Struggling-through

Alex Taylor
Microsoft Research

'Struggling-through'

Using the excuse of summer, I want to use this talk to lazily meander through a few things in HCI and design that have preoccupied me over the years. I'll talk a little about Microsoft Research and the kind of research it fosters as well as resists. Looking back at some of my own work, I'll try to trace a meaningful thread that ever-so neatly knits together the mix of ideas and topics. I'll fail in this, but in making the effort my hope is I'll give coverage to some of the things that have gone well and the far more frequent problems that routinely dog my work. Overall, I'd like my ramblings to be an invitation to questions, controversies and agreements.

Bio:Alex Taylor is a member of the Socio-digital Systems Group, Microsoft Research Cambridge. His work to date has explored routine aspects of everyday life in connection to computer-related design. More recently, he has been investigating our relationships with robots and other 'curious thinking machines'. Rather than informing design directly, Alex's research seeks to open up the possibilities for different and new ways of interacting with technology. A further goal has been to reflect on the intersections between humans and machines, and wonder what the unceasing developments in science and technology might mean for being human.