Donna Miller Watts

Given the challenge to create an innovative capability to enhance individuals’ personal use of “big data,” I worked with a team of 2 developers and a journalist (Carl Jamilkowski, Omer Shapira, Michael Rothman) to iterate through a number of ideas inspired by the challenge. 

We arrived at the idea of a capability that would reflect back individuals' social media exposure to them, and empower them with the information they would need to adjust or improve their social media images according to their stated desires.

My Role:  Ideation (multiple rounds), design research, user research & interviews, interaction flows, documentation;

Approach:  We employed a design thinking approach, brainstorming and iterating  through a few variations of potential data mining exposure and defense product ideas,  before settling on MINE and its final focus. 

We began by looking at different ways in which personal data is accessible and visible without consent, as well as ways in which these data could be used to judge individuals without their express consent.  I researched and wrote about earlier means of data mining and abuse by corporations in our quest to understand how data mining is used and abused today ("Big Data's Poor Cousins"). [link]

• Our first iteration of the product was "{Blank}-ability," thinking of social media's potential impact on job candidates, loan applicants, etc.

• After conducting research on the uses of social media vetting and online activity in housing and health insurance rates, our project quickly morphed into "Hire-ability," realizing the greater potential for social media to have impact on multiple areas of individuals' lives.

• Once we began to delve more deeply into data mining, we fleshed out features that could enable individuals' greater control over their exposed social media, and in so doing, we arrived at MINE.

With MINE, we wanted to put forth a product that would enable individuals not only to understand how their social media and online activity might be seen by others.  We wanted to offer them the ability to exert some control over what data they choose to expose about themselves, wherever possible, and thus, how they choose to represent themselves.

One could argue that individuals always have this control over what they choose to make public, but we found in our research, that many people today have no idea of the multiple entities viewing their presence, using their data to evaluate them, or how their presences might be viewed by persons and entities different from themselves and their friends.

Research:  We began with in-person user interviews, generally conducted in the field, in university and work settings.  We questioned people regarding their social media use and quickly moved to requests for interviewees' judgments of individuals shown in photos in  various situations and absurd/drunken or mysterious settings. 

MINE was an application that lets you see yourself as others might see you and judge you---both defensively and aspirationally.

Challenge:  Create an innovative capability to enhance individuals' personal use of "big data".

MINE evolved from the initial idea of a "data mirror." 

MINE was awarded the "Best Systems Design" award in an international design competition at Microsoft Design Research's 2013 Summer Faculty Research Conference.

Press:  https://mediashift.org/2013/07/microsoft-design-expo-5-civic-projects-aim-to-make-data-useful/

While inexact, these interviews provided the basis for MINE's sourcing for data reflection back to the user.  In our second round of user research, we employed anonymous online questioning of users through Mechanical Turk, offering respondents an online set of questions accompanied by the same series of photos.

Process:  As we finalized our MINE concept, we knew that user research would be key to building out the features at the core of the projected product: MINE presents you with a snapshot of how others may perceive you through your social media.

From our initial and iterative design research and brainstorming, and the responses and reactions to our interviews and Mechanical Turk results, we arrived at MINE's data evaluation features: 

(1) A MINE user's data (Facebook account contents, Instagram etc.) would be evaluated by a machine algorithm, looking for images of say, any or multiple pictures of you holding red Solo cups, (among other things);

(2) A MINE user's data and presence online would be evaluated anonymously by another MINE user, whose data, in turn, would be similarly evaluated by another anonymous MINE user. 

The combination of these two means of evaluation formed the core of MINE's functionality:  Give another MINE user your evaluation of their social and online presences, in order to get another MINE user's evaluation of your social and online presence.  [fix this paragraph, cut down--concise] 

It was from this research that we evolved the combined approach to user's data evaluation that formed the core of the MINE service:  Give an evaluation to get an evaluation.