General conference chair Harri Oinas-Kukkonen is watching some of the many posters that have been on the conference.

The days keynote is really exciting Virpi Roto (Principal Scientist Nokia Research Center) is giving a great keynote.

She is for instance making a clear differentiation between Usability (optimal functional ease of use) which we can measure versus User Experience which is subjective.

Virpi Roto managed to make the whole auditorium silent, and people were just taking pictures of her slides (like the two below).

Different emotions during interactions are not equally important
-Virpi Roto

User Experience is the attitude towards the product. It its the key to get people loyal to our devices.
-Virpi Roto

Virpi also introduced the “dream of brand building” as seen below. Total brand dedication that people get a tattoo:

She went on to state that although Nokia is the world 5′TH most valued brand, she has never seen a Nokia tatoo.

Another key point Virpi made was the need for clear metrix

You need to be able to measure [UX] – if you cannot measure you will be miserable
-Virpi Roto

The first keynote by Kristina Hook was really interesting. Basically she and her team are taking affective computing to another level. I would almost say, that she de facto is investigating “pathos” appeals in technology (mobile, tablet and gamings systems). I really liked her presentation.

Standford has made a super cool presentation on Facebook and is thus taking the lead in the sense of new learnings. B.J. Fogg and Daisuke Lizawa had a great paper on differences in types of interaction in Japanese social networks versus Facebook/western social spaces.

Brian Cugelman made a nice presentation on website credibility:

I had my own session on the persuasive design of Knowledge Management Systems (KMS) and I had both positive and negative feedback.

Also really interesting at the persuasive is the short paper sessions. This year short papers are presented for 10 minutes in clusters of three and then a short discussion. This is a great format, since you get a lot of short pitches

For instance Evan Rosenfeld had a good session entitled: “How to build persuasive web applications: Three fundamental feedback loops”

Again we got some some nice practical design patterns from Stanford. It seems that they have undertaken the task to actually map out all persuasive interaction design patterns that they can find. This will be very useful in taking Persuasive Technology Design to the next level – enabling us to prescribe design.

Below professor B.J. Fogg and Julie Leth:

Day 1 will close with a closed with a panel where I will be participating.

Overall a lot of interesting viewpoints emerged on day 1 and it was evident that there is still plenty of issues to be discussed in regards to the future of rhetoric and persuasion.

More on this tomorrow – where I will use a better compression for the pictures ;-)

In contrast, Mr. Jobs said that multitouch drastically simplified the process of controlling a computer.

There are no “verbs” in the iPhone interface, he said, alluding to the way a standard mouse or stylus system works. In those systems, users select an object, like a photo, and then separately select an action, or “verb,” to do something to it.

via: NYTimes

Although Jobs is speaking on the status of low cognitive strain in direct touch interfaces (interaction design). He is choosing a pure linguistic metaphor. Since I am taking the general approach, that you are indeed designing the communication situation when you are designing Collaborative software I was happy to see him state that.

Well the only flip side might be that he also states that languages without verbs are possible. Hey, could the verb not be the actual touch…? touch = noun + verb?

Anyway, HCI designed as communication – not only interaction.

First I had had meetings with SAP, Google and IDEO – and had talks on innovation and technology. This certainly gave me new insight.

Then I attended Persuasive07 which was held at Stanford by the Persuasive Technology Lab. It was the second time that the conference was held, and the first time that I attended.

I found the conference to be very interesting and very inspiring. Prior to attending I had read Professor B.J. Fogg’s book titled: Persuasive Technology: Using Computers to Change What We Think and Do. I liked it a lot since I am working to bridge Rhetoric and UCD and the book is giving me a head start.

Also I was relived to find that there is actually a smaller crowd of skilled scientists that are working with technology from a perspective that fits into my PhD project. At the conference I met several scientists from Aalborg that also have a communications perspective towards technology.

Finally I attended my first ever CHI (Computer Human Interaction). This was also a true learning experience. The worlds leading scientists gave talks on papers on Interaction, new modes of interaction and on topics such as collaboration and mobility – how does humans get the most benefit from computers? How do we design systems more efficient and better?

A few pictures seems fair:

Weekend at Healdsburg – Imagine to have that perfect view!

Weekend at Healdsburg – Young and reckless

Weekend at Healdsburg – Professor B.J. Fogg with a the giant soap bubble maker.

San Jose from the Marriott 12′TH floor

The railway tracks in San Jose (and Rilla Khaled).

The Persuasive Technology Lab at CHI. Dean Eckles and B.J Fogg pushing the new book on mobile persuasion.

1 of 2.000.000 slides I saw at CHI :-)

Another slide of 2.000.000 slides I saw at CHI :-)

Kristian Tørning at the pacific ocean – Half Moon Bay