my mobile phone & me

by piti(bon) patcharavalai
 user

Communication

Defining identities Talk about mobile phones

Establish, Maintain or Change
social relationship
Form & Function

Communication

Form & Function

mobile
others
phone
Defining identities

Defining identities What a mobile phone which offers form & function means to users (user and others)
Form & Function What a mobile phone is (pure form)
Communication Where a mobile phone participates in, as a tool, a medium, a content and material support for a social relationship
Questions
user

User's profile
lifestyle,demographic,attitude toward himself, shopping, leisure

Mobile phone History

How many mobile phones have you had so far?
Why did you change from the previous one to this one?
How long have you been using it? Are you happy with it?
Responses (from answers and observation)
User Experience(user identity, form&function)
If your mobile phone was a person what kind of person it will be? please User identities
describe(personality, prefession, class) fahionable, stylish, clever, helpful, Difficult to identify even from user himself/herself as I beleive
useful, young, mature, tough? form&function reflects user identity either function based or form
base. Customisation or any addition accessories can be done from
Customisation? how? why? both intrinsic and extrinsic motivation.
Content of Communication Social differentiation and integration
What kind of conversation/situation is it when mobile phone is your topic A mobile phone can have totally different meaning for user(trekky
of conversation? look or business look). Most of the interviewee relate it to his/her
Has your mobile phone ever been criticise by others? How you react? On maturity. (matured student/professional)
the other hand?
Content of communication
Social reationship Brand reliability
How does your mobile phone affect your relationship with others? New features and technologies
Game (How to, competition)
Comments and critics

Social relationships
Keep in touch with friends and family
Maintain a good relationship with boyfriend
Develop a better relationship by gaming
user
Set up a meeting, work related use
 Sherman Cheung (22)
Tutor's assistant/Post grad. student
"Normally I dress minimal color but occasionally I would dress colorful and try
to be creative"

Others (Classmates, Boyfriend, friends&family)

Communication, content and social relatioship aid
"My friends agreed with me that it is good looking and warned me about higher
microwave-risk"
"It is more difficult for my friends and classmates to contact me, this cause me
some problems with them sometimes."
"If I want to express my personal feeling, I will prefer doing it face to face"

Sony Ericson T100 (6 months old)

Form: Light weight, simple, fragile and good looking
Function: Unreliable, lack of memory capacity, health concern
"My mobile is like my brother close relationship, good looking but when you get to know
him..something missing (he is deft)"
"Feel out of touch or contact when it didn't work properly"

Case 1 : User's attitude toward her mobile phone changed after bought it, realise that it is not reliable and lack of capacity in memory.
This led to change in others' attitude toward user(user identity) by becoming unreliable as well as her mobile phone.
 Surieh Gaomas (28)
Journalist/Post grad. student (Journalism)
"I like wearing casual but because of the nature of my work ,I will dress
appropriately to work(interview)"

Others (Classmates, Boyfriend, friends&family)

Communication, content and social relatioship aid
"It 's like a link between me and my family and my boyfriend because I call them
with it..I even kiss it good bye when I hung up the phone"
"My friends want my mobile phone"

Nokia 5210 (1 year old)

Form: Faminine, Modern, Tough, Serious
Function: Reliable, Easy to handle size, Durable
"My mobile phone is like my boyfriend very close to me, reliable and I am in love with it"
"Keeping in touch is very important for me so I take care of my mobile phone as a valuable item"
"I don't like change, so durability and reliability is very important to me"

Case 2 : User considers buying her mobile phone base on her experience and beleif in reliability of Nokia, after bought it, she develop
a new relationship by value it as a resemblance of her boyfriend and family in her long distance relationship.
 Yin Ho (24)
Retail designer/BA, student (Environmental design)
"Being treated appropiately is important for me"
"If I have to buy a new one I will look for the one that has camera since that
will be useful for my work and hobby"

Others (Classmates, Boyfriend, friends&family)

Communication, content and social relatioship aid
"Yes, It helps my social relationship but not much as I am the person who develop
a relationship"
"Some of my friend told me that it is very old fashion model, I said I don't care as
It works well for me, that's good enough"
"Nokia is the best for me"

Nokia 3310 (2 years old)

Form: Plain serious color
Function: Easy to handle size, Durable and Reliable
"My mobile phone is a reliable employee and it's like I am in control I can change a new one if I have to"
"It looks ok for me and fuction very well in all aspects a mobile phone can be"

Case 3 : User considers buying his mobile phone base on his experience and beleif in reliability of Nokia, after bought it, he've developed
a relationship that base on its reliability as a function-base artefact regardless of its form.
 My conclussion : every elements in the sociolinguistic context effect each other

Change in user identities effect communication

(social relationship and content of communication) and
mobile phone identites(meaning)

user

Communication

Defining identities Talk about mobile phones

Establish, Maintain or Change
social relationship
Form & Function

Communication

Form & Function

mobile
others
phone
Defining identities
Change in mobile phone identites Change in communication
(meaning) effect user identities communication (social relationship and content of communication)
(social relationship and content of communication) effect user identities and mobile phone identites(meaning)

User may buy a mobile phone by considering both form and function in a different level of priority depend on user's frame of reference.

Some aspects of considered form and function reflect user's identities or user's differentiation and integration.

Relationship between user and his/her mobile phone can be developed through time, a result can be either positive or negative
experience which may lead to change or creation of new identity of the mobile phone.

These changes may reflect user's identity and his/her social relationship since mobile phone may be perceived as user's identity.