Reflecting Human Values in the Digital Age
Reflecting Human Values in the Digital Age
The mission of Human Computer Interaction or better known as HCI is to understand the relationship between human and computers with a goal to improve the current technology design. As technology has developed so rapidly, the relationship between human and computers has taken on a new dimension. We are now so dependent on computers that we are in danger of not surviving without them. “HCI in 2020” which was held in Seville , Spain in March 2007 gave a chance to academic and industrial researchers to voice out their opinion, debate the future of HCI as well as other issues related to this field. The participants had a wide range of opinions, all agreed that the field of HCI much change its scope and method if it is to remain relevant in the 21st century. In the early years, HCI’s common activity was to model a user’s interaction with a desktop computer so that the interface between person and machine could be optimized. This was done in a controlled environment. In the 1990’s , the objective of HCI began to change with the growth of communication networks that link computers. A better understanding of HCI has increased slowly, as common words like “user-friendliness” and “user experience” gained global acceptance. The result being, today, HCI is a recognized academic discipline with conferences, lectures and research dedicated to it. Today, HCI has come out of the workplace and taken its place in homes, public places and institutions of learning. This has led the field’s practitioners to rethink their design goals and to be accountable as technology may not only be functional and useful but may also exasperate.
The relationship or interaction between human values and technology needs to be much more cautiously navigated than before because values are not something that can be catalogued like books in a library but are bound to each other. Failure to do so may result not only in a volatile generation gap but
The mission of Human Computer Interaction or better known as HCI is to understand the relationship between human and computers with a goal to improve the current technology design. As technology has developed so rapidly, the relationship between human and computers has taken on a new dimension. We are now so dependent on computers that we are in danger of not surviving without them. “HCI in 2020” which was held in Seville , Spain in March 2007 gave a chance to academic and industrial researchers to voice out their opinion, debate the future of HCI as well as other issues related to this field. The participants had a wide range of opinions, all agreed that the field of HCI much change its scope and method if it is to remain relevant in the 21st century. In the early years, HCI’s common activity was to model a user’s interaction with a desktop computer so that the interface between person and machine could be optimized. This was done in a controlled environment. In the 1990’s , the objective of HCI began to change with the growth of communication networks that link computers. A better understanding of HCI has increased slowly, as common words like “user-friendliness” and “user experience” gained global acceptance. The result being, today, HCI is a recognized academic discipline with conferences, lectures and research dedicated to it. Today, HCI has come out of the workplace and taken its place in homes, public places and institutions of learning. This has led the field’s practitioners to rethink their design goals and to be accountable as technology may not only be functional and useful but may also exasperate.
The relationship or interaction between human values and technology needs to be much more cautiously navigated than before because values are not something that can be catalogued like books in a library but are bound to each other. Failure to do so may result not only in a volatile generation gap but