When computational systems become increasingly mobile and ubiquitous, digital information and the use of computational systems may increasingly be immersed into the physical and social world of objects, people and practices. However, the digital, physical and social materials that make up these hybrid spaces have different characteristics and are hard to understand for users. In addition, users are themselves part in constructing and re-constructing the hybrid spaces. The main question addressed in this thesis is whether making aspects of the digitally mediated hybrid spaces observable and accessible provides support to users. The observability may provide support for the specific task at hand or help in building an understanding for what the system does and how, an understanding that is needed to explain system output and to cope with service breakdowns. The fundament of the approach is to empower users of computational systems to actively make sense of the system themselves. Two prototype services are described, Socifer and MobiTip. Their common denominator was to make digitally mediated parts of the hybrid spaces observable to users. Without disqualifying other kinds of information, the work focussed on digitally mediated social trails of other users. Building on experience from the prototype work and an investigation into in seamful design, observability and awareness, I have investigated the effects of making a computational system’s social context observable to users in a way that - is separated from the service’s main functionality in the interface, allowing it to become peripheral and non-obtrusive; - uses simple models and little interpretation; - to some extent opens up the service to allow for user appropriation of both service content and functionality; and - is informative rather than proactive in order to empower the user rather than acting on the user’s behalf. By designing systems that fulfil these criteria I claim that the user will be supported in performing the task at hand, with or without the service, and that with service use, the user will become more and more aware of the possibilities and limitations of the underlying technology. In addition, the digitally mediated hybrid spaces where physical, social and digital contexts meet constitute application domains in themselves, domains that users may enjoy exploring. / Mobile Life

This thesis project opens up an interaction design space in the InfoSec domain concerning raising awareness of common vulnerabilities and facilitating counter practices through seamful design.This combination of raising awareness coupled with boosting possibilities for deliberate action (or non-action) together account for augmenting agency. This augmentation takes the form of bottom up micro-movements and daily gestures contributing to opportunities for greater agency in the increasingly fraught InfoSec domain.

Facebook kan ses som ett exempel på den nya webb som följt de riktlinjer som sammanställdes i Web 2.0. I riktlinjerna lades tonvikt på sociala medier och en interaktiv webb, centrerad kring användaren och användarskapat innehåll. Sedan starten har Facebook News Feed implementerat en algoritmisk kuratering (eng. algorithmic curation ) för att ge användaren vad han eller hon söker baserat på tidigare interaktion. Studier har gjorts för att analysera hur användarna upplever den underliggande algoritmen. Dessa har visat att människor ofta utvecklar egna teorier om hur algoritmen fungerar och att detta påverkar hur en användare interagerar med nyhetsflödet. Det sätt algoritmisk kuratering används idag i applikationer är främst genom att tillämpa en sömlös designfilosofi. Detta görs för att förenkla användarupplevelsen genom att lägga en “svart låda” över de underliggande processerna. I vår studie intervjuade vi tio studenter om sina tankar om nyhetsflödet och hur mycket kontroll de har att anpassa flödet efter personliga preferenser. Vi ämnar även bidra till diskussionen gällande fördelar och nackdelar med en så kallad seamful design kontra en seamless design och hur användaren upplever resultatet av ett flöde som har implementerat en algoritmisk kuratering. Resultatet visar att vi kan se samband mellan bristande tillit till systemets anpassningsverktyg och låg transparens. Våra användare uttryckte att de kunde förstå varför de får de resultat de får, men vi fann även att den stora delen av innehållet var irrelevant för deras intressen och personliga preferenser. Våra resultat visar ett behov av att fortsätta forskningen på olika plattformar för att se om en något ökad insyn kommer att bidra till att lita på frågor och underlätta manuell anpassning av system för högre relevans. / Facebook can be seen as an example of the new web emerging with the rise of Web 2.0. The guidelines of this new web put emphasis on social media and an interactive web, heavily centered around the user and user created content. Since the start the Facebook News Feed has implemented an algorithmic curation to give the user what he or she wants based on prior interaction. Studies have been made analyzing how users experience the underlying algorithm. They have shown that people often are developing their own theories on how the algorithm work and that this also affect the way a user interacts with the feed. The way algorithmic curation is used today in applications is mainly by embracing a seamless design philosophy. This is done to simplify the user experience by putting a “black box” over the underlying processes. In our study we interviewed ten students on their thoughts about the News Feed and the amount of control they have to adapt the feed according to personal preferences. We aim to contribute to the discussion on the benefits and downsides with a so called seamful design in contrast to a seamless design and how users experience the results of a feed that has implemented an algorithmic curation. Our results show connections between a lack of trust in the systems tools to customize the feed and low transparency. Our users expressed that they could understand as to why they got the results that they get, but we found that the vast majority of content was irrelevant to their interests and personal preferences. Our results indicate that there is a need to continue the research on different platforms to see if a somewhat heightened transparency will help with trust issues and ease manual adaptation of systems for higher relevancy.