The impact HCI has on society, economy and culture
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What is HCI?
(Hewett, 1996) said that “HCI is a discipline concerned with
the design, evaluation and implementation of interactive computing systems for
human use and with the study of major phenomena surrounding them”.
Society
With the development of new HCIs over the last few decades,
computer have become more accessible to people and are now used in nearly
everyone everyday life. Most of the population today on computers or at least
has some access to one to use for whatever purpose they have. They can word
process documents, research online and even send emails to friends and family.
In mostly every electrical equipment from washing machines to microwaves use
some to sort of computer chip for them to do the job. Each of the domestic
devices have an interface that everyone uses. Many businesses, hospitals and
researchers rely heavily on computers in today’s world. By making new ways for
us to interact with these devices effectively and easy means far more can
access them. Many domestic devices have simple and effective HCI designs, so
that people who have used it can be more comfortable with the menus, options,
colours, fonts and overall look of the interface.
Economy
(Olive Mcgown, 2013) said "HCI is greatly changing our culture due to the way that electronic devices are becoming a bigger part of our everyday lives, with more features than ever to help us during the day. Moore’s Law states that computer power will double every two years. This means that the amount of tasks that electronic devices will become more varied and complex as time goes on. They will continue to become more and more integrated into our lives.
An example of this happening is the advancement of smartphone technology. Today’s smartphones are incredibly capable, being able to perform things that only computers could do several years ago. For many people, a smartphone now does everything they need an electronic device for and they no longer have need for a proper computer. Some smartphones even come with multi-core processors – a technology that is still relatively recent for desktop and notebook computers. Smartphones are also experimenting with new technologies such as text-to-speech, voice recognition, augmented reality and multi-touch screens. Mobile internet on smartphones allows for easy communication over services like Twitter or Facebook. Entertainment is also easily accessible with services like Netflix or Lovefilm that have mobile applications."
Culture
(Hatimlafia, 2012) "The impact of HCI on culture can be shown through the simple of use of translators that can remove the language barrier preventing people from having conversations. This can help not only on a social aspect but also with work purposes, as in when people work abroad. The HCI here helps with things by making the translators very easy to use with the use of touchscreens and semiotic GUI’s, meaning we do not have to input the commands ourselves but just press a button to translate our text or speech. Furthermore household appliances are changing the way we live our lives, as we no longer must hand wash our clothes as most people have a washing machine, a lot less kids play with toys now as most play on games consoles. Less people read hardback books in comparison to 60 to 70 years ago as more people prefer to watch television instead now. Our lives are constantly being changed by technology and HCI is continually making the technology easier and easier to use. HCI in household appliances can be seen in things such as vacuum cleaners. Just the simple idea of the vacuum cleaner having wheels makes it alot easier to use as we do not have to carry them all over the house. Furthermore there is the semiotic side of Television remotes, as they tend to have coloured on/off buttons to make it easy to differentiate them from the rest of the buttons on the controller."
Bibliography
Hewett, 1996. Available from http://old.sigchi.org/cdg/cdg2.html [accessed on 17/10/2013]
Oliver Mcgown, 2013. Available fromhttp://olivermcgownhci.wordpress.com/2013/01/29/impact-of-hci-on-society-culture-and-the-economy/ [accessed on 17/10/2013]
Hatimlafia, 2012. Available from http://hhaat.wordpress.com/2012/10/08/impact-of-hci-on-culture/ [accessed on 17/10/2013]
(Olive Mcgown, 2013) said "HCI is greatly changing our culture due to the way that electronic devices are becoming a bigger part of our everyday lives, with more features than ever to help us during the day. Moore’s Law states that computer power will double every two years. This means that the amount of tasks that electronic devices will become more varied and complex as time goes on. They will continue to become more and more integrated into our lives.
An example of this happening is the advancement of smartphone technology. Today’s smartphones are incredibly capable, being able to perform things that only computers could do several years ago. For many people, a smartphone now does everything they need an electronic device for and they no longer have need for a proper computer. Some smartphones even come with multi-core processors – a technology that is still relatively recent for desktop and notebook computers. Smartphones are also experimenting with new technologies such as text-to-speech, voice recognition, augmented reality and multi-touch screens. Mobile internet on smartphones allows for easy communication over services like Twitter or Facebook. Entertainment is also easily accessible with services like Netflix or Lovefilm that have mobile applications."Culture
(Hatimlafia, 2012) "The impact of HCI on culture can be shown through the simple of use of translators that can remove the language barrier preventing people from having conversations. This can help not only on a social aspect but also with work purposes, as in when people work abroad. The HCI here helps with things by making the translators very easy to use with the use of touchscreens and semiotic GUI’s, meaning we do not have to input the commands ourselves but just press a button to translate our text or speech. Furthermore household appliances are changing the way we live our lives, as we no longer must hand wash our clothes as most people have a washing machine, a lot less kids play with toys now as most play on games consoles. Less people read hardback books in comparison to 60 to 70 years ago as more people prefer to watch television instead now. Our lives are constantly being changed by technology and HCI is continually making the technology easier and easier to use. HCI in household appliances can be seen in things such as vacuum cleaners. Just the simple idea of the vacuum cleaner having wheels makes it alot easier to use as we do not have to carry them all over the house. Furthermore there is the semiotic side of Television remotes, as they tend to have coloured on/off buttons to make it easy to differentiate them from the rest of the buttons on the controller."
Bibliography
Hewett, 1996. Available from http://old.sigchi.org/cdg/cdg2.html [accessed on 17/10/2013]
Oliver Mcgown, 2013. Available fromhttp://olivermcgownhci.wordpress.com/2013/01/29/impact-of-hci-on-society-culture-and-the-economy/ [accessed on 17/10/2013]
Hatimlafia, 2012. Available from http://hhaat.wordpress.com/2012/10/08/impact-of-hci-on-culture/ [accessed on 17/10/2013]
