Oral interview, Réanne C, 24 y.o., interior architect student: Not technophobe but close, at least, far from being technophile 

This is a synthesis of the interview.
This person likes computers as a working tool, but smart phones or computer as tool of communication doesn’t interest her.
For instance she doesn’t have and don’t want a Facebook account, she profoundly dislike it because there is a loss of quality (investment and interest) in the messages.

Reasons of low quality of Facebook messages
• Undefined recipient – we are not necessarily the recipient of the message, we do not necessarily have a recipient to our message
+ Instantaneity – amount and rate (speed) of message rise. We are distracted, multi-parallel-communication
+ Easy – technology makes things easier. Less effort needed, less effort spent
+ Emotional expression limited – the interface limits ourselves. We need to find ways to express our feeling without writing a long paragraph of text
= Less quality of the message

What is the quality of a message?
• Implication in composing the message: time spent, words chosen, personalised (targeted to at least a recipient)
• Interest of the message: entertaining content, informative content

Examples of consequences
Waiting for an answer (undefined recipient) + high rate of message (Instantaneity) = addicted to news feed, Like a drug
Message short and quick (easy) + forget smileys (emotional expression) = Interpretation possibly wrong

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Detail of the arguments

Let’s forget about embedded chat, private mails and groups of diffusion (lists of friends) for the moment. 
Public status is the specific thing that brought Facebook (a little bit like Twitter).
Main reasons of disliking Facebook comes from its comparison with physical live communication.
Live communication can be exclusive, privileged / at a defined moment of social interaction. Sequential, consecutive, intuitive.
Facebook is semi-public, no precise receiver of the message, too much interlocutors / is instantaneous but not synchronized, multi-parallel-conversation, is too much distractions and speed, not enough investment, effort in quality of message.
Information is quickly displayed, ready for consuming, free for any members: it’s the “fast food” of communication.

Undefined recipient – we are not necessarily the recipient of the message, we do not necessarily have a recipient to our message
When sending a message with no precise recipient we are waiting for an answer (or a reaction)
No reaction = no reader = frustration of being alone = like throwing something that nobody catches = depressed to talk alone 

Instantaneity – amount and rate (speed) of message rise. We are distracted, multi-parallel-communication
The ancestor of the blog is the book or the personal (open) journal. The scale of time is really bigger between writing, publication and feedback.
Even in a letter, ancestor of the e-mail, there is more patience, the pleasure of waiting.
We live in the society of instantaneous, we have got to work faster and faster and this trend applies to communication.
Emotions didn’t change, it’s the way to communicate them that is corrupted.
Less time spent, less implication, more message processed, less quality.

Easy – technology makes things easier. Less effort needed, less effort spent
Technology is made to assist us and it assists us also for communication – We delegate a part of our social interaction process to computers.
Delegating communication to a machine is considering that it is enough time consuming to simplify it and save time by leaving that to computer-assisting technologies.
The notion of effort in the communication gets lost because of the facilitation of communication by digital devices: Less quality of the message.

Emotional expression limited – the interface limits ourselves. We need to find ways to express our feeling without writing a long paragraph of text
We don’t have the tools to express human feelings using a machine, the interface is limited, or limiting. 
We need to recompile the message (when short) because not always well encodes (with smileys, or longer text), it leaves a wide room for interpretation.

Second question, why do you hate computer technologies or especially robots.
What if robots could help grandmas to cross the road? It’s a behaviour of humanity, it usually asks an effort. delegating this to a machine is considering that compassion is enough time consuming to avoid it and is worth saving time by leaving that to computer-assisting technologies.
Computer is made on wires and electricity, it is dead and cold and it is getting too close to life (imitating it, assisting it)
A living species like Human is characterized by 5 senses + intelligence. Computer and robots is trying to fake human being with sensors + artificial intelligence.
It’s frightening when this not alive thing have alive kind of behaviour that are comparable to instinct or intelligence (ex. robot dog).
Trying to Imitate life is wrong.
It’s the same with media. Talking face to face is rich because of all what surrounds the message. For instance you can look wherever you want (hands, eyes, etc.), you feel the smell of the other, the physical distance between the bodies, you can’t with a webcam.
Trying to reach that richness of communication doesn’t seems interesting.

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Ideas
Interview more extreme users.
Technophobes – The lack of professional vocabulary forces to imagine metaphors, instinctive and simple way to talk about technology (good source of inspiration).
Technophiles or addicts – maybe extrapolates the good aspects of the trad-off of digital communication
– What do you like about it computers?
– What do you like about communicating with the computer?
– What do you appreciate by seeing your friends digitally instead of IRL?
– Do you prefer friends on facebook or in real?
– How did you brake with your last girl friend (depending the age of the user)

Interview people who spend time with the TV turned on without watching it. Is it to have a presence?

Are values changing? Is it a question of generation?
e.g. Wishing a happy birthday
50 y.o. people would see each other, send a post card
25 y.o people would SMS, telephone
15 y.o. people would mail, facebook only ?
It might not happen soon because the first social contact that human has is with his mother and except if babies are not anymore born naturally and raised by humans.
These behavior maybe already exist for extreme users as WOW players. An example of extreme user is a World of warcraft player that died because of too much playing.
Ref: “the machine stopes”

Play with communication interruption parameters
Waiting for an answer (undefined recipient) + high rate of message (Instantaneity) = addicted to news feed, Like a drug
Message short and quick (easy) + forget smileys (emotional expression) = Interpretation possibly wrong