Understanding public displays as a medium for place-based communication: implications from current practices with non-digital displays

Abstract

Public screen displays are now common in urban life and are increasingly perceived as a pervasive communication medium. Still, despite their huge potential to address a very generic and very relevant need, i.e. communication, public displays have not yet been appropriated by society as a general-purpose communication medium. Unlike mobile and social media, which are now deeply embedded in commercial and social practices, public displays are still seen as a much less obvious and much more complex medium. In our research, we seek to uncover alternative usage paths for public displays. In particular, this work is motivated by the idea that there might be significant value in the use of digital public displays as a generic and open medium for place-based communication. To inform the design of new concepts of public display exploring this concept, we studied current place-based communication practices with non-digital displays across 40 places of various types. The contributions of this work are as follows: the identification of the major usage dimensions that characterise the wide range of value propositions that can be offered by place-based displays; the analysis of the relevance of those usage dimensions across different types of place; the identification of the primary role played by externally sourced content in place-based communication; and the characterisation of current practices associated with place-based media. We also discuss the relevance and the meaning of these contributions in regard to the design of novel digital public display systems for place-based communication. Place-based communication; public displays; non-digital displays H.5.m. Information interfaces and presentation: Miscellaneous.