CSCW ‘98 DEMO PROPOSAL: The Hummingbird: Mobile Support for Group Awareness

The Hummingbird is a small portable device which supports social awareness between people who frequent the same physical location. The Hummingbird uses wireless communication to give members of a group continuous aural and visual indications of which other group members are in the vicinity. Although many solutions for providing awareness information exist, they are either tied to the desktop (e.g. ICQ) or dependent on a pre-existing infrastructure (e.g. Active Badges). Hummingbirds have the advantage of working any time, anywhere, which will be shown in this demonstration. We will let attendees get hands-on experience with the Hummingbird prototype, but the demonstration will not be limited to the demo room. Attendees will be allowed to borrow Hummingbirds and use them in the conference area. In this way, participants will be able to explore how Hummingbirds can support group awareness during a conference situation. DEMONSTRATION REQUIREMENTS No special requirements, except some table space. PRESENTER INFORMATION The demo presenters are all part of the research group PLAY: Applied research on art and technology at the Viktoria Research Institute. Their roles in the Hummingbird project are as follows: • Lars Erik Holmquist: project leader, concept design • Joakim Wigström: hardware design • Jennica Falk: evaluation, hardware design