Lab 7 - Location Base Services

The purpose of today's lab is to analyze location based service systems:

Facebook Places

What is it supposed to do? 

Facebook Places is supposed to enable you to find places such as restaurants, hotels, and other locations/attractions you might enjoy.

What is the human interaction factor here? How, when and why do humans use the tool?

Part of the human interaction factor is people can review places through their Facebook account and write about their local area. Facebook Places also means people can "check in" when they get to a destination, and then check who else in their Friends list is also there. 

Humans use the tool via their phone, when they want to tell their Facebook friends where they are in real time, so that (for example) they can meet up with others in the same location.

Is it a push or pull service?

Possibly a push service, as Facebook Places sends out messages into your NewsFeed and notifications. Even if they're not messages asking you to use the product, they have similarities with a push service in that they aren't asked for.

What is their business model?

Not sure, but as it's part of Facebook, I would assume the business model is advertising revenue. 

How might a business use the system?

If there are well-known personalities associated with the business, for example the CEO, they could post their location as part of a spontaneous competitions and/or surprise event, to interact with followers in a particular location.

FourSquare

What is it supposed to do? 

Lets's you find places to eat, drink, shop, etc. anywhere in the world.

What is the human interaction factor here? How, when and why do humans use the tool?

The human interaction factor is users put in what they like, and FourSquare then suggests places for them to visit. Humans can also review places. FourSquare can be used through your web browser, when you're travelling overseas and want something good to eat that someone else has rated highly. 

Is it a push or pull service?

Pull - as from what I've experienced, you just log in and search when you're ready. However, if FourSquare starts sending me emails, I may change my mind as to whether it is push or pull...

What is their business model?

Haven't seen any advertisements so far... According to a bit of Google research, Foursquare requires money from vendors as "verification".

http://www.businessinsider.com.au/foursquares-revenue-model-sharpens-into-focus-2012-5

How might a business use the system?

Could encourage the customers to review/vote on FourSquare, and over time, could advertise their voter rating in store to generate more interest.

ThumbVista

What is it supposed to do? 

ThumbVista provides a service to businesses wanting to target customers with relevant communications based on location, time, and interest.

What is the human interaction factor here? How, when and why do humans use the tool?

The connection with customers is the human interaction factor! An example of humans using the tool (service) is when they have a business and want to target people with relevant advertisements (say finding customers based on their location) through their mobile phones. 

Is it a push or pull service?

It's a push service. Advertising messages on one's phone, are generally not requested.

What is their business model?

ThumbVista's business model is providing a service to other businesses. 

How might a business use the system?

An example of how a business might use the system is by finding prospective customers in their general area.

LevelUP

What is it supposed to do? 

LevelUp enables mobile payments, thereby making traditional wallets redundant.

What is the human interaction factor here? How, when and why do humans use the tool?

The human interaction factor is when a user used the service to pay for something. This might occur while they're out shopping, by scanning their mobile phone to pay for something instead of their credit card. Humans use this tool because it's convenient. (Most people carry their phone all the time, so why bother carrying a wallet when the phone can serve the same purpose?)

Is it a push or pull service?

From what I understand, it would be a pull service. 

What is their business model?

LevelUp charges businesses who use the service to process payments.

https://www.thelevelup.com/

How might a business use the system?

 A business might use the system to process sale payments, and it could be an attractive reason for customers to shop there. For example, a business could have an advertisement saying "Forgot your wallet? No worries, just shop here with your phone!"

Google Location

What is it supposed to do? 

Track your locations!

What is the human interaction factor here? How, when and why do humans use the tool?

The human interaction factor here is seeing a history of where you have been at what times, For example, if you wanted to know where you were at 2:06pm last Thursday, Google Location can help! Humans use the tool through, say, their Android tablet.

Is it a push or pull service?

Possible a pull service, as you can opt out of having your location data tracked.

What is their business model?

Not sure. I'd imagine that being part of Google and all, the business model would have something to do with selling the data they collect to businesses trying to target customers.

How might a business use the system?

[Same as how they could use Facebook Places - please see above.] Could use it to see where their employees are! I think one Pizza place uses something like this so that customers can check how far away their pizza delivery is...

—Location Based Services

Why do you want to check-in on a particular location?

To share where you are with friends.

—Why do you (or don’t you) enjoy the function?

With all the privacy issues, it's a bit concerning having people know where you are.

—Why do you think that people want to use it?

It is a very cool feature being able to see in a GUI where you were at what time, with a bird's eye like view.

—Why do business want to use it?

Businesses can used location based services to target prospective customers. Thus using their advertising budget more efficiently.

Lab 6 - Crowd sourcing sites review

Ponoko (Manufacture design)

Workforce: 150, 000+ at 12 digital making centers across the USA, EU and NZ.

Customers: Anyone, as well as a lot of big brands including Disney, Google, Apple, HP, Icebreaker, and more.

Positive impact such sites have on the current market place: 

• Ponoko's service is innovative, pushing ideas out there that the current market place may be able to adapt and utilize in their own way. 
• If Ponoko is correct in assuming distributed digital mass production is "the third industrial revolution", the current market place will benefit from the lessons Ponoko has learned in pioneering.

Negative impact such sites have on the current market place: 

• Ponoko might be putting some manufacturers out of business due to the quality of their services as an alternative to other ways to manufacture. 

Chaordix (Business Innovation)

Workforce: Customers and followers of big brands, wanting to contribute to the development of products.

Customers: Big brands such as IBM, P&G, Lego, and others seeking co-created products, market intelligence, and customer advocacy.

Positive impact such sites have on the current market place: 

•  Chaordix's concept of engaging customers through this crowd sourcing method may give other business innovation organizations some good ideas to try implementing, thus improving the overall standard of the marketplace.

Negative impact such sites have on the current market place:

• As Chaordix has the ability to connect customers to big brands, marketing specialist agencies could have a loss of business, especially if they utilize the more traditional, possibly less engaging ways of reaching customers.

Icons for Group Project



Pixabay

Iconarchive.com

1. Open the blog post
2. Click the photo of fruit
3. Right-click open in new tab
4. Copy the URL

Clear image

Lab 5 - Collaboration Tools

Today's Lab task was to look at some collaboration tools, pick one to sign up for, and explore the software.

I picked GroupZap. The reason I picked this one is because GroupZap doesn't require users to set up an account, which means all you have to do to invite others to collaborate with you on it, is to add their email address. At first, I was concerned with the security aspect of this, but not to worry as GroupZap has additional features, such as making the board "read-only" and the option to set up a password for users to enter before accessing your board.

What type of tool

GroupZap is a collaboration tool whereby users can share a virtual pinboard and put up stick notes. Sounds simple, and it is, which makes it incredibly easy to learn how to use, and very handy! It's similar to sticky notes on Windows computers, except you can share these sticky notes with the rest of your team, and it has more features (e.g. resizing, adding images, icons)

What is it supposed to do

GroupZap is supposed to offer a way to share ideas with team members.

What is the human interaction factor here? How, when, and why do humans use the tool:

Humans use the tool when they want to visually represent some tasks that need doing in a format similar to using a physical pinboard with paper, coloured sticky notes. Occasions to use this might be during team projects, or even just to share a daily to-do list with family members. Humans use the tool because it's very easy to learn to use. It's a simple concept with few menus.

Business model

The big downside? The FREE version only lasts for 24 hours. At that point, your board expires - unless you subscribe for $5.

However, you can export your board as a PDF or PNG file, which is handy (of course you won't be able to edit it after that).

How would you use these tools for your project and in other environments?

I'm considering using it to throw up ideas for my projects, and save them as a series of PDFs, or even just to record a to-do list I have for the day. As I can access it through a browser, it's very accessible anywhere.

Lab 4 - Virtual Worlds

Introduction to Second Life... a Virtual World.


I'd say these virtual world games can benefit you as a player by providing some leisurely entertainment, just walking around and talking to people. It's a fairly relaxing activity, and you can talk to people from pretty much anywhere in real-time. The purpose of the virtual worlds is to connect people in an animated, fictional environment.


People are addicted to these games because of the social interaction element I think. It's a bit like what first draws a user to Facebook. It's like an open environment where you can suddenly can connect with all these different people. In a way, it's exciting talking to different people without worrying what they think of you, because it's all so anonymous (if you do it safely). There's also the feature of creating your own avatar, which gives you a way to imagine what it could be like to look differently. This can be addictive, as it's like creating a virtual representation of yourself, which can be quite fun.


The big risks in virtual world games are security and the possibility that playing in such environments, will negatively impact your real life interactions. It's important to stay safe and realize that the players controlling the avatars may not have you best interests in mind. Also, because of the addictive nature of the games, you should ensure that you do not spend too much time on them and withdraw from real life interactions.


Second Life makes money by offering a free version of Second Life, with the option to upgrade and pay for things with real money. It can be difficult to understand why people would pay for features in a virtual environment when there's very little tangible benefit. However, it is guessed that because of the addictive nature of Second Life, users see it as worthwhile to spend that money. This could link back to the idea of negatively impacting your real life interactions though, as there is the question of why one would want to invest money into virtual interactions, over investing that money into real life social interactions.

Lab 3 - Social Network data in Gephi

Social Network data of a Public Facebook group, being analysed in Gephi

Today we learnt how to use Gaffi to analyse Facebook data. Our tutor used data showing the influence of friends in her network, the rest of us used data downloaded from a Public Facebook group. To download the data, we used Netvizz.

Once the data was downloaded, we could open the graph file in Gaffi. First impression was a whole lot of dots and lines. It was as though someone had tried to do one of those connect-the-dots drawings. Then we were told that each dot actually represents a post. Oh!

Next we learnt that there's different ways to view the data. I explored some of the options besides the ones we were instructed to use (YifanHu and YifanHu's Multilevel) but at this elementary stage, I couldn't grasp the significance of the different data views. 

We also tried changing the colours. I also tried dragging the dots around, trying to "untangle" them. Pointless really, considering it's a connected up network!

There was also the option to change the size of the dots, so a bigger dot represented greater influence.

I can see this would be useful... perhaps there is a way to track back to that post (using the number provided) and see what it was about the content in that post that was so influential!

The picture at the very top of this post shows a view where the number assigned to each post shows instead of datapoints. This looked very cool. Messy, and dense, but exciting.

Lab 1 - Twitter

Twitter... didn't have much time to work with this, but I'm not completely unfamiliar to using Twitter, so at least it wasn't like, WOW, what is this??! ;)

Just as easy to use as Blogger - when it comes to uploading a photo. The first time though, Twitter had an error when I tried to tweet a cat photo. It's fine now.



Why do humans use it?
Not sure yet... I'd say just to follow news and celebrities.

Twitter is a social media website. It reminds me of Facebook. Probably because whenever anyone mentions "Social Media", the next two thoughts are Facebook and Twitter... as though they're cousins!

The main difference I see so far is the character limit on Twitter.