Sociability Issues for Designing Usable Mobile iTV Applications

The adoption of mobile iTV will depend not just from the availability of suitable technologies but mainly from the limitations related to its use. As for many other examples of personal communications technologies, several issues related to the appropriateness of use in different social contexts will have an important impact in users’ acceptance of this technology. In this paper we present three mobile iTV scenarios that highlight some of the most relevant relationships between tasks, devices, interfaces and the environment that may affect and be affected by sociability. Some findings about these relationships will be described to outline how they may influence designers to create more usable mobile iTV applications.