Paper Reading #8

Comments:
Comment #1
Comment #2
Reference:
Title: Exploring Mobile Technologies for the Urban Homeless
Author:  Christopher A. Le Dantec
Venue: CHI 2010, Atlanta, Georgia
Summary:
This is a short article that discusses ideas for mobile devices for the homeless. The author wants to address legibility, literacy, and legitimacy. He defines the issues with legibility as "How does access to purposefully designed technology impact how homeless individuals interpret the urban environment and the opportunities available to them," literacy as "How does adding specific capability to a familiar technology (the mobile phone) alter the way the homeless interpret and use that technology as a tool for interacting with society," and legitimacy as "In what ways do forms of legitimacy influence the legibility afforded by technological artifacts and the literacy of the intended users." These are the questions he is looking to answer. He is targeting mobile phones for the first part of his research because of their functionality and their ability to promote social status. The second part of his research will have field work and questionnaires to understand how homeless interact socially and how they could use technology at these centers that would help the homeless.
Discussion:
I really don't enjoy the articles that don't discuss anything specific and only discuss aims of their research.  Also, I don't think giving things of value to the homeless is a smart idea. They'll just steal and sell it. And while that may be unfair to some homeless as not all would, a majority would because food is an incredible motivator. Overall this idea might be alright, but I have a hard time picturing homeless using these devices as something other than a means to get food (among other things).