This document outlines a dissertation proposal for a virtual and social meetup system. The system would combine online 3D chatting in a virtual world with offline group meetings in the real world. For the virtual world, it would allow users to interact through personalized avatars in 3D scenes and chat via text. Various scenes like a home, global chat room, and exotic locations would be created. Background music would match each scene's atmosphere. The system would also encourage users to organize real-world meetups based on shared interests to foster real connections alongside the online interactions. The proposal discusses technologies like PHP, MySQL, and 3D modeling software that would be used to develop the system.

1. Virtual and Meetup System
-------Dissertation Proposal
Name: Tong Xu
Student No.:0702542

2. Table of Contents
Chapter1 Introduction……………………………………………………………3
1.1Brief Introduction of the Proposal………………………………….3
1.2Initial Thoughts……………………………………………………...3
1.3The Motivation………………………………………………………4
1.4Literature Review……………………………………………………5
Chapter2 Concept and Technologies………………………………………….…6
2.1 The Concept…………………………………………………….…..6
2.1.1 The 3-D Virtual World…………………………………….….6
2.1.2 Meetup in Real World…………………………………….…...8
2.2 User and User Experience……………………………………….…9
2.3 Technologies for Final Project………………………………….….9
2.3.1 The Use of PHP…………………………………………….…..9
2.3.2 Building Database with My SQL and PHP……………….….9
2.3.3 Interactive Media Technologies………………………….….10
2.4 Research Models……………………………………………….….10
Chapter3 Research Methods………………………………………………..…..11
3.1 Design Method…………………………………………………..…11
3.2 Snowball Techniques…………………………………………..…..11
3.3 Cooperative Evaluation…………………………………………...12
3.4 Ethnomethodology and Virtual Ethnography……………….….12
3.5 Issues for Space-Based Approach…………………………….….13
Chapter4 Timetable for Future Plans…………………………………….……14
4.1 The Exploration and Preparation………………………………...14
4.2 The Realization of Project…………………………………………14
References………………………………………………………………………..15
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3. Chapter1 Introduction
1.1 Brief Introduction of the Proposal
Virtual and Social Meetup System is my dissertation proposal, a social networking that
facilitates online three-dimensional chatting in virtual world and offline group
meetings in real world.
For online 3-D chatting, it combines online chatting with online games together. The
distinction of the proposal is that it entitles the merits of traditional text chat as well as
its own characteristics, ie. Users are able to socialize, connect and interact with other
participants using personalized avatars in the virtue world which resembles the real
meeting environment.
For offline group meetings, it acts as social media where the internet is not restricted
to use online, but helps people to unite together and share passions in real world.
Technology does change life; in my project it is possible to see how real groups make
real difference.
1.2 Initial thoughts
This dissertation proposal is different from my previous thoughts. Actually it is not
easy to come to this step, but it is worth working as the proposal becomes more clear
and interactive.
Building a website to introduce courses of Interactive Media was my initial proposal.
While in the process of research I found many similar websites and the only job left
was just to organize diverse kinds of information together. As this work was
uncreative and less interactive, I gave up this idea.
Then I put up the idea to set up a social website to make friends and date with them.
The functions were Profile (where users are able to notify friends about themselves),
Friends (where a list of friends would appear to connect and interact with), Search
(where users can identify specific individual organized by hobby, city, school or
region) and Match Me (where tailor-made suggestions of dating would be given to
each member according to their various demands).
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4. Thanks to grateful help and useful suggestions from professors and classmates, they
have pointed out drawbacks of my plan, including issues like how to attract people
together, the problem of data filtering and the target users were not clear, etc. Apart
from this, they gave me valuable suggestions to add more interactive features.
Gradually the proposal to make a social networking of Virtual and Social Meetup
System becomes clear.
1.3 The Motivation
The motives to build such a network come from three aspects:
Personal Considerations: My background was English Literature and I did not get
in touch with computer technologies before studying Interactive Media. That is
the reason why I am often under lots of pressures during the process. When
thinking of dissertation proposal, I really hope to take this as an opportunity to
consolidate knowledge through the use of interactive media techniques I have
learnt. In this case building a website is a practical choice to offer me such a
platform.
The Power of Social Media: One of the great things about social media is that no
one really knows what the next big thing is, whose uncertainty arises my interest.
Social media utilizes the technology of the internet to “open up dynamic dialogue
with target users, allowing for interaction and personal connection. Social
media has become extremely popular because it allows people to connect the
online world, then to form different relationships. The successful examples of
social media are Facebook, Twitter, blogs, etc.
The Problem in the development of Social Media: The same tools we choose to
use for bringing us together as the human race are also used to keep us apart.
Heinferman said “The internet does a number of wonderful things, but it treats
geography as irrelevant. We still live in a world where the local level is extremely
important.” Nowadays we get accustomed to talk with people online all over the
world, but we are less likely to recognize our neighbors living in the same
community! Therefore, my social networking tends to be a motive force to
encourage and unite people together to meet in real life.
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5. 1.4 Literature Review
Before starting my dissertation, it is necessary to examine the previous work to get
inspirations and make improvements for mine.
In Text Chat In Action, Jachi O’Neill and David Martin examined the method of how
participants manage their interactions through considering multiple threads. As the
conclusion, they suggest to develop multiple chat windows, and use alternative
channels. Associated with my proposal, text chat will be adopted as it is an effective
medium to support informal words communication in 3-D chatting. But limited by my
capability, I will not develop other channels such as audio or video ones.
In CSCW at play: “There” as a collaborative virtual environment, authors examined
game’s flexibility to allow players to develop their own forms of play within the game.
Some valuable aspects have been discussed, like how the environment supports a
range of social activities around objects. Such issues are essential for my dissertation
to build a fluid interaction space in 3-D environment. Only when participants feel free
and trusty in the virtual world, can they enjoy the pleasure that virtue meeting brings
to them.
In Chatting with Teenagers: Considering the Place of Chat Technologies in Teen Life,
professors examined the use of SMS and IM in the teenage population, covering the
content of what types of activities teenagers coordinate via SMS, and the significance
of using SMS for teenagers. Viewing the fact that teenagers have been on the
forefront of adopting instant messages (IM), in my dissertation, although I will not
focus on teenager users, I will make suitable avatars or setting choices to prevent
misleading them.
Moreover, from the book Interaction Design, I have learnt the process to perform
Cooperative Evaluation; Usability Issues in Website Design gives me guidelines to
design a good web.
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6. Chapter2 Concept and Technologies
2.1 The Concept
Virtual and Social Meetup System as the combination of online chatting and offline
group meetings, its content needs to be considered from two perspectives how to
build a vivid virtual world and how to take advantage of social networking to
encourage participants to meet in real world.
2.1.1 The 3-D Virtual World
Researchers at MIT and Harvard have found that “people who had had a chance to
internet with each other (by computers only) on a virtual tour of a museum
subsequently had more successful face-to-face meetings than people who had
viewed only profiles.”
The lifelike 3-D virtual world will be built mainly from three aspects: avatars, 3-D
scenes and music for different virtual rooms. The setting goal is to provide attractive
and comfortable personal spaces for participants to communicate and interact with
others they are interested in. However, dialogues in conversation will be displayed
purely in text just like other traditional text-based chat, which is because text chat
application is mature supporting either messaging between two participants or
multiple participants.
First of all, choices of avatars are essential in 3-D chatting owing to the fact that
avatars are the embodiments of real participants, and their attitudes towards
avatars decide the future of the website.
In my plan, a set of avatars will be provided to let participants choose from. Of
course, they are allowed to personalize their avatars at any time to become what
they want to be, through the change of skin color, hair style, body shape, and even
the gender. Moreover, it is very common in Facebook to find a member uses
nonhuman figures like a fish as the avatar. I also would like to allow participants
to make avatars something nonhuman and funny like a robot or maybe even a
flower.
When making avatars, I will try to avoid sexual bias or sexual innuendo like large
breast or unbelievable thin waist, and extremely perfect (like Barbie) or wicked
(like Hitler) images will not appear. The objective is to set good models for
participants, especially teenager users, without misleading them.
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7. There are two things need considering when designing avatars, one is the
aesthetics of avatars, such as characteristics including appearance, actions, and
the way to dress up. The other thing is the programmatic factor of avatars, which
refers to the ability of avatars and its interactive features.
Secondly, various 3-D scenes will be animated to offer fantastic spaces for
participants to chat in lifelike virtual environment. 3-D scenes have two
advantages: one is that these spaces reduce distances between users—they are
able to chat “face-to-face”; the other is that such virtual environments give users a
better quality user experience than traditional text chatting. Different scenes are
used for different usages to generate different feelings.
Some possible scenes are listed as follows, and I have begun to realize some of
them in 3D Max:
“A Home Away From Home”: If two participants are in favor of each other or fall
in love, this room is a perfect choice for dating, dancing, flirting and more. It is
romantic and private, where users can enjoy the feelings of sweet love.
“Global Chat”: Here participants are able to meet and collaborate with friends all
over the world in unique 3D environment.
“Exotic Scenery”: In this part, the chatting room will be decorated like the style in
China or Egypt. This design will gain the favor by those who are fans of exotic
cultures. In addition, they travel through the world when staying at home, and no
luggage fees required. : )
“Ordinary Sitting Room”: Here participants can experience the warmth of family,
when they sit on the sofa with a cup of coffee on the table.
Thirdly, music is available matching the atmosphere of each room. Background
music is necessary when chatting in 3-D room as music promotes communication.
Music not only reflects the culture, but also expresses and affects experience,
creates feelings and responses among listeners.
I have chosen traditional Chinese music and light music from Youtube; for other
pieces of music, like sounds in disco and other nature sounds, I will make them
myself in Logic Pro. The link of Chinese music is as follows:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S1iAAqQ71P8&feature=related.
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8. 2.1.2 Meetup in Real World
Over the past few years more and more social networking springs up like Facebook.
However, the characteristics of Virtual and Social Meetup System lie in its combined
functions, ie. it promotes and creates opportunities for participants to meet in real
world apart from online chatting. The function to facilitate real meetup should be
realized through traditional website design, hence some of my previous work would
be of some help, for example, functions of “Search” and “Match Me” can be adopted
to use.
Issues about how to match people effectively and how to bring people together
determine the popularity of this kind of networks.
With the purpose of matching people effectively, personal information is required
from prospective members before they can search for other individuals using
criterion of gender, location or age range. What is more important, search engine
should be available on every webpage to facilitate matching.
Topics of interest are also needed from members, in that case the system is able
to recommend related groups and activities, or inspire participants to start new
groups to find like-minded people.
In order to gather people together, it is necessary to raise the name recognition
among internet users. Inspired by the developing history of Meetup.com, whose
surge came after the time when American political candidates were attracted to
use Meetup to coordinate their grassroots movement. Similarly, I hope to twitter
some famous people who are fans of social media, and try to invite them to test
Virtual and Social Meetup System.
With the popularity of social media, it is impossible to attend all the networking
events and parties around the city, but still people have the needs to meet new
people and learn about others. Based on personal preference data that members
offered, some information of related topics, events and venues in and around the
city will be informed to users through emails if they allow doing so.
Consequently they are less likely to miss the meetup they are interested in,
without being distracted by a plethora of other resources.
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9. 2.2 User and User Experience
As a general-purpose social networking, the target users are not confined to a
certain group. However, taking into account of my capability and marketing
feasibility, I define focus groups of Virtual and Social Meetup System to students in
University of Limerick.
As a student in the same University, there are several advantages to broadcast my
dissertation proposal. First of all, it is easy to gather users’ feedbacks. I can send
emails to students, or post threads on campus forum to encourage them to try my
web. Then, I have geographical advantage to interview participants face to face to
ascertain user expectations and acceptance of services. In addition, online surveys
can also be conducted at the same time to collect real-time data on demand more
generally.
Efficiency and usability will be paid attention to offer a quality user experience
when they socialize online and interact with system’s services. To test efficiency of
the system, a task list will be designed to test the understanding of users for current
system, and whether the system can fit the real-life demands of users. As to
usability issues, the usability checklist written by Larisa Thomason will be
employed during the iterative interactive design.
2.3 Technologies for Final Project
2.3.1 The Use of PHP
I need to code a section that always displays the latest news which is
automatically generated, and titles of latest five news are shown automatically;
Web forums are required to set up in PHP, where users can post their own threads
or reply to others’ ones in various groups. Some researches have shown that
offering web forums is a good way to get users to return to the same site.
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10. 2.3.2 Building Databases with My SQL and PHP
A user database needs to be implemented through the use of My SQL to save and
keep the data of users;
A detailed database that covers all the contents should be built to facilitate
participants to browse all functions or search for a particular service;
In the book Teach Yourself: PHP, My SQL and Apache, it says that “Using PHP
and My SQL to create dynamic, database-driven website is a breeze.”. With the
combination use of two technologies, there are TWO tasks to do in the following
months. Firstly, building a Content Management System (CMS) for storing,
indexing and searching text or functions; secondly, building a web-based email
service to facilitate users of related information they are interested in through email
to their existing mailbox.
2.3.3 Interactive Media Technologies
Virtual and Social Meetup System will be realized in Dreamweaver.
Avatars will be designed in Flash to facilitate users to make personalized ones.
Various 3-D virtual environments will be realized in 3-D Max.
Background music special for each virtual scene will be made in Logic Pro to
avoid the infringement of musical copyright.
2.4 Research Models
SP-STUDIO (http://www.sp-studio.de/ ): It is the flash game to create customized
characters through changing skin color, adding accessory or selecting
backgrounds.
Meetup.Com (http://www.meetup.com/tour/ ): It allows members to find and
join groups unified by a common interest, such as hobbies, politics, games,
movies. Users enter their ZIP code and topic they want to meet about, and then
the website helps them to arrange a place and time to meet.
IMVU(http://www.imvu.com/ ): With IMVU users create their own avatars to
chat in animated 3-D scenes.
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11. Chapter3 Research Methods
3.1 Design Method
The design method I want to adopt is User—Centered Design. As user-generated
website, Virtual and Social Meetup System relies on users and has to meet the needs
and expectations of real users with the consideration of constraints and relevant
factors. The users’ requirements need to be thought over at the beginning of the
design process, and the prototype and evaluations should also be based on users’
needs. “Know your users” and “YOU are NOT users” are two simple but important
formulas to obey.
After analyzing users’ cognitive frameworks, some user requirements should be
drawn, then it is routine to draw several prototypes (in papers or Wizard of OZ) to test
them with users. The reactions of users to potential functions and features will direct
the improvements of prototype and design concept. The design process should be
iterative and always involves users.
3.2 Snowball Techniques
Snowball techniques will be used to collect users. As I stated in previous chapter,
prompted by constant threads on campus forum, UL students will be encouraged to
try my social networking. Some of them would browse it and tell their feelings to
their acquaintances. Thus the user group would grow like a rolling snowball, and
gradually enough data would be gathered for the research.
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12. 3.3 Cooperative Evaluation
Cooperative evaluation is most useful for early feedback for redesign process in a
rapid iterative cycle.
The process is as follows: recruiting users covering various knowledge, experience,
skills and educational background, then designing a form of task list, the result of
which is reflective of users’ needs and direction of future design, and then
interacting and recording during the process of testing.
“Thinking aloud” is of great importance for cooperative evaluation, through taking
notes users’ actions and problems will be detected for further design process.
3.4 Ethnomethodology and Virtual Ethnography
Ethnomethodology is the study of moment-by-moment nature of work as
practical ongoing accomplishment of everyday life, and the corresponding output
tends to be rich descriptive texts. However, ethnomethodology is characterized as
indexicality, so the context will be referred to in which the language takes place in
the practice.
To understand the properties of text chat, ethnomethodology will be employed to
deal with actions and interactions of activities. During the process, how to put up
“Implications of System Design” with ethnomethodological approach is a crucial
step to analyze interactive activities.
Ethnography is a qualitative and interpretative technique that involves
researchers engaging in some degree of immersion and direct observation of the
work in its natural setting. Related qualitative techniques include in-context
interviews, focused observation, video-diary, and interactive walkthroughs of
space.
From CSCW at play: “There” as a collaborative virtual environment, I learn the
method to study online activity characterized as “virtual ethnography”. “This
approach involves the familiar techniques of ethnography with a significant
amount of time spent online in the research setting, observing, participating and
taking field notes.”
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13. 3.5 Issues for Space-Based Approach
In 3-D virtual world, the familiarities and intuitions in interacting in physical spaces
should be explored.
One issue is about embodiment, ie. how people are identified and presented in the
space. In 3-D spaces, participants need the basic sense of front, back and face to
recognize themselves.
Another issue is about navigation, which concerns with how virtual spaces are
represented and how people are able to find their way around in virtual world.
Last but not least, awareness plays an important role in 3-D environment, which refers
to how position and direction can be measured in 3-D space design.
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14. Chapter4 Timetable for Future Plans
4.1 The Exploration and Preparation (Mainly in first half of May)
I have registered as a member in Meetup.com and IMVU. Throughout the process
of doing the project I will experience the existing social networking services as a
user, from which some innovative ideas or improvements may come out to
implement the dissertation proposal.
On social media like Facebook and Twitter, various kinds of information and
learning resources are available, from which some original thinking may spring
up. When ideas come clearer, it is necessary to go to Google Scholar to find some
theoretical background or support to check their feasibility.
During the first half of May, I have to make the most use of time to learn related
technical knowledge as much as possible, including PHP and My SQL. These
preparations are of great importance for the realization of dissertation proposal
during the summer vocation.
4.2 The Realization of Project (From late May to late August)
From 18th to 31st of May: To understand users and draw requirements for my
project; to find some target users to observe and interact with them;
Throughout June: To realize initial prototype in the form of paper prototype or
Wizard of Oz, and to test them with some users, then to make improvements for
the prototype.
From the beginning of July: to build high-level prototype, including setting up
functions and providing services in PHP and My SQL as I stated in Technologies
in Final Project in Chapter2. The duration of this process cannot be estimated,
and it varies as the research goes deeper.
From July, the dissertation will be written as the project goes on.
Now when I review the timetable, I feel confident because I know what I should do at
any time from now on although lots of hard work is in front of me. I will keep to the
timetable and hope to finish my project at late August.
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15. References
Robert D. Putnam, (2000) Bowling Alone. New York: Simon&Schuster.
Julie C. Meloni, (2003) Teach Yourself: PHP, My SQL and Apache. Sams Publishing,
Indiana.
Luke Welling, Laura Thomason, (2005) PHP and My SQL Web Development. Sams
Publishing, Indiana.
Mark S. Ackerman, (2000) The Intellectual Challenge of CSCW: The Gap Between
Social Requirements and Technical Feasibility. Human-Computer Interaction,
Volume15, Issues2&3, Pages179-203.
E Agichtein, C Castillo, G Mishne, (2008) Finding High-Quality Content in Social
Media. New York, NY, USA.
Jachi O’Neill, David Martin, (2003) Text Chat In Action. ACM, New York, NY, USA.
P40-49.
Barry Brown, Marek Bell, (2004) CSCW at play: “There” as a collaborative virtual
environment. ACM, New York, NY, USA. P350-359.
R E Grinter, L Palen, M Eldridge, (2006) Chatting with Teenagers: Considering the
Place of Chat Technologies in Teen Life. ACM, New York, NY, USA. Volume 13,
Issue 4.
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