Abstract

Interaction is increasingly a public affair, taking place in our theatres, galleries, museums, exhibitions and on the city streets. This raises a new design challenge for HCI – how should spectators experience a performer’s interaction with a computer? We classify public interfaces (including examples from art, performance and exhibition design) according to the extent to which a performer’s manipulations of an interface and their resulting effects are hidden, partially revealed, fully revealed or even amplified for spectators. Our taxonomy uncovers four broad design strategies: ‘secretive, ’ where manipulations and effects are largely hidden; ‘expressive, ’ where they tend to be revealed enabling the spectator to fully appreciate the performer’s interaction; ‘magical, ’ where effects are revealed but the manipulations that caused them are hidden; and finally ‘suspenseful, ’ where manipulations are apparent but effects are only revealed as the spectator takes their turn. ACM Classification

Citations