UniCast and GroupCast: An Exploration of Personal and Shared Peripheral Displays

Joseph F. McCarthy and Tony J. Costa
Workshop on Shared Environments to Support Face-to-Face Collaboration at the ACM 2000 Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW 2000), 2-6 December 2000, Philadelphia
[Paper (PDF)]

Abstract:

We often hear predictions of a technology-rich future in which our environments will be filled with artifacts that can sense and respond to us in new ways — a world filled with cameras, microphones, visual displays and audio speakers, to name but a few. Although such a world may seem threatening or menacing in some depictions, it may be possible that such developments will lead to more accommodating environments, encouraging more frequent and beneficial interactions among the inhabitants of such spaces.

A physical space that can sense people in the vicinity, and has knowledge of their interests, can use this information to create new informal interaction opportunities for these people. For example, a shared public display in a workplace, combined with a tracking system, can display information of mutual interest to the people passing by the display. People may choose to take advantage of this information to initiate a conversation with someone about whom they may know very little, leading to an increased sense of community in the workplace.

We have built two applications to explore the use and effects of peripheral displays in two different workplace contexts: UniCast, a personal display within an individual's office; and GroupCast, a shared display in an open area of an office building.