Feb 13 2007
Jan Chipchase and Nokia Research’s design work for emerging markets
Jan Chipcase of Nokia Design has a fascinating job - to conduct exploratory behavioral field research, run user studies and develop applications and products that find their way into the mobile marketplace.
Jan has a direct disclaimer on his publications page: “A lot of rich qualitative user research loses it’s soul by the time it’s been squeezed into conference and journal submission formats and in addition, work involving concept generation tends to remain confidential. So what you see here scratches the surface, nothing more.” I wish more of the user researchers and usability professionals in the world were like this!
Jan’s Publications page is a goldmine of knowledge for anyone interested in the space of mobile phones and mobile design research, especially for emerging markets. Here are links to two very interesting Powerpoint presentations. One is on creative compensatory mechanisms for mobile phone charging in Africa which describes some of the creative kiosk based operations in Africa that enable mobile phone users to charge their phones through intermittent power supply. The second is a very visually powerful Powerpoint on Nokia’s user research practices and methods.
If this has piqued your interest, here’s another interesting spin by Jan titled “Ten things you didn’t know about Mobile TV”, which documents his user research in South Korea on Mobile TV usage scenarios and his musings through his field research in New Delhi.
