Simple, social, ethical and beautiful : requirements for UIs in the home

The paper sets out some requirements for the user interfaces of technologies that are to be used in the home. Each theme is illustrated with some of the current research being carried out at CUHTec. Interfaces for domestic technologies should be: Simple we are willing to expend only slight cognitive resources in many domestic contexts (this theme is illustrated by the extreme example of assistive technology for people with dementia); Social much of what we do in the home is purely for social enjoyment (illustrated by our work to develop quantitative measures of fun based on the behaviour of groups sharing photographs); Ethical domestic caring technologies pose serious issues of privacy and informed consent (illustrated by our work on social dependability in the design of telecare), and Beautiful the objects in our homes speak to our tastes and values (illustrated by our work with Jayne Wallace, a digital jeweller).