January 2012
1 post
7 tags
“…he [she] is forced to represent the individual as a completely passive victim...”
– Jean Baudrillard, Selected writings (1988)
reflagged from Nicolas Nova at Pasta & Vinegar: Baudrillard on the difficulty to grasp people’s needs
December 2011
2 posts
14 tags
The Future of Computing in China: Stories that...
This was originally published on Bytes of China. In this post, my discussion on trust, creativity, and stories in the Chinese computing industry is relevant to how culture binds or fragments tech communities.
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The future of computing in China is a frequent topic in the tech community.
Most recently, NY Times published an article by John Markoff and David Barboza that discusses a...
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“Theory is like underwear. It should be worn inside, not outside.”
– Richard Madsen (Background: Him and I were discussing where I put the theory section in my chapter outline.)
November 2011
3 posts
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The Invisibility of Ethnography →
(I published this on Ethnography Matters)
What are ethnography’s doings? I mean, really, how do you describe what exactly an ethnographer does? S/he watches people? Explains people’s feelings? Translates cultural ideas into concrete stuff? I’ve come up with some interesting ways that work for me to describe my work, but it still requires context and to a person who has never worked with an...
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“yes, the most successful, innovative sites on the internet are mostly devoted to...”
– More from the Internet as Social Movement (via modernandmaterialthings)
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Ethnography Matters: A new blog about Ethnography!...
There’s a new blog about ethnography! Ethnography Matters explores what is means to be an ethnographer today. Of all the amazing blogs out there on anthropology and design, there wasn’t a place where ethnographers who focus on technology & media could discuss and share ideas, methods, and tips. So Heather Ford, Rachelle Annechino, Jenna Burrell, and I decided to make a place just...
October 2011
6 posts
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Thinking of Social Media as Places
Heather Ford’s post, New Geographies, on the newly launched blog, Ethnography Matters, is a wonderful read. She asks a really good question - how do we know when we’ve moved from one place to another when we’re online? And why is that the questions we ask about social media, force it into a bad vs good dichotomy?
*btw - do subscribe to Ethnography Matters! Heather was the...
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An example of why culture and design matter for...
P1120774 on Flickr.
An Xiao Mina’s latest post about seat numbers in China is a great example of how design that attempts to understand the user’s world matters. She explains in her post why there is no 12E in this photo:
Contrary to intuition for English speakers, seats 12F and 12D are next to each other on the train. Why no 12E? After some time, I realized it’s because the...
“Developers are realizing that they can deliver amazing experiences when they...”
– The impact of Apple’s Siri release: From the former lead iPhone developer of Siri
“Siri is basically a contextual, semantic, personalized search engine. We...”
– The impact of Apple’s Siri release: From the former lead iPhone developer of Siri
“More than ten years ago, before 9/11, Goldman Sachs was predicting that the BRIC...”
– Will Asia save global capitalism? - Opinion - Al Jazeera English
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“The space in which we live, which draws us out of ourselves, in which the...”
– Michel Foucault, “Of Other Spaces”
No other essay has informed the way in which I understand and articulate the digital space more than this essay by Foucault. If you read nothing else by Foucault, at least read this essay. You will never look at mirrors or boats the same way again.
(via...
September 2011
4 posts
15 tags
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Pairing Academic Research with Visual Materials - ...
Dan Lockton’s blog post announcing his PhD, ‘Design with Intent: A design pattern toolkit for environmental & social behaviour change,” is super inspiring.
My PhD involves developing a ‘design pattern’ toolkit, called Design with Intent, to help designers create products, services and environments which influence the way people use them. The toolkit brings together ...
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Creating A Digital Experience tied to Physical...
Tesco’s Homeplus Virtual Subway Store in South Korea is a great example of how to create a service based on existing user practices, rituals, and needs.
Behind the accessible yet super advertising-agency language of this marketing video is an example of great ethnography! (ignore their subjective claims that South Koreans are the 2nd hardest working people in the world- forgive Chiel -...
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“As social actors we expect authenticity in others, and in ourselves. In a time...”
– From “Theory Meets Methods: Data & The Authentic Cyborg Self”
(via modernandmaterialthings)
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“In terms of internet research, multi-sited ethnography – in particular Marcus’s...”
– Walker, Dana M. (2010) The Location of Digital Ethnography, Cosmopolitan Civil Societies: An Interdisciplinary Journal (via dan3)
August 2011
4 posts
9 tags
Leila Takayama's 5 suggestions for designers
I met human-robotics interaction researcher, Leila Takayama, in Palo Alto over yummy Korean food when I was working with Nokia. She is truly awesome. Leila is a prolific researcher who is truly committed to her furthering intellectual dialogue between private and academic sector.
And plus - we both think James Landay gives great advice : )
reblogged via Pasta & Vinegar:
“What...
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““The most important Design for Social Innovation is Invisible…The...”
– Heller Communication Design » Blog Archive » The most important Design for Social Innovation is Invisible.
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Design Research: A Methodology for Creating User...
For a long time, I’ve wanted to understand how ethnographically driven research is different from market research. While I intuitively understood the differences between the two, I didn’t take the time to fully sort it out.
I finally found someone who not only clearly explains the differences, but provides greater clarity and depth to my understanding of design research.
I love...
July 2011
7 posts
10 tags
Designing Around & For Objects that are Cultural...
I love moleskin. I love its deep respect for user creativity.
The blank black leather cover whispers to the notebook owner,
“I trust you with this empty space to do what you need to do with it, just promise to carry me with you wherever you go. “
And its owners are loyal to Moleskin because of this message. Someone could put lots of stickers or someone could just tape their name...
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“Baraniuk argues that this trend of narcissism as it plays out on Facebook...”
– Facebook Narcissism? » Cyborgology
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“The Egyptian people have proven time and again that they are leading digital...”
– From “The Revolution is Not a Branding Opportunity”
Via OWNI
(via modernandmaterialthings)
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“It’s not simply that they [aid organizations] leak so much money on their...”
– This quote is from an article that gives a cutting critique of Oxfam’s charity work around the recent events in Somalia. While the author cites more traditional development/charity projects, like Oxfam, I would say that this quote also stands for existing technology development projects that...
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Balancing Data vs. Design: James Landay asks if we...
We are living in a data obsessed period from open data movements to the data visualization craze. There is a sense that if only we had access to more data, then we could analyze the data and then make rational deicisons. But we forget that data itself is never just pure or neutral data, nor is the representation or the interaction with it.
We are also living in a design renaissance. But there...
June 2011
2 posts
6 tags
IBM's culture as an institution instead of as a...
From the beginning, IBM had a concept of itself as an institution, not just a technology company.
I read this quote by Rosabeth Moss Kanter in “1100100 and counting,” an article in The Economist about IBM’s success.
Kanter wrote SuperCorps, a book about successful companies.
I really love this quote because it reflects exactly what I love about the intersection of culture,...
6 tags
The Culturally Situated Weibo 随手拍 Instant Photo...
This is a re-post from my Bytes of China blog. I discuss how a the singles phenomenon on Weibo is a culturally situated practice. You can also read Alexis Madrigal’s gloss of my post on The Atlantic, How China’s Twitter, Weibo, Became a Dating Platform.
What first started out with well-meaning citizens taking pictures of child beggers on the street has now turned into a national ...
May 2011
1 post
9 tags
My new blog about my research in China: Bytes of...
I’ve just moved to China for fieldwork. I’ve decided to keep a separate blog of all my ethnographic observations so that it doesn’t get mixed in with my general observations about culture and technology here on Cultural Bytes.
I will still blog here, but just not as often as most of my brain for the next year will be focused on just China. If I have Bytes of China posts that...
March 2011
3 posts
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Tim Hwang on SocialBots & Twitter - Socially...
This experiment from Tim Hwang is a GREAT case study to talk about the interdependence of humans and digital machines. He created a clandestine competition for teams to program bots that would influence twitter users.
Teams, armed with the latest tools, have been architecting and launching swarms of robots to compete in influencing and shaping the social behavior of online communities...
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Slides/Notes for my SXSW talk on my research in...
En route to China, I stopped in Austin to give a talk at my first SXSW! Attendees were at 20,000 plus for interactive - 5,000 more than last year - a sign that this conference is growing in quality content or a sign that the economy is about to burst.
So what did I overhear the most at SXSW?
The internet is really important! Web 3.0 is here! The reign of the virtual! Networked sensors...
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“What irks me the most, I guess, is this kind of “omerta” pact in the gaming...”
– Gosh - another fascinating post from Dubious Quality, quoting an email about Bulletstorm. (via ubiqwitness)
February 2011
2 posts
9 tags
Moving to China to do research! Will be blogging...
Good day world! it’s finally happening! I’m moving to China to do my research! wooohoo!
So I’m moving to China to do my research, and then coming back to write something that I hope to buddha doesn’t kill my soul to write creative non-fiction. (here’s some more details about my research). I have a post on my personal blog about all the things and people that I will...
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Speaking about the next 300 million Chinese...
Just bought my tickets to Austin, Texas for SXSW - who else will be there? This will be my first SXSW! I get to play with the amazingly smart and playful Glenda Bautista, who invited me to join the Futures 15 line up. Future 15’s are a SXSW curated panel of short talks on specific topics. Last year Baratunde was on the same panel and I heard that he killed it with his talk: How to be Black....
December 2010
5 posts
6 tags
“Statistical investigation grasps the material of these practices, but not their...”
– limits of statistical analysis in the words of Michael de Certeau (1986:xviii)
de Certeau, Michel [1984] 2002. The Practice of Everyday Life. 1st ed. University of California Press.
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Ethnography in a digital world: the field site in...
How can ethnography in a digital world capture culturally embedded practices and discourses that are specific to communities that are no longer place-based? What are the future routes for a field that has been traditionally rooted to a bounded sense of place? How do we identity not only when our field work begins, but where? I try to provide some preliminary answers in this field paper.
I argue...
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My interview about ethnography and community...
Somehow the internets connected Dhiren Shingadia and I, which then evolved into a skype convo and then his interview with me: Understanding communities through ethnography (I recommend reading it here on Future Lab - better formatting).
Here are some of the questions that Dhiren asked me:
As a sociologist and ethnographer, what are the core outputs of your studies at the moment?
What are the...
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Ethnographic Reflexivity of Observed Realities:...
I am delighted to read this quote below from Angell & Demetis, 2010, Science’s First Mistake: Misinterpreting Observation, Delusion and Paradox. (thanks webisteme for posting this!)
We cannot even know if reality is consistent with sense data, because we only perceive what is already consistent.
After all, under hypnosis we can be jabbed with a needle and yet feel no pain, or smell...
16 tags
“It has become commonplace to regard the high-tech and creative industries as...”
– The Intercultural City, Phil Wood & Charles Landry (p. 144)
November 2010
4 posts
15 tags
Spoke at "Creating Community Environments" at ITP
I was a guest speaker at the wonderful Kristen Taylor’s seminar, Creating Community Environments, at New York University’s ITP program.
I talked about my upcoming move to China to conduct one year of fieldwork. Here’s a short in-progress description of my research project and a link to my presentation.
I also elaborated on the importance of understanding social ties as...
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Visual overview of my upcoming fieldwork in China...
I’m preparing for my move to China! I’m going to live there for 1 year so that I can touch, breath, and eat fieldwork 24/7. I’m beyond super excited for this. I’ve prepared a visual overview of my project on slideshare and a short in-progress description (will prob change every week!) for a more academic audience.
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My Book Review of Rich Ling's New Tech, New Ties:...
I just finished reading Rich Ling’s New Tech, New Ties: How Mobile Communication Is Reshaping Social Cohesion. This book is a lovely accumulation of the oeuvre of Ling’s research over the last decade. It is a healthy rain-forest of citations and unique connections between cellphones and sociological theory on interaction rituals. And if you don’t want to read thousands of pages of original...
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Deconstructing the Time-Space Compression Theory...
ok one more blog post on something that informs thought process (again Kevin this is your fault!)
I read lots of books from economic geographers and communication theorists about the effects of new technologies on society. Many theorists agree that digital tools cause spatial and temporal disconnects, shifting the way we experience everyday life. Within this group are scholars who propose...
October 2010
1 post
14 tags
Are we Really Post/Super/Hyper Modern now?
I have imposed a blogging ban on myself until I defend my field exams so that I can move to China (for the record kevin this is your fault!). But I am breaking the rule to share a quote that SO APTLY describes my feelings on grand meta-theories that claim we are now in super-modernity - or even still stuck in post-modernity.
Some unedited thoughts that come to my mind on when you social...
September 2010
3 posts
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The Great Internet Freedom Bluff of Digital...
Over the last few months I’ve been following the developments around Haystack, an “anti-censorship tool” for Iranian internet users. As the media was fawning over Haystack as a free speech tool and its co-creator, Austin Heap, as a poster-child for digital activism, I observed conversations unfold on the Stanford’s Liberation Technology email list-serve where members began to raise some...
7 tags
My Talk at Nokia Research Labs - Values in...
Nokia Talk - Values in technology design and use: ethnography’s contribution
View more presentations from triciawang.
I gave a presentation at Nokia Research Center, Palo Alto back in June, 2010. I’ve already written a post that explains my sides on China, but I still need to create one for Mexico. So stay posted! In the meantime, the abstract is below and here’s the...
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My New Academic Workflow With My Ipad, iAnnotate,...
I’ve been meaning to write about my academic work flow for a long time as it’s something that I’ve been trying to figure out. After talking with Susan and then looking at Graham Webster’s academic workflow, I offer you my process on how to deal with pdfs, citations, and academic books. A big part of my process now involves the ipad! I got it for the same exact reasons...
August 2010
2 posts
16 tags
Privacy and The Anonymous user in China:...
Since my keynote on neo-informationalism in regards to the Google-China saga, I started thinking that one of the blind-spots of living in a neo-informationalist world is to see “free-information” as a binary - either information is open or its not, either you make your identity known or not (update - I develop the idea of neo-informationalism in my piece on Haystack censorship tech)....
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