Does the Public Still Look at Public Displays?: A Field Observation of Public Displays in the Wild

Public displays are widely used for displaying information in public space, such as shopping centres. They are typically programmed to display advertisements or general information about the space in which they are situated. Due to recent advances in technology, public displays are becoming ubiquitous in space around cities and can potentially enable new interactions with public space. However, despite these advances, research reports that public displays are often found to be: (1) generally irrelevant to the space in which they are situated; and (2) ignored by passers-by. Although much research has focused on tackling these issues, a gap remains regarding knowledge about how public displays in the wild are currently being used at a time when people are increasingly relying on their smartphones as a main source for accessing information and for connecting with others. The study reported in this article aims to address this gap by presenting new insights about the current practices of non-research public displays and their role in a hyperconnected society. To achieve this, we provide results from a field observation study of non-research public displays and contextualise our findings within an analysis of related work. This article makes three main contributions: (1) identifying how user engagement with public displays has changed over the past 10 years; (2) understanding how the pervasiveness of smartphones and other connected devices has modified whether users notice public displays and their interactions with public displays; and (3) outlining design recommendations and opportunities towards making public displays more relevant in a hyperconnected society.