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[ba-ohs-talk] Some interesting HCI/Peirce-based ideas for OHS/Touchgraph


The B.E.S.T. (Bridging Economy and Society with Technology) beyond
Internet    (01)

1999 -  The "B.E.S.T. Beyond Internet" is an Open Framework research
program which has been promoted within the interdisciplinary Ph. D.
program "Telematics and Information Society" at the University of
Firenze, just along the research path from the inidividual to technology
in the Global Network using a new interdisciplinary research concept,
with a systemic and integrated approach.
< http://best.det.unifi.it/>    (02)

RATIONALE
The network and its applications are expected to deeply influence all
kinds of human activities in a short time;    (03)

   * such a process will have significant effects on the life, work,
     relationships, of the individual, while inducing profound changes
   * on the human and subjective sphere of the individual, affecting
     mechanisms and context of human perception,
   * cognition and emotion, and eventually affecting social integration
     significantly as individual and economic subjects,
   * while modifying the way to exploit rights and duties related to the
     individual citizenship.    (04)

The widespread and significant improvement of the quality of human life
has thusfar to be considered the proper, final objective and engine of
such an epochal transformation.    (05)

OBJECTIVES    (06)

   * Widening adaptability to different user subjectivity,
   * Providing user personalized applications – intended in the deeper
     sense
   * Support instrumental and symmetric exploitation of User Profiles
     (UP)
   * (UP) effective production, updated management, use and safeguard
     under control of the user himself or of someone acting on hisbehalf    (07)

< http://best.det.unifi.it/publications/presHCI/MCP.pdf >    (08)

Human subjectivity is the key factor to be exploited in order to achieve
a balanced and stable progress towards the Global Network; such
subjectivity exploitation must be directly under the control of the end
user of the Network itself.    (09)

   * Systematically exploiting and balancing users’ subjectivity in
     operating interactions and relations
   * Matching instrumental and technological network evolution to
     subjectivity factors
   * Inherently matching the different cultural, social and economic
     contexts
   * Thus allowing a stable development of the network towards Universal
     Access to the new Information- Communication- Knowledge Society    (010)

This will eventually lead to a more symmetric setting of different users
and actors within the Network, be they end users or providers. The
economic, cultural and social contexts of the individual, have,
therefore, to be carefully accounted in the effective exploitation of
human subjectivity.    (011)


BEYOND
Proper matching of the human subjectivity factors in the Global Network
requires new technological and operational advances, thus implying a
Network evolution at all its levels, going beyond the Internet itself.    (012)

Network matching for instrumental exploitation of human subjectivity,
also to allow widespread opportunities and symmetric capabilities of
relationship and interaction among the network subjects, is therefore a
transdisciplinary research and development line to be systematically
pursued in order to:    (013)

   * match compatibility with the different cultural, social and
     economic contexts
   * allow the balanced, then stable, development of the Network towards
     the Universal Access to the new Information-Communication-Knowledge
     Society.    (014)

C A L L   F O R   C O O P E R A T I O N
The support and cooperation of external subjects is called for increase
the capability of the B.E.S.T. beyond Internet program to obtain
significant results within its research framework. Research activities
are indeed developed within the "B.E.S.T. beyond Internet" program in
different ways:    (015)

   * Independent activity within the program; this is carried out
     independently within the program, based on the internal resources
     available, autonomously or through free contribution/funding from
     external bodies. This is typically devoted to "exploratory studies"
     or "basic research"
   * Activity in cooperation with external bodies; this activity is
     jointly carried out in cooperation with external bodies on
     objectives of common interest pertaining to the program. It can be
     any of the types of research activity highlighted previously
     ("exploratory studies", "basic research", "task oriented research
     projects", "experimentation in Pilot Trials").
   * Independent and linked activity of external bodies; this can
     autonomously and independently be carried out by external bodies to
     concur in the achievement of the Program objectives, while keeping
     the necessary and agreed link with the internal activity of the
     Program.    (016)

Parties interested in cooperating can contact the B.E.S.T. beyond
Internet core team
Email: best_core@achille.det.unifi.it    (017)

http://best.det.unifi.it/people_core.htm
http://best.det.unifi.it/people_asso.htm    (018)

Cognitive subsystem functions    (019)

   * The Tutor Agent is supposed to properly understand End User’s
     queries through Natural Language
   * The Tutor Agent must correctly interact with the Global Network
     through Web-like languages
   * The Shared Knowledge Space should be a database where Users belief
     in Network resources is shared and exploited
   * End User’s profile can be properly used and safely managed through
     the Tutor Agent and Trust Intermediaries
   * The Tutor Agent implements the “Subjectivizing Engine” through the
     Actuative subsystem    (020)

Basic Logic Platform    (021)

   * The Resolution Layer: This layer performs a personalized meta-data
     structuration on the data flows, thus making it possible for the
     higher layers to properly manage them, and to the proposed system
     to be independent from the transport layers (XML might be here the
     leading technology).
   * The Localization Layer: This layer is responsible for showing the
     End User a unique view on his/her Global Network Resources, which
     are structured in personalized DNS-like location trees and
     addressed through Uniform Resource Names defined by the End User.    (022)



Global Network Data Streams    (023)

   * Flow coloring concept must be extended to subjectivity
   * It could be possible to classify Global Network data streams
     depending on their subjective value to the End User
   * Formal Communications (working e-mails)
   * Informal Communications (friendly communications,..)
   * Commercial Transactions (user’s money is concerned)
   * Emergency (critical information, civil protection information,
     tele-medicine data, and concerning general public emergency
     situations)
   * Tele-action flows through which end users are performing actions by
     using the Global Network
   * Information and Application data download/search    (024)

BEST Functions Example    (025)

   * Flow coloring concept must be extended to subjectivity
   * It could be possible to classify Global Network data streams
     depending on their subjective value to the End User
   * Formal Communications (working e-mails, ...)
   * Informal Communications (friendly communications,..)
   * Commercial Transactions (user’s money is concerned)
   * Emergency (critical information, civil protection information,
     tele-medicine data, and concerning general public emergency
     situations)
   * Tele-action flows through which end users are performing actions by
     using the Global Network
   * Information and Application data download/search    (026)

Peirce’s vision:
August 8-10 2001, HCI 2001, New Orleans USA 19/23
16. Semiosis
Meanings of expressions cannot be represented by a tree-like format (the
dictionary), that is in terms of combinations of metasemiotic
constructs, the nodes (no longer interpretable). In Peirce’s vision,
meaning is a (potentially) infinite series of other expression
(interpretants), which may be different descriptions (experiential,
scientific, etc.), Minsky’s frames (scenarios), etc., which virtually
cover all knowledge people share about a concept, in different cultural
sub-contexts. The Global Semantic Space is an encyclopedia endowed with
contextual selectors (Eco). The process of semiosis (from the expression
to the meaning) is also (potentially) unlimited because any
“interpretant” (e.g. a textual description) needs to be interpreted and
its terms brings to
new concepts (and its interpretants).    (027)

For humans, semiosis is constrained by the current topic, and the
interpretation is temporarily accepted if the global reading is felt as
semantically coherent by the reader.    (028)

In COllaborative System Architecure (COSA) our research group has
developed a collaborative
environments development framework, by defining several “worlds” as End
User’s localization systems and “avatars” as his/ her Tutor Agents
Through COSA, the Basic Logic Platform (Resolution and Localization
layers) of the proposed architecture has been implemented
COSA is a platform built with XML and DNS- like technologies
< http://best.det.unifi.it/publications/presHCI/GV.pdf >    (029)