The Mobile Lab conducts participant ethnography and user integration research to study patterns of mobile media use - in particular, to evaluate the usability and applicability of GPS-based locative media with respect to outdoor environments and audiences. Most of our design projects incorporate some kind of participatory design process that invites end users to become part of the creation process by testing our prototypes (often while they are still being designed) and offering their feedback, ideas and preferences. This input is then incorporated into new design iterations, and invariably makes these designs more accessible, interesting, and relevant to target audiences and the community at large. We incorporate tactics ranging from participant observation and live usability field trials to focus groups, in-depth interviews, surveys and statistical analysis into this research. In some cases we also invite partner research groups, such as Concordia’s EMU group (Evaluation Mobility Useability), to participate in these evaluations as well. Media ethnography is employed both to evaluate our own designs, and to assess wider audience issues and receptivity to mobile media on behalf of client organizations. In March 2008, we did both when we completed a major research report evaluating the audience potential for Parks-based mobile media in partnership with Parks Canada.

Broadly speaking, the Banff New Media Institute is committed to working not just with international new media artists and businesses, but also the diverse communities of practice steadily adopting digital expression - both globally and locally. In keeping with this philosophy, our work at the ART Mobile Lab acknowledges its global context while remaining deeply rooted in the local. We are striving to create mobile media content tailored not only for mountain places, but mountain-going people, by incorporating an inclusive attitude into our design process, backed up by the human-centred research methods described above. In this activity, we join the hundreds of mobile media projects currently engaging community-based design practices around the planet, from the tropics to the far North and South

Related Publications:

Public evaluation of a handheld locative trail guide created by the ART Mobile Lab