Ubiqutious transport systems: Negotiating context through a mobile-stationary interface

Ubiquitous computing environments grant organizations a multitude of dynamic digital traces composed of context signals emanating from embedded and mobile components. However, previous research indicates that the utility of context data is frequently hampered by a priori interpretations of context embodied within the acquiring technologies themselves. This paper reports an 18 month action research study seeking to rearrange an industry wide assemblage of stationary, mobile, and embedded technologies and associated organizations for the purpose of facilitating cross-organizational access to reinterpretable digital traces of context data. This was done by embedding the notion of seamfulness in an open standardized interface as a means to shift the locus of interpretation of context data in ubiquitous transport systems. In environments such as these, open access to context data is of essential importance to create opportunities for flexible interpretations of mobile work for uses not anticipated by preconfigured representations. However, this requirement essentially clashed with the business strategies of actors providing context data acquiring technology. This clash resulted in a negotiated design compromise of limited access and a well defined expansion of additional uses of context data between the involved actor groups. Addressing the issue of how organizations can derive value from context data, the contribution of this paper is an analysis of the complexity of accomplishing links between socio-technical elements in ubiquitous computing environments.