Category: Research tidbits

Bits and pieces that led to more cogent thoughts

Vintage Values

Published on Author Elizabeth F. Churchill

We got some press for our project on vintage shopping. That makes my heart sing! eBay is a commerce platform that embraces new, old, vintage, consignment….. all kinds of goods are circulated through eBay satisfying instrumental needs, nostalgic revisitations, sentimental acquisitions, aspirations fulfilled. I call our more recent project into this Vintage Values – playing… Continue reading Vintage Values →

Reasons to be Cheerful

Published on Author Elizabeth F. Churchill

This is a draft of a column I wrote for ACM interactions magazine. I have been thinking a lot recently about physical and emotional health, and especially about the tricks we play on ourselves to uplift mood and perspective in challenging times. I have an “earworm” for challenging times, a 1970’s single that was released in the UK by Ian Dury and The Blockheads. This column is named after that song, Reasons to be Cheerful, Part 3. Continue reading Reasons to be Cheerful →

Putting the Person Back Into Personalization

Published on Author Elizabeth F. Churchill

In this draft of a column I wrote for ACM’s interactions magazine, I propose that we need to rethink and expand our ideas about “personalization”. Building on my discussion of data and data sciences, I believe we need to think about process “process” personalization, where we design for interactive exchanges more carefully as well as “outcome” personalization which is what we are currently focused on in the search, recommendation and collaborative filtering world. As interfaces and interactions get more adaptive, the “intelligence” embodied in the data we gather needs to be put to the design of adaptable and socially adept user interfaces as well as carefully filtered content. We need to think about the ‘how’ as well as the ‘what’. Continue reading Putting the Person Back Into Personalization →