"The dissertation builds on available sociological approaches to understanding everyday life in the networked city to show that emergent technologies reshape our experiences of spatiality, temporality and embodiment. It contributes to methodological innovation through the use of data bricolage and research blogging, which are presented through experimental and recombinant textual strategies; and it contributes to the field of science and technology studies by bringing together actor-network theory with the sociology of expectations in order to empirically evaluate an area of cutting-edge design." Looking forward to reading this.

Jasper van Kuijk on desire paths.
(I really ought to get round to a proper post linking use marks and desire paths at some point; they can tell us a lot.)

"“We modified the bolt seal so that we could open it when we wanted to ,” he said. “See, we can take a bolt seal that is already on a container being shipped, modify it and enter the container whenever we want.” Someone who managed to slip these tampered bolts into the supply chain could steal millions of dollars of merchandise, smuggle goods or people in legitimate containers, or contaminate the food supply. I studied the bolt, intrigued that the security of our global supply chain rests on such an innocuous object."

"Folksy urban legends as management metaphors work great!" as one commenter puts it. Nevertheless, this is a good story (I think Lessig includes it in 'Code' too) whether it's true or not. From the point of view of this research I'm more immediately interested in the technique (influencing user behaviour) than the 'innovation lesson' (changing the problem) – de Bono, TRIZ, etc have all made this clear years ago. Incidentally, a 'TRIZ master' investigates the legend here – http://www3.sympatico.ca/karasik/GF_evolution_of_legend.html

"Yep. Jakob Nielsen invented spam. "

"Sentences are not maps… Most diagrams and maps aren’t friendly, either… An exceptionally friendly type of diagram is available. "
Interesting way of illustrating and understanding "valid user paths" among other logical relationships. Worth exploring I think.

"As a professor, I am in the constant company of 18- to-23-year-olds. I have taught at both public and private universities, and I have to report that the levels of comfort with, understanding of, and dexterity with digital technology varies greatly within every class. Yet it has not changed in the aggregate in more than 10 years… Only a handful come to college with a sense of how the Internet fundamentally differs from the other major media platforms in daily life."