah, it's very much a scrapbook. 00:34:09.179 --> 00:34:11.530 Anyway, that's a little bit of a tangent. 00:34:11.530 --> 00:34:17.560 So any other thoughts on the Bardzell paper, 00:34:17.560 --> 00:34:20.330 before we leave? 00:34:20.330 --> 00:34:20.909 We're good? 00:34:20.909 --> 00:34:24.210 OK, now let's do keywords for a second. 00:34:39.389 --> 00:34:42.750 OK, so I'm tempted to-- 00:34:42.750 --> 00:34:48.380 we had perspectives in the last paper, and now we have lenses. 00:34:48.380 --> 00:34:50.659 So maybe we can start with lenses, 00:34:50.659 --> 00:34:54.500 and they can describe what the difference between a lens 00:34:54.500 --> 00:34:55.489 and a perspective is. 00:34:55.489 --> 00:34:58.130 AUDIENCE: So I specifically said lenses, because perspectives 00:34:58.130 --> 00:35:00.170 can mean personal perspectives. 00:35:00.170 --> 00:35:02.540 You might have a very different perspective of a game 00:35:02.540 --> 00:35:05.210 than I do, because of our personal backgrounds, 00:35:05.210 --> 00:35:06.377 and likes, and whatnot. 00:35:06.377 --> 00:35:08.210 But the lenses are more, you're viewing this 00:35:08.210 --> 00:35:10.370 through a performance-based lens, 00:35:10.370 --> 00:35:12.620 you're viewing this through an interaction-based lens, 00:35:12.620 --> 00:35:16.890 you're viewing this through the context of a particular thing. 00:35:16.890 --> 00:35:19.550 So perspectives can be that, but it can also 00:35:19.550 --> 00:35:22.700 be through your self, or through how we use it, 00:35:22.700 --> 00:35:24.980 or how certain people might feel. 00:35:24.980 --> 00:35:27.973 There's why I specifically said lenses. 00:35:27.973 --> 00:35:28.640 PROFESSOR: Yeah. 00:35:28.640 --> 00:35:32.100 And I think, yeah, that's spot-on, what they mean, 00:35:32.100 --> 00:35:32.600 as well. 00:35:32.600 --> 00:35:35.270 It's more like, I, as a person, choose 00:35:35.270 --> 00:35:37.070 to put on this lens, a little bit 00:35:37.070 --> 00:35:39.860 like you might switch the lens for your camera 00:35:39.860 --> 00:35:41.930 for a particular purpose. 00:35:41.930 --> 00:35:49.315 OK, so did you have more to say about your word? 00:35:49.315 --> 00:35:49.940 AUDIENCE: Yeah. 00:35:49.940 --> 00:35:53.480 So one of the big things, as he's 00:35:53.480 --> 00:35:56.147 talking about in this paper, is how through different lenses, 00:35:56.147 --> 00:35:58.730 the same thing can be viewed in very different lights, or very 00:35:58.730 --> 00:36:02.420 different ways, or come out very differently in the criticism. 00:36:02.420 --> 00:36:07.730 So he has the three different criticism points of Maeve, 00:36:07.730 --> 00:36:11.000 and is saying at the end about how, 00:36:11.000 --> 00:36:16.160 just because of these lenses, the criticism of either 00:36:16.160 --> 00:36:21.410 the interaction, the performance, or the users 00:36:21.410 --> 00:36:22.850 comes through differently. 00:36:25.570 --> 00:36:26.290 PROFESSOR: Yeah. 00:36:26.290 --> 00:36:30.790 I think we should be able to jump to almost any of the words 00:36:30.790 --> 00:36:31.560 from there. 00:36:31.560 --> 00:36:37.480 Let's maybe do interface first. 00:36:37.480 --> 00:36:41.830 AUDIENCE: OK, so one of my favorite sentences 00:36:41.830 --> 00:36:47.170 in this article is that form and content, interface 00:36:47.170 --> 00:36:49.450 and information are inseparable. 00:36:49.450 --> 00:36:53.500 And interface describes how you interact 00:36:53.500 --> 00:36:57.460 with the information that's being presented to you, 00:36:57.460 --> 00:37:01.030 and can greatly influence how you interpret the information 00:37:01.030 --> 00:37:03.250 that is presented to you. 00:37:03.250 --> 00:37:07.630 They use, as an example, I think it 00:37:07.630 --> 00:37:10.840 was like a Java applet, the word synonym finder, 00:37:10.840 --> 00:37:13.210 this visual synonym finder. 00:37:13.210 --> 00:37:16.090 I actually have a memory of using this way back 00:37:16.090 --> 00:37:19.330 in the day, the early internet days, 00:37:19.330 --> 00:37:21.790 of having it in this bubble on the screen. 00:37:24.400 --> 00:37:28.060 PROFESSOR: Early world wide web base. 00:37:28.060 --> 00:37:30.120 Internet is, you weren't around. 00:37:30.120 --> 00:37:32.040 AUDIENCE: No, that's true. 00:37:32.040 --> 00:37:34.870 That's what I meant. 00:37:34.870 --> 00:37:39.380 Back in the days when dial-up was a thing. 00:37:39.380 --> 00:37:42.350 So I remembered that experience, and so that was a-- 00:37:45.440 --> 00:37:52.010 the way that they frame it is that experience of seeing words 00:37:52.010 --> 00:37:53.608 and connection to other words, and how 00:37:53.608 --> 00:37:56.150 they relate to each other, and being able to make these hops, 00:37:56.150 --> 00:37:59.027 these may small hops, but end up very far away from the word 00:37:59.027 --> 00:37:59.735 that you started. 00:37:59.735 --> 00:38:02.870 It makes language more fluid, instead of like, 00:38:02.870 --> 00:38:05.690 when you read a dictionary, which has basically the same 00:38:05.690 --> 00:38:10.070 information-- it contains words and what they mean-- 00:38:10.070 --> 00:38:13.940 but it's presented in this very logical, strict manner. 00:38:13.940 --> 00:38:18.920 And similarly, with this Maeve project, 00:38:18.920 --> 00:38:20.540 you can think of it as, oh, you just 00:38:20.540 --> 00:38:22.910 have a collection of files on different-- 00:38:22.910 --> 00:38:29.750 I think it's architectural, this architectural project-- 00:38:29.750 --> 00:38:32.177 and you could click through the files, or something, 00:38:32.177 --> 00:38:33.510 have it on your computer screen. 00:38:33.510 --> 00:38:37.910 But now they've turned it into, basically, the users 00:38:37.910 --> 00:38:39.860 of the system are performers. 00:38:39.860 --> 00:38:45.860 What they choose to view gets presented on a larger screen, 00:38:45.860 --> 00:38:53.050 and they also get to see how they're, like the cards 00:38:53.050 --> 00:38:56.290 that they choose, relate to things that other users are 00:38:56.290 --> 00:38:56.920 choosing. 00:38:56.920 --> 00:38:59.710 And this adds like a social element, 00:38:59.710 --> 00:39:04.450 a performative element, and greatly changes 00:39:04.450 --> 00:39:11.560 the way users can see how each of these different cards 00:39:11.560 --> 00:39:14.410 are, like they can actually see more direct comparisons 00:39:14.410 --> 00:39:16.370 and [INAUDIBLE]. 00:39:16.370 --> 00:39:19.110 So yeah, I [INAUDIBLE]. 00:39:19.110 --> 00:39:20.820 PROFESSOR: No, no. 00:39:20.820 --> 00:39:23.970 Yeah, that's a pretty powerful idea. 00:39:23.970 --> 00:39:28.710 I think that it's not just a quantitative difference 00:39:28.710 --> 00:39:31.440 between different interfaces. 00:39:31.440 --> 00:39:36.060 Another example would be the physical typewriter 00:39:36.060 --> 00:39:37.740 versus a word processor. 00:39:37.740 --> 00:39:41.940 It's not just that the word processor makes it easier 00:39:41.940 --> 00:39:43.750 or faster to produce text. 00:39:43.750 --> 00:39:46.320 We actually write different things. 00:39:46.320 --> 00:39:50.400 We think differently because of this word processor 00:39:50.400 --> 00:39:53.760 working in a certain way than we used to think 00:39:53.760 --> 00:39:55.470 when we had typewriters. 00:39:55.470 --> 00:39:59.640 It's somehow changed the world, and not just, 00:39:59.640 --> 00:40:04.560 again, quantitatively, but qualitatively. 00:40:04.560 --> 00:40:11.010 People understand texts and themselves 00:40:11.010 --> 00:40:16.410 differently because of this change of interface. 00:40:16.410 --> 00:40:20.670 And this is just an extension of that, 00:40:20.670 --> 00:40:27.090 where we can understand another data set completely 00:40:27.090 --> 00:40:31.740 differently, depending on how it is, not just presented to us, 00:40:31.740 --> 00:40:34.290 but how we are allowed to interact with it. 00:40:37.270 --> 00:40:42.570 We will get back a little bit to the idea 00:40:42.570 --> 00:40:50.430 of being able to interact with ideas next week, 00:40:50.430 --> 00:40:53.250 when we're going to start thinking about how 00:40:53.250 --> 00:40:55.260 to disseminate the knowledge that we're 00:40:55.260 --> 00:40:57.114 generating in this class. 00:40:57.114 --> 00:41:00.570 But I leave that there, for now. 00:41:03.460 --> 00:41:05.320 I'm just going to keep going here. 00:41:05.320 --> 00:41:07.515 Distinction? 00:41:07.515 --> 00:41:09.140 AUDIENCE: That was me. 00:41:09.140 --> 00:41:14.180 The article was talking a lot about how, increasingly, we're 00:41:14.180 --> 00:41:20.210 splitting form and function, and the ideas, the information 00:41:20.210 --> 00:41:22.670 you want to convey to the user and the way 00:41:22.670 --> 00:41:25.490 that you do that are considered differently, 00:41:25.490 --> 00:41:28.380 and that that's not a good thing. 00:41:28.380 --> 00:41:32.540 It's like the idea of using the lenses and the interface, 00:41:32.540 --> 00:41:36.230 the stuff we've been talking about, to mix the two, 00:41:36.230 --> 00:41:39.110 because it's often more successful. 00:41:39.110 --> 00:41:40.730 You want to get the-- 00:41:40.730 --> 00:41:42.680 I'm just going to use play a game-- you want 00:41:42.680 --> 00:41:47.390 to get plot information across to the player, 00:41:47.390 --> 00:41:49.310 because it's a story, but you also 00:41:49.310 --> 00:41:51.350 want them to have fun while doing it 00:41:51.350 --> 00:41:53.660 and interact with the story. 00:41:53.660 --> 00:41:56.510 So they were talking about the idea 00:41:56.510 --> 00:41:59.750 of performative experiences. 00:42:05.230 --> 00:42:09.220 PROFESSOR: That goes very much along the same lines of what 00:42:09.220 --> 00:42:14.510 we were talking about, with the interfaces, I think. 00:42:14.510 --> 00:42:18.470 Let's keep on going, the information. 00:42:18.470 --> 00:42:20.480 AUDIENCE: Yeah. 00:42:20.480 --> 00:42:22.880 The reason I put that down was also 00:42:22.880 --> 00:42:26.810 because of the way the paper said 00:42:26.810 --> 00:42:30.840 that interface and information are inseparable. 00:42:30.840 --> 00:42:35.230 PROFESSOR: I see you've all caught on to the same idea. 00:42:35.230 --> 00:42:40.210 I guess that is the big takeaway from this paper. 00:42:40.210 --> 00:42:46.510 And it's all, I think, the same sort of criticism of, maybe, 00:42:46.510 --> 00:42:53.620 specifically in software engineering, for reasons 00:42:53.620 --> 00:42:57.640 of dealing with complexity, we divided different aspects 00:42:57.640 --> 00:43:00.250 of these artifacts into different roles, 00:43:00.250 --> 00:43:01.540 and different teams. 00:43:01.540 --> 00:43:04.750 And it turns out it's kind of a suboptimization, 00:43:04.750 --> 00:43:09.670 because it all has to work in concert, 00:43:09.670 --> 00:43:13.280 or it's not going to be successful. 00:43:13.280 --> 00:43:16.900 And sort of trying to find a way back 00:43:16.900 --> 00:43:27.340 to ideas of the designer and the one actually manufacturing 00:43:27.340 --> 00:43:29.020 something being the same person, where 00:43:29.020 --> 00:43:36.100 they have full control over all aspects of it, to how can 00:43:36.100 --> 00:43:42.220 we have complex development with a lot of people involved, 00:43:42.220 --> 00:43:49.570 and still not lose touch of the organic unity of the thing, how 00:43:49.570 --> 00:43:53.320 it all relates to each other. 00:43:53.320 --> 00:43:56.590 Did performance have anything else 00:43:56.590 --> 00:43:58.810 to add that hasn't come up already? 00:43:58.810 --> 00:44:03.900 I feel like we're beating this to the ground. 00:44:03.900 --> 00:44:06.040 AUDIENCE: More information? 00:44:06.040 --> 00:44:06.800 PROFESSOR: Yes. 00:44:06.800 --> 00:44:10.000 Yes, if there was something that you felt hasn't been-- 00:44:20.990 --> 00:44:24.760 AUDIENCE: Well, I guess we didn't 00:44:24.760 --> 00:44:30.250 talk about the communication aspect that was in the paper, 00:44:30.250 --> 00:44:38.720 about how the user is in the loop of application, 00:44:38.720 --> 00:44:42.000 but also now, with like social media, 00:44:42.000 --> 00:44:44.750 you're also communicating things to other people. 00:44:47.540 --> 00:44:49.640 PROFESSOR: Right. 00:44:49.640 --> 00:44:50.140 Yeah. 00:44:54.550 --> 00:44:57.570 And performance, did you have something to add? 00:45:00.150 --> 00:45:04.080 AUDIENCE: I don't know if I have much more to add. 00:45:04.080 --> 00:45:06.675 But I just thought it was really interesting, because I, 00:45:06.675 --> 00:45:09.330 or at least when I'm designing, I think of my users 00:45:09.330 --> 00:45:10.740 like in a vacuum, kind of. 00:45:10.740 --> 00:45:12.960 Or if it's a multiplayer experience, 00:45:12.960 --> 00:45:15.030 then I think of them working together, 00:45:15.030 --> 00:45:19.860 but I had never thought of someone being performing, 00:45:19.860 --> 00:45:21.420 as a user. 00:45:21.420 --> 00:45:23.880 And so I just thought that was interesting, 00:45:23.880 --> 00:45:27.690 an interesting takeaway for me and my design endeavors. 00:45:27.690 --> 00:45:28.630 PROFESSOR: Right. 00:45:28.630 --> 00:45:34.410 I don't think it's just pointing towards the importance of user 00:45:34.410 --> 00:45:39.030 testing, but also trying to challenge your own assumptions, 00:45:39.030 --> 00:45:43.680 as you're having people test your artifact. 00:45:43.680 --> 00:45:48.990 Again, the things we create are our babies, 00:45:48.990 --> 00:45:54.900 and we tend to sort of cradle them a little hard sometimes, 00:45:54.900 --> 00:45:59.160 and we don't want-- we want people to get how 00:45:59.160 --> 00:46:01.540 we intended them to be used. 00:46:01.540 --> 00:46:06.480 And then we might be less open to seeing where 00:46:06.480 --> 00:46:10.680 the users or the participants actually 00:46:10.680 --> 00:46:13.950 subvert our intentions, but still 00:46:13.950 --> 00:46:16.590 make interesting use of the artifacts, 00:46:16.590 --> 00:46:19.260 and that is something that we could actually 00:46:19.260 --> 00:46:24.615 benefit from, from allowing and allowing ourselves to see. 00:46:27.180 --> 00:46:31.980 And I think just one example was when 00:46:31.980 --> 00:46:38.910 I was talking to game designers here in Boston about designing 00:46:38.910 --> 00:46:42.480 co-op games, and I was making a case that they often 00:46:42.480 --> 00:46:45.390 make a less interesting experience for player 2 00:46:45.390 --> 00:46:49.470 than for player 1, I had a guy come up to me afterwards 00:46:49.470 --> 00:46:52.110 saying, I've made co-op games for 10 years 00:46:52.110 --> 00:46:57.480 and never thought of myself as anything other than player 1. 00:46:57.480 --> 00:47:02.100 So if you're making those kinds of experiences, 00:47:02.100 --> 00:47:04.830 at least try out the different roles 00:47:04.830 --> 00:47:08.220 that you are designing for, and not 00:47:08.220 --> 00:47:11.220 make assumptions that, well, the expert 00:47:11.220 --> 00:47:13.590 or the highly-skilled person is always 00:47:13.590 --> 00:47:15.820 going to be in this role, and that fits me, 00:47:15.820 --> 00:47:18.690 so I'm always going to try out that role. 00:47:18.690 --> 00:47:22.500 Because when you try out the role of player 2, 00:47:22.500 --> 00:47:27.480 you might find that it's much less either fun or interesting 00:47:27.480 --> 00:47:33.207 than you intended for it to be, just as one brief example. 00:47:33.207 --> 00:47:35.040 AUDIENCE: I also found it really interesting 00:47:35.040 --> 00:47:39.660 how they connected performance to social media platforms. 00:47:39.660 --> 00:47:43.215 Because that is an interactive experience that isn't a game, 00:47:43.215 --> 00:47:46.320 but some people think it's a game. 00:47:46.320 --> 00:47:47.468 How many likes do you have? 00:47:47.468 --> 00:47:49.260 PROFESSOR: Yeah, it can be gamed, for sure. 00:47:49.260 --> 00:47:51.030 AUDIENCE: Yeah, or like World of Warcraft, 00:47:51.030 --> 00:47:54.960 where you create this alternate persona, or you put on this, 00:47:54.960 --> 00:47:55.680 you perform. 00:47:55.680 --> 00:48:00.300 You perform the role of knight elf priest, or whatever, 00:48:00.300 --> 00:48:06.300 or you perform the role of a popular figure on Twitter 00:48:06.300 --> 00:48:11.280 who talks about puppies, and that sort of thing. 00:48:11.280 --> 00:48:14.250 And I hadn't thought of it as performance before, 00:48:14.250 --> 00:48:17.190 but it really comes down to that. 00:48:17.190 --> 00:48:20.910 And depending on how much community 00:48:20.910 --> 00:48:24.840 aspect you have inside of whatever you're developing, 00:48:24.840 --> 00:48:27.660 it seems like there's more of a performance aspect. 00:48:27.660 --> 00:48:29.040 PROFESSOR: Yeah. 00:48:29.040 --> 00:48:34.830 There's a lot of opportunity for designing your own role 00:48:34.830 --> 00:48:41.310 or identity online than you have in offline performance. 00:48:41.310 --> 00:48:43.560 I mean, we're still performing a certain role 00:48:43.560 --> 00:48:47.970 when we're at work versus at home, and so on. 00:48:47.970 --> 00:48:52.200 But you have a lot more variables to tweak, I think, 00:48:52.200 --> 00:48:52.740 online. 00:48:52.740 --> 00:48:56.410 And it's just something that's inherently in you. 00:48:56.410 --> 00:48:58.740 It's not something that we have any experience 00:48:58.740 --> 00:49:02.700 from before this century. 00:49:02.700 --> 00:49:08.910 We just didn't have massively multi experienced 00:49:08.910 --> 00:49:11.370 virtual environments, and now we do. 00:49:11.370 --> 00:49:16.020 So we're struggling a little bit with how to design for them 00:49:16.020 --> 00:49:19.050 and make sense of them, but no one else 00:49:19.050 --> 00:49:20.380 is going to do it for us. 00:49:20.380 --> 00:49:25.860 So you are the ones to solve these issues. 00:49:25.860 --> 00:49:28.310 Congratulations.