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The Networked Home: An Analysis of Current Developments and

Future Trends in the Transformation of the Home

Alladi Venkatesh

Associate Director

CRITO

University of California

Irvine

avenkate@uci.edu

Erik Kruse

Research Manager

Ericsson ConsumerLab

Stockholm

Sweden

and

Eric Chuan-Fong Shih

Babcock Graduate School of Management

Wake Forest University

P.O. Box 7659

Winston-Salem, NC 27109-7659

(January 2003)

This paper was written as part of ongoing research under Project NOAH II, at the Center for research Technology (CRITO), University of California, Irvine. Project NOAH II was funded by grants from the National Science Foundation in USA (NSF grant no. IRI 9619695), and in Sweden from Ericsson, Electrolux, and Vattenfall under the sponsorship of the Marketing Technology Center (MTC), Stockholm.

 

The Networked Home: An Analysis of Current Developments and Future Trends

Alladi Venkatesh, Erik Kruse and Eric Shih

Abstract

The paper examines the concept of networked home, as both a social institution and a technological construction.  While the concept of networks is not new to family studies, the new technologies of information and communication are requiring us to look at the home as an intersection point of sociology and technology.  Fundamental to our analysis is the concept of the home as a living space that unfolds into a collection of multiple centers – home as entertainment center, work center, information center, communication center, home management center, learning center and shopping center.  In our analysis, the living space is subdivided structurally into social, physical and technological spaces in which the centers are embedded as organic elements.  The integration of the centers into the living space model is fundamental to understanding the home as networked home.  Finally, the paper discusses the potential for home-based services that can be introduced into the home.

 

The Networked Home: An Analysis of Current Developments and Future Trends

Alladi Venkatesh, Erik Kruse and Eric Shih

Introduction

The theme of the conference is IT enabled change.  In this paper, we address the transformation possibilities in the home front due to new technologies.  In the last few years, there has been a growing interest in the home as an important site for targeting emerging and futuristic technologies of communication and information.  Research in this area is being pursued by scholars from different disciplines, from sociologists to cognitive psychologists to computer scientists.  In addition, many developments are taking place in the world of practice that includes architects, home builders, community developers, various industry segments dealing with digital technology, the entertainment industry and so forth.  Finally, many policy makers are intently watching these developments with great interest and contributing to the field with many policy scenarios.  In this paper, we do not wish to cover all the elements of the growing field but some important aspects that have broad implications for all concerned.  In particular, the paper addresses two issues, the concept of the Networked Home (Section I), and the Design of Home Information System and the Introduction of Home-based services (Section II).  Finally, the paper will present a summary of what we have learned from our past studies (Section III).  The paper is based on the ongoing work being conducted under the umbrella of Project NOAH located at the Center for Research on Information Technology, University of California Irvine. In terms of home networking, the significant questions are:

SECTION I

-What is a Networked Home?

-Why has the concept gained in importance? What is its significance?

-How is the current emphasis on the Networked home different from the home as it is currently or conventionally understood?

-What conceptual models exist for viewing the home as a Networked Home? 

-How will families adopt the Networked Home? Or, what is the future of the Networked Home?

SECTION II

-How can we use network concepts to design an home information system and introduce new home-based services?

SECTION III: CONCLUSIONS

-What have we learned from previous studies?

SECTION I

The Networked Home

The concept of home networking has grown in prominence recently (Magid 2000, Ruhling 2000, Business Week 2001, Miyake 2002).  With the emergence of mobile telephony and other personal communication technologies targeted for the home use, the concept of home networking is receiving much attention because of possible dramatic shifts from current levels of practice to new levels.  A related concept to the Networked Home is the Automated Home or the Smart Home.  Many of the R&D or prototype developments are based on the availability of PC/Internet-based technologies that are already part of the home technology scene (Harper 2000).1  In this paper, we address various issues concerning the networked home.  Table 1 gives a picture of the concepts with which we are working that will be elaborated in the remainder of this paper. 

(Table 1 about here)

What is a Networked Home?

We define the networked home in terms of two major components: an internal household network, which consists primarily of network relationships with family, friends and social circles; and an external network which connects the home to outside agencies, such as schools, shopping centers, work/office, and other civic/community centers.  Networks can be described in terms of social, physical and technological spaces or configurations, terms that will be explained later.

Why has the concept gained in importance? What is its significance?

There are two major initiatives that we see.  First, the technology initiative suggests that technologies are available in today’s fast-paced, electronic world that connect people to people, people to machines, and machines to machines.  For a long time the average citizen had only the house telephone as the primary technology of communication network (Wellman and Tindall 1993).  Even today, for the most part, this has not changed.  Recent developments in communication technologies have been quite dramatic--especially in regard to wireless telephony, satellite communication, mobile telephony, and the Internet, all resulting in faster and more efficient communications globally.  The so-called communication revolution is touching the ordinary masses, and highly complex technologies are entering everyday life. 

Second, the communiy initiative raises the question of how individuals and families can access these technologies.  In the final analysis, however advanced the technology might be and whatever its desirable qualities may be, its success is measured in terms of community acceptance.

The two initiatives, the technology initiative and the community initiative, ultimately deal with the same question. What are the current technological needs of families, what would be their future preferences, and what would motivate them to acquire new technologies as they are introduced into the social order?  There are also several other issues concerning standards, customer service, and government regulation, which are outside the purview of our discussion here but which can become quite relevant.  Our focus here is how to conceptualize the home as a user of network-related technologies and to ascertain what issues emerge in this context.  Along the same lines, we ask how these new technologies can enhance the value of home networks and what trends are foreseeable in this regard. 

How is the current emphasis on the Networked home different from the home as it is currently or conventionally understood?

Network approaches to the study of household or family behavior have a long tradition.  The concepts and issues relating to social or community networks (Scott 1991, Wellman and Leighton 1979) or, more specifically, to family networks have been well researched by scholars over the last fifty years (Bott 1957, Milardo 1988).  One can say that Elizabeth Bott’s (1957) work remains the classic piece in this area. Many other scholars have followed her with a fair amount of sociologically oriented themes.  When we speak of networks in the family context, we are referring primarily to social ties that emerge from these networks.  To quote Szinovacz (1988),

“The themes of social affiliation and integration have been central to sociology and social psychology since their beginnings.  We have learned that the specific characteristics of their social ties have important consequences for the individual and larger societal structures. Among these ties, interactions with and supports from relatives and friends have been and continue to be of primary importance. Whatever impact industrialization and urbanization may have had on nuclear families, they have not erased the social support functions. . . . (p.7).

The more recent developments in the area of family networks point to some new thinking in the structural analysis of social systems.  These include patterned interconnections of family members with other families and social groups.  The four types of networks widely discussed in the family sociology literature are kin-networks, friendship-networks, work/professional networks and community networks (Grieco 1987, Milardo and Allan 1997, Roschelle 1997).  Very little writing appears on the role of technology in fostering family networks, although Wellman (1999) and associates have initiated a series of research studies on technology in the context of organizational and personal networks.  The question that arises in the present context is whether technology is an enabling agent in fostering family networks or an active promoter of networking practices.  

For a major part of the twentieth century the radio and television (both one-way), plus the telephone (two-way), were the main media/communication technologies that found their way into the homes of ordinary citizens.  They heralded, in a sense, the first communication revolution.  In the last few years, we have seen a veritable avalanche of technologies entering the home and thus leading to the creation of new forms of networking possibilities.  One of the key technologies with which we have been concerned during the last decade or so is the home computer (Venkatesh 1996).  More recently, the computer’s networking value has increased dramatically, primarily due to the Internet.  Other factors contributing to networking possibilities in the home are the rapid convergence of communication and information technologies.  As mentioned earlier, Figures 1 and 2 present a graphical description of home network evolution from both a technological perspective and a social perspective.

The rise of the Internet, with its attendant social consequences, suggests that traditional network approaches can be viewed in a new (technological) light.  However, recent developments in the technological front have caused us to identify the relevant category of inquiry as “networked home” (ref. the title of this paper) rather than “networked family.”  This may not be just a semantic issue, because it brings to the forefront the fusion of technological networks and social networks.  One can argue, therefore, that the emphasis on networked home is inclusive of and an extension to the notion of networked family.

To add greater refinement to the concept of networked home, we integrate the notion of “family” as a sociological group with “home” as a combination of physical and social spaces.  Simply put, the distinction between “family” and “home” is that we regard family as a social institution and view home as a living space.

In sum, while the idea of network itself is not new, it is the technological advances that have changed the character of the family networks and have introduced greater complexity and variety into home life (Kiessler 1997).  Further, while networks can exist in the absence of technology, modern networks are highly technologically based.

What conceptual models exist for viewing the home as a Networked Home?

Three main conceptual schemes motivate our thinking in terms of the networked home.  First, the networked home should be embedded in the overall concept of “home as living space.”  This is demonstrated through viewing the structural composition of the home as based on a typology of spaces.  Second, the networked home should capture the elements of networking in a transparent fashion.  Third, the home is viewed not simply as a structure but as the site of human and social processes that are central to the functioning of the family.  This implies that we identify the organic elements of the home based on the typology of the centers of home life.  We shall discuss these three perspectives in that order.2  Although the discussion of spaces would be relevant to the over-arching concept of the home as living space, that will not be our main concern in the paper.  Rather, the focus is on the links between the networked home and the centers that are the organic elements of the home.

Structural Configuration –Home As Living Space:

For our purposes, we configure the home in terms of “living space.’ (for an earlier development of the concept, see Venkatesh and Mazumdar (1999). Also see Hughes et Al. (2000), who allude to similar ideas).  The living space (Figure 1) includes three structural components: the social space, the physical space and the technological space.  The social space consists of the members of the household, the activities performed by them in the home, the time spent on those activities, and the interactions between the members of the family.  The physical space refers to the physical layout of the home and its constituent parts (kitchen, bedrooms, bathrooms, etc.).  The technological space consists of the household technologies that are embedded in the physical space and used by the members of the family as part of the social space.  The structural concept of the home does not exist in vacuum. It is related to the organic aspects of the home.

(Figure 1 About Here)

The home, as a manifestation of living space, caters to the emotional, social, educational, and recreational needs of the members of the family.. In designing the home as living space, these various needs must be taken into account.  As a living space, the home has evolved dynamically over time; that is, historically its character has changed in fundamental ways.  As living space, the home can also be differentiated transculturally.

We divide the living space into three components—the social space, the technological space, and the physical space.  These three spaces are not mutually exclusive, and the meeting points of these three define how families carry on their everyday life.  We shall now discuss each of these spaces and how they interact with each other.

The Physical space:

Relative to other spatial concepts (technological and social), physical space is likely to change less frequently during the life course of a family.  In one sense, space is a “given” in that it is not easily alterable.  For our purposes, we define the physical space as the total space configured in measured units, the organization of the space into subcategories based on the functionality assigned to each sub-space (kitchen for cooking, bedroom for sleeping, bathroom for personal bodily care, living-room for family time, etc.), and the size of each subcategory and its orientation to another subcategory (e.g, the bath room should be next to the bedroom).  The physical space contains the adjacent exterior areas (deck, patio, the garden, the garage, the drive--way, etc., as applicable, as well as the interior subspaces.

In designing the physical space, consideration is given to how families live and to what activities they perform in terms of their family life.  For example, in designing the kitchen, the physical space must be organized in such a way that cooking/meal preparation is conducted efficiently. Similarly, the kitchen should be organized to permit installation of a refrigerator, stove and other kitchen appliances and technologies.  In these two examples, one visualizes the physical space and its essential link to the social and the technological spaces through the concept of living.

The Technological Space:

We define technological space as the total configuration of technologies in the home and the organization of various technologies within the physical space and also in reference to the social space.  The technological space consists of the number of technologies in the home, the density of the technologies relative to the size of the home and people living in the home, and the marginal contribution of additional technology to the overall quality of home life.  Thus, a modern home may have not only the standard kitchen appliances but more than one TV set, more than one telephone, more than one computer, and so on.  Its density is measured in terms of the cumulative presence of the technology within the physical space relative to the number of family members, as well as to relative levels of use of the technology for home/family purposes.

Technological space has gained particular importance recently because of the emerging notion of the “smart home.”  The smart home idea has been around for at least a decade, and we began to hear about its potential as early as the mid-eighties when prototypes were built in the U.S., the U.K. and Scandinavia.  However, its implementation has not been very successful and has been a little slow.  Embedded in the concept of the smart home are smart appliances which manifest basic qualities of programmable machine intelligence.

The Social Space:

The social space is a significant component of the living space because it defines the living space in a fundamental way.  The social space establishes a direct link to the context of family life, the needs of the family, the various household activities that are performed on a daily or weekly basis, the time spent on assorted activities by family members, and the goals of the family.  The social space is the most complex of the three spaces, for it involves variable elements and is where the family members not only perform activities but are engaged in various social actions, tensions and emotions.  The social space is not a “given,” as are the physical and technological spaces, but by its very nature the social space displays ebbs and flows.

What is the relationship between these three spaces? How are they coordinated?  Does the family maintain a balance in negotiating these spaces? How so? These are questions that need both theoretical arguments and empirical insights, for on these two aspects rest the design considerations for home technology development.  In a recent paper, Wai on Lee (2000), a Microsoft HCI scientist, uses the three-space model to investigate the adoption of WebTV and the level of its acceptance into a small sample of households.  In his preliminary research, the author found interesting family dynamics within the living space-- degrees of conflict, as well as accord, between the spaces.  His findings confirm the validity of the three-space model for designing and testing new products.

From the point of view of design, the living space can be viewed as embedding technology-based product environments.  In designing products for the home, the spatial configuration may be taken into account.  It is important, however, to remember that the product environments (as elements of living space) are not the same for all home-based technologies.  For example, the product environment for a refrigerator is not the same as the product environment for a television set.  What is common to both is that each technology has a particular configuration profile in terms of social/technological/physical space that defines its position within the home. 

Time

While we conceptualize a home in terms of the three spaces, we must not lose sight of time as another important element of home life.  That is, how much time each family member spends within it constitutes “living space.”  One way to handle time is to make it part of the social space, that is, by considering how people use the technological space and physical space temporally.  Another way is to introduce time as a separate dimension by creating a new element called “temporality.”

The Living Space and the Networked Home

As shown in Figure 2, the home network consists of an internal household network, which emphasizes network relationships with family, friends and social circles, and an external network, which connects the home to outside agencies, such as schools, shopping environments, work/office, and other civic/community establishments.  Collectively, we call these connections social networks.  In general, networks can be described in terms of their social, physical, and technological configurations.

Currently, the uses of computers by households are very extensive compared to what they were in the early nineties.  These uses can be categorized under two different sets.  The first set covers actual household applications.  In descending order the applications under are: e-mail correspondence (personal/family-related rather than work-related); games/recreation; job-related use; educational use; home management; and shopping.   We call this set of categories content-based.  The second set looks at the uses in a different, more conceptual way: communication, information, learning, and entertainment.  These two sets of categories open up networking opportunities that are extensive both in scale and variety.  In current parlance, home networking is limited to the home PC, the set-up box and the phone.  One can imagine the immense technological possibilities that have transformational capabilities.  The two category sets can be combined process-wise or organically to yield a conceptualization of the household as a collection of centers.  We elaborate the concept of centers in the following discussion.

Organic Elements of the Home:

The living space can be operationalized organically in terms of what we call the family activity center (see Figure 3) which itself is a conglomeration of sub-centers (see Figure 5).  The concept of centers is a modification from a previous work by one of the authors (Venkatesh 1996) in which the term used was household “sub-environments.”   We have identified eight potential centers of home: the entertainment center, the work center,the home mangement center,  the shopping/financial center, the family interaction center, the information center, the communication center, and the learning center.  The centers are presented in a chronological fashion to demonstrate why the home has become a very important and significant site for technological development.  In the 1950s, the concept of the home was in terms of the activity center. Most early technologies in households were targeted toward specific activities related to cleaning, meal preparation, washing clothes, and other activities where labor or time could be saved. With the introduction of television in the late fifties and early sixties, the home became an entertainment center.  In the eighties, with the arrival of computers in the home, it became possible for people to work at home, and we see the beginnings of the work center.  In the nineties, new media and information technologies and the Internet, in particular, began to transform the home even more dramatically. The home can now be viewed as a shopping center, as in home shopping, a communication center, an information center and a learning center.  These new developments have contributed significantly to reconfiguring the home in terms of networks.

(Figure 3 About Here)

Will families adopt  the concept of the Networked Home?

Or, what is the future of the Networked Home?

It is not very clear whether families will adopt the concept of the technologically-oriented Networked Home or how they will adapt it to their needs. We have only glimpses of their attitudes and reactions.  From what few indications we have, however, their reactions appear to be mixed. 

A recent national study conducted in the United States (Venkatesh 2002) shows that households with a computer and an Internet connection are more likely to adopt new technologies than households without a computer or an Internet connection (see Table 2). 

(Table 2 About Here)

In addition, younger households are more likely to be networked than older households.  Similarly, children are more likely than adults to adopt networking technologies.  There are also some studies that indicate that mobile telephony is diffusing faster in Northern Europe and Japan than the rest of the world.  But this picture is not static.

What this all suggests is that, in the near term, we will see greater adoption of specific technologies rather than a wholesale adoption of new technologies.  Second, technologies will be adopted in a progressive fashion depending on consumer experiences with similar technologies.  For example, the rapid increase in the use of the Internet suggests that the technologies of communication with Internet capabilities have a greater potential than do those that are not “connected.”

SECTION II

The Designing of Household Information System for Home-Based Services

The networked home analysis (previous section) examined issues concerning home life and communication patterns which are technologically mediated.  The emphasis is on the communication aspects of family members internally with family members and externally with outside agencies, schools, work places, shopping and other environments.  The section looks at internal functioning of the household in terms of specific activities and information needs as well as important links to external service providers.  In other words, it examines communications in a networked context and issues relating to internal activities of the home, the design and development of an information center and a framework for designing home-based services.  Instead of a top down approach (i.e technology push), our approach will examine the user environment in great detail before recommending technological solutions.

Many information based technologies are being targeted to the home.  They range from personal computers, to digital cameras to screen fridge to various information appliances.  A serious look at the infusion of these technologies reveals that while they can perform various technical feats they are not by themselves capable of delivering the services that are so essential to running the household.  The question we pose in this research is how can these technologies be embodied with service content, or more accurately, how can these technologies be exploited jointly by the service providers and the households and add value to family life.  It is true that there are examples of service providers who have failed in some of their attempts—as in the case of some grocery services (e.g. Peapod).  What we need now is a study of the cause of such initial failures and the development of a model and framework for the delivery of home-based services. 

In this section we present a model of household information system and delivery of “home-based” services via the Internet technologies, and test its viability, feasibility and usefulness.  The model is both a conceptual and an implementable model that can be used as an input into designing a service based system.

Rationale 

We are currently facing two major developments both of which are examples of recent “technology push.”  One development is similar to Microsoft’s vision of digitized home as detailed in a recent publication (Neibauer 1999).  The other development is the current debate on information appliances (Bergman 2000).  Both developments raise some interesting issues.  According to some technology experts, the day is not far off when households will begin to acquire a variety of information appliances.  The question is, how is the contemporary family going to deal with these technologies that are looming large on the domestic horizon?  Our previous work on family use of information technology shows that families are reluctant to “overtechnologize” their homes, but at the same time are quite open to technologies that fit with their current patterns of behaviors and possibly add value to the family life. The “household information system and activity center” is a concept in that direction.

The Household Information System and Activity Center…

There are two aspects to information appliances, the appliance aspect and the information aspect. Although the “label” appliance is a misnomer because information appliances are basically digital devices and do not bear much resemblance to the mechanically oriented conventional household appliances, they are partially grounded in a similar logic as the existing appliances in terms of labor and time saving capabilities.  Of course, there is already some prototyping and testing of appliances that combine the mechanical and intelligent (information) functions.  Ultimately, the goal is to combine the time saving and the labor saving aspects with information and communication capabilities. Based on our recent work on home networking, we feel that the focal point of these appliances can be the household as an activity and information center.  This means that (a) they assist the family in performing various household tasks according to some fundamentals of domestic life and (b) they are also imbued with strong “information” (digital) content. 

These new possibilities create a new opportunity both for the user (i.e. the household) of the technology and the producer of the technology.  In order to fully understand all the relevant possibilities, what is needed is a systematic exploration and development of household information system and activity center that families can adopt as a centralizing point for maintaining family records that contain financial, shopping, medical, dietary, child-oriented, and other types of domestic information.  In order to develop such a system we need to understand family life and family information needs in a methodical fashion.  From a technological perspective, this would provide a sound basis for understanding IT enabled or IT mediated content of the technological space in the home. 

Home-Based Services…

A second aspect of our approach is to identify the services that families need in relation to each component of their activity center.  In other words, our research tries to integrate three elements, family activities, enabling technologies that assist households in carrying these activities and Internet-based services associated with the household activities as well as  the technologies.

A Heuristic Model…

An example of what we propose might be useful. Imagine a young family that has set up their new home.  Also imagine that the couple needs a lot of information that guides them through the first year of their family life. They have recently acquired a computer with all the Internet connections etc.  This family has identified the set of activities that they have to pursue to run the family on a daily basis and are in the process of identifying a set of services that would enable them to perform household activities. The services they are seeking and the activities that they are performing are linked through Internet-based (enabling) technologies.  There is an interesting link here between the services they need and the information system that they will develop in due course.

The simple model is shown in the following flow graph and is schematized in Table 3.

       Household Activities            (Household Information System)

Home-based Technologies       

External Services into the Home

The heuristic model can be represented in a structural form as shown in Table 3.

(Table 3 here)

A Characterization of Related Work

There is a growing literature on information appliances. A very good technical source is a recent edited book by Eric Bergman (2000) titled, “Information Appliances and Beyond.” There are also various commercial reports and publications.  One characteristic of these publications is a rather uncompromising technological push.  There is not much published work on information appliances within family user contexts.  One interesting exception is the work by Microsoft scientist, Wai On Lee (2000) who tested our model of “Home as Living Space” for WebTV application in the home. The results are interesting but are very preliminary.

There is really not much work in the Information System (3<sup>rd Column – Table 3) or the Home-based services (4<sup>th column – Table 3) discussed above.  The development and design of these perspectives is where the potential for new services is.

SECTION III

Conclusions – What Have We learned from Previous Studies?

The following is a summary of our findings based on 10/15 years of research on the home front with particular reference to the use of computers and more recently, the Internet.  All the studies are available on our website, http://www/crito.uci.edu/noah.

1. Concept of “home” is changing is dramatically.

-Varying degrees of computer domestication

-Computers are being integrated into the home but the integration is not complete.

-Ubiquity of computers spatially.

-Ad hoc designs of space.

Current Uses/Trend Toward Domestication

-Movement from computerization of the home to domestication of the computer

   -Uses not only increasing but expanding, especially due to the Internet.

-Computers generally seen as easy to use, fun, creativity enhancing.

-Frustration with software difficulty and hardware glitches.

3. Enthusiasm for the Internet

-Revolutionary information/communication tool.

-Educational medium - crucial for children.

-Communication center - cost savings and convenience.

-Information Center - Extremely important.

-Entertainment center - moderately enthusiastic.

-Shopping Center - Moderate interest.

4. Frustration about Internet

-Speed

-Content

-Security

-Privacy

-Addiction

5. Gender Differences

-Women (tool and task orientation and a more holistic approach)

-“I just want to work.”

-Not concerned with what is under the hood.

-Attracted to user friendly features.

-Low interest in style

-Male (object/pleasure orientation)

-Fascination with innards (speed, power, latest components)

-Gadget orientation

-Status symbol

-Not interested in style

6. Generational Differences

-Children are learning intuitively.

-Adults are relying on instructions (formal and informal. e.g. manuals, seeking help).

-High degree of parental mediation.

7. Children’s use

-A primary reason to adopt

-Necessary for education

-Concerns about gaming

-Knowledge not entertainment view

-Violence/pornography

-Addiction/anti-social impact.

8. Class issues

-Working class families receiving computers as gifts

-Computers have an aura of precious commodity.

-Limited working knowledge

-See IT as means for children’s mobility.

9. Impacts

-Access to new forms of control vs. loss of old.

-Progress seen as inevitable.

-Need to stay current.

-Pragmatic questioning.

-Searching for balance.

10. Smart Home

-High interest in remote monitoring of temperature, lighting and security.

-Medium interest in LAN.

-Low interest in smart appliances (e.g. Screen Fridge)

-Concern that smart homes may mean loss of control.

-Is manual override possible?

-Are we going too far with the idea of automation?”

-Attraction-Repulsion syndrome.

 

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Table 1. Basic Concepts of the Networked Home

Concepts   Characteristics   Elaboration

1. Networked Home  Internal Networks  Family/Relatives/Friends

Time Connection (e.g. messages in

               absentia)

Social/Physical/Technological

spaces connected 

People connected 

External Networks  Work

School

Shopping/Banking

2. Automated Home  Machine Connectivity   Efficiency

(Smart Home)   Human Interactivity  Convenience

Programmability   Ease of use

Remote access

Security

3. Domesticated Home  Meal Preparation   Family interactions

Family Health   Family values/norms

Family Rituals 

Child Rearing

Every day activities

4. Structural Configuration of Home as Living space  Social space

the Home.      Technological Space

Physical Space

5. Organic View of the Home Home as Networked Center Entertainment Center

Work center

Home Management Center

Family Interaction Center

Information Center

Communication Center

Shopping/Financial Center

Learning Center

 

Figure 1

   HOME AS

LIVING SPACE

Social/Cultural Space             Physical Space

         Technological Space

 

Figure 2. Home Networks (Social)

External   Technology   Internal 

Networks       Networks

Office   Shopping    School    Social/Community   Family          Friends

 

Figure 3. The Networked Home and the Concept of Centers

Home Management Center

Family Interaction Center

Entertainment center

      Work Center

Communication Center

Information Center

Learning Center

Shopping Center

         1950+          2000+

 

Table 2

Ownership of New Technologies Among US Households

 

Computer Households

Non-computer Households  

Freq.

%

Freq.

%

Electronic organizer or Handheld Computer

203

22%

26

9%

Fax or telex machine (separate from PC)

186

20%

11

4%

Pager

329

36%

51

17%

Voice Mail/Voice Message Service/Answering Machine 

776

85%

183

61%

Video game console (Nintendo, Sony Playstation, etc.) 

407

45%

80

30%

DVD, DIVX, Laser disk player

118

13%

12

4%

Stereo System/CD Player

871

96%

224

74%

Satellite TV

133

15%

41

14%

Cable TV

666

73%

197

66%

Cellular Phone or PCS

580

64%

99

32%

Video Camera

422

46%

79

26%

VCR

885

97%

256

85%

Digital Camera

123

14%

14

5%

 

Table 3. Activities-Technologies-Services

Components of Activity Center (i.e. Family Activities)

Mediating or Enabling Technologies

Home Information System Inputs (will include both appropriate software or direct inputs)

Home-Based Services on the Internet

Family get together, Family vacation

Digital Photography and Peripherals

Photographic records, Digitized family pictures

Customized vacation planning services

Family cooking, meal preparation

Smart kitchen appliances

Family consumption of  food, types of meals prepared, family member tastes and preferences, frequently or occasionally purchased items

Database Access for Family Cooking Needs

Children’s education, entertainment and other interests o children (music, reading, sports)

PC Use, Hand-held information appliances

Children school performance, library information, other needs of children, records of children’s interests.

Access to sources that provide reliable information regarding children’s educational and developmental needs.

Home financial management

PC, Information Appliances

Family financial, tax records, credit card information

Ongoing services for family financial planning and management.

Family communication, Social contacts

PC (e-mail), cell-phone, pager, Information Appliances

Addresses of friends and near/extended family, keep track of invitations and social occasions

Home communication network and services

Shopping

Same as above

Store addresses, items purchased, record of monthly shopping both online and offline

Access to databases and resources relating to family shopping.

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