Abstract- We have developed a communication support system that estimates the
... developed a new mobile communication tool for cellular phones that uses ...
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Version#1 < remote place and has little chance to meet others in person, the status of others (whether they were at their office or home or in the middle of a meeting) seems to have been more important than detailed location information. This particular user suggested to us that we should show the status of each user using an icon in the Top Page. TABLE 3. SENSITIVITY OF THE USERS TO REVEALING PERSONAL INFORMATION.
The intended users are to be friends who would share location or other sensitive information with each other. However, we have to consider the problem of privacy, because location information is acquired automatically and periodically. Actually, some users had worries about sharing position information before they began to use our system. After the studies were over, we asked them what kind of information made from location information they would be willing to reveal (Table 3). Most of the users didn’t mind if persons who were close to saw the list and location name, distance, and state of movement. However, the number of persons increased who minded revealing the longitude and latitude of where they were. When we show only the location name via "Imadoko mapion", the precision of the location information decreases, because others can’t figure out at which point the target person is in the map shown. They seem to think it undesirable to show their own locations in order to increase the precision of the location information. Two-thirds of the users didn’t want to show even a location name to persons who were not so close to. The ratio of decrease in the number of users who agreed to show their location seemed to depend on human relations more than on the kinds of information revealed or on the precision of information. Most users wanted to be able to control which personal information about them gets revealed, according to human relations. We need to a function that allows them this control in the future. However, we learned after the study was over that most of the users valued sharing location information. Most users said that our system was not only convenient to use but also pleasant to use. Our system would suit for friends or families more than the people who are busy colleagues at the same company.
5 IV. DISCUSSION Interfaces have been studied that help mobile telephone users answer the question "What is the best way to make contact right now?" [1-6]. The idea of integrating schedule and location information into a communication tool might not be new. Some projects have explored this with PDAs, using MS Outlook for schedule info and relying on the user to update their location information. Our aim is not only to share location information as awareness information and to help users to select an appropriate communication channel, but also to give users a chance to meet in-person. One novel aspect in iCAMS is the on-screen interface for the cellular phone using CHTML. We sort online users by proximity, then prioritize the available communication channels based on the activity the user is doing according to their schedule and location. [1-3] are also web-based applications for the cellular phone. However they facilitate the ongoing interaction between two people. Another novel aspect of our projects is the use of NTT DoCoMo's location detection service. Some projects also use location information as awareness information. However, the location information was limited to information in a building [6], or involved users entering location information by manual operation [2, 3, 5]. In our projects, location information is within the city spaces, and is acquired automatically. Work in the active badges [6] requires a specialized environment and the possession of specialized equipment. In contrast, our system uses conventional and popular technologies, and explores how these technologies can be used for new purposes. We think that these two approaches have important differences in terms of where they might be used, and also in terms of who might use them (e.g., highly-paid engineers and researchers in high-tech workplaces, vs. a broad diversity of people in common, everyday settings). The formal similarity of the two research programs is contradicted by their very different settings -- that is, the settings are very different in terms of where they might occur, how much preparation would be required in these environments, the social classes involved in usage, and the work/life activities that could be affected. In other projects users often forgot to update their information manually [5], and we had the same problem with the users in our system. However, location information is acquired automatically and periodically in our system. That is advantageous in being able to update awareness information on a user at any time; however we must pay attention to privacy issues in revealing location information. The intended users are to be friends who would share location or other sensitive information with each other. However, we have to consider the problem of privacy. Actually, some users had worries about sharing position information before they began to use iCAMS. After the study was over, however, sharing location information had become popular among most of the users. There seems to have been occasional instances when users didn’t want to reveal their position to someone else. In
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