Social Interaction Design

Designing software for human-human interaction, then, is about more than user-friendly interfaces. Does the system encourage or facilitate appropriate behaviors from its users? Does it 'speak' using appropriate cultural language and social gestures? How do its target users want to interact with one another in the first place?
These are not questions that most social software today answers effectively. How many of your friends on Facebook do you actually consider friends? What does it mean to poke someone? Twitter begins with the question "What are you doing?" but most of the worthwhile tweets don't answer it. And why can't I put my Twitter followers into groups? If given the choice I might say one thing to my (true) friends and another to colleagues and coworkers...but the tool forces the lowest common denominator.
At IDEO we've started using the term "social interaction design" to describe the work of creating tools for both human-computer and human-human-interaction. At the very least, that means the work requires designers or design teams that understand as much about ethnographic methods as they do about information architecture and interface design. But merely adding an anthropologist to a design team to tackle a social software problem isn't enough. Though similar in many ways to more traditional forms of interaction design, the work is unique enough that it has forced us to look at many of our own design processes and adapt them for these new challenges. Here are some of the ways social interaction design is different:

From user-centered to users-centered
Human-centered approaches to industrial and interaction design have long focused on studying human behavior to create informed and appropriate designs. In product-centric contexts, human factors specialists pay close attention to human-artifact interaction and look for opportunities for improvement.
With social software, the object of study is less tangible. A social interaction designer must consider not only people, environment, and existing tools, but also the unseen elements of the system such as social relationships, power dynamics, and cultural rules. Who are the stakeholders in the system and what do each of them want or need? How does information flow and where are the friction points? What does it feel like to be a part of this particular culture?
At one level this seems mundane and obvious, but at another it is profound: what the designer or team is doing is conducting their research in the language of interface. This is ethnography without words.Of course, these are the same sorts of questions any ethnographer asks—in that sense they are nothing new. But the intensity required to gain this kind of understanding, both in terms of time and level of immersion, is substantially greater than in the more tangible and direct forms of user study. There's a reason most anthropologists spend months to years in the field producing an ethnography: this is complex, time-consuming stuff. Design projects tasked with creating social software should expect to spend the majority of their time in situ with whatever community or organization the tool is meant to serve.

From design-by-principle to ethnography-by-prototype
Human-centered design often begins with a "human factors" research phase that culminates in synthesized concept frameworks and a set of design principles. This is essentially a compressed form of traditional ethnography where understanding is distilled down to key insights. From this clarified perspective the design team then builds a series of prototypes which may be taken into the field for further feedback.
When designing social software, that process requires some adaptation. Because of the complexities that come with understanding a cultural system, a set of design principles simply can't contain enough information to drive effective design on its own. A comprehensive ethnographic study—the kind that produces a book several inches thick—might make an ideal first step, but in practice no one will ever have the time to conduct one.
The best alternative, we've found, is to blend the human factors and prototyping phases through iterative cycles of creating and evaluating software concepts. As early as possible, the team creates rough concepts of a solution and uses them to guide conversations and explorations of the social system they're trying to serve. Conversations about the concepts highlight weaknesses, the concepts are modified accordingly, and the process is repeated. Again, and again, and again.
At one level this seems mundane and obvious, but at another it is profound: what the designer or team is doing is conducting their research in the language of interface. This is ethnography without words. By creating concepts as early as possible and using them to both express and evaluate their understanding, the design team is taking the most direct route they can toward the construction of a socially effective solution.
In practicality, what this means for the designer is that a combination of traditional anthropological and interaction design skills are essential. Throughout the design process the work requires fluency both in the language of interface and the methods of ethnographic research. Such a combination is rare find in a single designer. When the task is left to the team, they will need to be sure to work closely together, involving both skill sets in every step along the way.

From design engagement to a design dialogue
The iterative prototyping process is always a dialogue between the social interaction designer and the social system for which the software is being designed. This process of refinement doesn't end with the software's launch, however. In fact, the launch of social software is really just part of an ongoing design process.
This is a fact that has become almost a given in the internet age. No longer required to reserve new versions for software boxes, today's developers are free to improve their software constantly.
This agile approach to software development, and design, is especially important for the social variety, however, because the human-human interactions the tool is meant to facilitate are themselves subject to change. Social interactions are inherently dynamic. Organizations and communities evolve over time, and the best tools grow accordingly.
And then there are the effects of the software itself: good social software will facilitate and encourage social interactions that were previously difficult, or indeed impossible. Thus the very act of creating the tools may profoundly alter the system that that tool was meant for. The tool changes the community changes the tool.
Unfortunately, the terms of many design engagements aren't set up to support the ongoing work that is actually needed, and in real life the process is often cut short. This is not only bad news for the designer, but for the organization or community the designer is meant to help as well: without this ongoing, iterative design dialog, the value of even the best solutions will wane dramatically over time. (For a great article about this, check out The Agency Problem by Joshua Porter.)

From anthropologist to armchair psychologist
Okay, so maybe this is about playing both an anthropologist and an armchair psychologist, but social interaction design requires taking all that learning about a particular community or organization and augmenting it with a sensitivity towards the more general peculiarities of human nature. Perhaps using this as a short-cut to effective systems, social interaction design can rely upon the knowledge that many aspects of human behavior are consistent across cultural settings.
For instance, altruism and anonymity seldom go hand in hand. Social software should either reward individual participation or publicize the non-compliant (we prefer the first option). People tend to resist change, particularly to their own personal habits and workflow, so how can a system minimize change by integrating into what users already do? Where change is mandatory, how can the transition be made as smooth as possible? And good design often leverages the path of least resistance; most users stick with the default choices. How can you use this to the benefit of the user and the social system at the same time? (Recommended reading: Nudge by Richard Thaler and Cass Sunstein.)

Computing for older users: Patronising or practical?

What connects Italian vegans, Valerie Singleton, and Linux Mint? Well they're all involved in a firm whose business is bringing computing to older users.

Whether or not Simplicity Computing succeeds will be a big test of two things - the appetite of older people to get online and the attractiveness of open source software as a means of dealing with digital exclusion.

Yesterday we took 80-year-old Betty Parsons for her first encounter with a computer. She climbed the stairs at the home of Nigel Houghton, who's masterminding the Simplicity venture, and sat herself down in front of the machine. When it's switched on for the first time, up pops Valerie Singleton - co-founder of the business launching Simplicity - and starts explaining what to do next, much like Microsoft's talking paperclip.

It's very basic - how to use a mouse, how to navigate your way around the simple front page and so on - but it needs to be. It's instructive watching someone using a mouse for the first time. Betty found it a real struggle - and that must be a big hurdle which some people will not clear.

Simplicity runs on the Linux Mint free operating system, and Liam Proven, who's designed the whole set-up, tracked down a company called Vegan Solutions - yes those Italian vegans - which had already produced a software package aimed at older users. He's worked with the Italians to adapt their Eldy software for British use.




So the home page is deliberately stripped down to essentials: six buttons leading to e-mail, web browsing, chat, documents, your personal profile - and more video tutorials by Val Singleton. There are no long menus with bewildering choices and wherever you are in the system, there's another button marked Square One, which takes you back to... well, you can guess.

Liam Proven told me that he was "platform-agnostic" but had chosen a Linux operating system for three reasons:

"Firstly, it means a fairly big price saving because Linux is free, so £70 to £80 is saved on what is meant to be a low-priced computer. Secondly, it's extremely secure so there's no need for anti-virus, and thirdly it runs very much better and faster than Windows on a more limited machine."
But there's a couple of questions to be asked about Simplicity. It's not all that cheap - systems range from £299 without screen or keyboard to £525 for a complete system. Then there are some people who will undoubtedly feel patronised by the very idea of a computer for older users - one woman got in touch with me this morning to express her annoyance - and others will ask why they shouldn't be taught to use Windows like just about everybody else.

When I visited a UK Online centre the other day, a group of older users of varying degrees of computing skill were using the desktops to surf the web and send e-mails, occasionally asking for help from a volunteer. The computers were all running Windows XP and it set me wondering whether this is still the first operating system most novices see when they come to one of these places.

UK Online pointed out that every centre operates independently, obtaining its funding from various sources and choosing what hardware and software to buy. But yes, it appears they almost exclusively use Windows - and mostly XP. A spokesman said: "Many choose Microsoft as it is the leading system used in the workplace or on PCs bought in retail stores and therefore the one customers often wish to learn."

They are also almost all using Internet Explorer to browse the internet - 86% of the computers are on various versions of IE, with just 10% on Firefox - so if you're learning about computers in a UK Online centre, you'll almost certainly be plunged into a Windows world.

So Simplicity is swimming against the tide, and may find some resistance, not from older customers, but from sons and daughters who'd rather see their parents learn the same system as themselves. But Betty Parsons certainly liked the look of it - though getting to grips with that mouse will still be a challenge - and the company says its stand was besieged by eager customers when it showed off a pilot system at an exhibition recently.

There's no reason - except for inertia - why we should all have to start our computing journey using the same system. Indeed, if Simplicity proves a hit, it may encourage others to look at their software and ask why it is so difficult for a first-time user to grasp. Oh, and one more thing - Val Singleton or a talking paperclip? No contest.