This paper focuses on the elements required for developing an interaction design framework based on Media Philosophy. For this purpose it is needed to deconstruct the presuppositions of HCI design. Following this the author suggests a re-definition of design, knowing, that design funnels the functioning code, that supplies the society with values and goals, but most importantly, that creates relations, which bring us emotions and experiences. The author argues, that by discerning the most important values it is possible to develop an effective and meaningful design method, so as to bring into the interaction an added value. It is also argued, that the current idea of desktop computers is non-functional for most of the intended purposes. It is therefore suggested to make the computer invisible in our life-world. However, this presupposes making the purpose of the computer readily visible, e.g. hiding the computer in the shapes of things of daily use. This paper is based on the works of humanistic thinkers as well as practitioners from the interaction design domain to allow for a broader theoretical reflection not only of the way how computer devices operate, but above all how they act in a human environment.

Interaction Design is a young discipline that grew out of an overlap of other science and design disciplines, its remit was the design of interactive products, services and systems for human behaviour. Visual Communication and its output of graphic design once had an early influence on Interaction Design, but this has since been devalued by the influence from more functionalist disciplines, leading to two myths about Visual Communication: it just does the ‘aesthetic bit’ on the interface, and that aesthetics has no real use or function beyond ‘beauty’. But aesthetics cannot be reduced and measured as a functionalist equation of ‘means-end’. By understanding aesthetics from a Pragmatist philosophical position, the aesthetics of interaction can be explored from a situated and culturally connected embodiment of an interactive experience. From this position aesthetics is viewed as emergent from the interactive experience through three factors: a socio-cultural context, a personal embodiment and finally a means-to-many-ends instrumentality. It is a cultural phenomenon and not an engineering problem that can be explored quantifiably. This makes this a phenomenological study, and closer to Visual Communication. The rhetorical nature of Visual Communication affords a change in human behaviour, evoking a cognitive and emotional response, making its remit about framing decision-making from use of image and text. Experience, emotion, and interpretation can only use qualitative methods to explore an aesthetic experience. This raises a more vexing question: what other design disciplines also share or rather claim a phenomenological position on aesthetics? This paper will set out to explore these amorphous boundaries to decide if Visual Communication still has an actual support position of influence on Interaction Design.

This paper is a theoretical contribution to the research area of Aesthetics of Interaction, but from a Visual Communication perspective. In order to convince those that still see Visual Communication as merely style and artifice, and an internalized and subjective design process, I will use the theses of Dourish ‘Embodied Interactions’ and McCullough’s ‘Digital Ground’ to connect to current HCI research. A Pragmatist philosophical position will be adopted from which to explore this Phenomenological area. This will present the design discipline from a fresher perspective of intellectual, considered and rhetorical discourse, into a richer understanding of the discipline by dispelling two unhelpful myths. Then an argument can be made to reposition Visual Communication as a stronger influence upon Interaction Design.

The explosive growth over the past decade in new digital media has been accompanied by a corresponding expansion in the research agendas of all disciplines concerned with communication practice. For the interdisciplinary study of Language and Social Inter- action, the ongoing evolution of information and communication technology (what we will refer to here as design) invites changes in the research agenda that are far more profound than merely extending the study of communication practice into new settings and new formats. The most important challenge we face in responding to the advance of information and communication technology is the challenge of accommodating a design enterprise within what has so far been understood primarily as an empirical enterprise-a very fundamental change in research practice and in what researchers pay attention to. What makes new information and communication technology important to the study of Language and Social Interaction? The introduction of computer and network mediation into talk is an interesting development in human history, and much useful empirical work is being done. Research on technologically mediated communication, however, tends to be organized around understanding whether what happens in these new en- vironments differs from what happens in more conventional contexts or using the new environments as a way to isolate particular forms of communication behavior. The first characterizes much of the work in computer-mediated communication (e.g., Hutchby, 2001). The latter characterizes much of the work in Language and Social Interaction us- ing the telephone to examine talk (e.g., Hopper, 1992; Schegloff, 2002). But much more important are the massively expanded opportunities for deliberate design and the accompanying explosion of interest in the structure, organization, and conditioning of discourse.

The argument discussed in this paper presents the following movements: first, it presents a brief history of cognitive science and human-computer interaction, raising some considerations arising from the interaction between these two disciplines. Basically the argument here suggests that HCI is still based on the vision known as first-generation cognitive science, where it is still possible to observe how human beings are seen as information processing, treating the act of thinking as an act which is purely computational, neglecting the complexity involved as well as the complexity of human experience. Then it will present the concepts of embodiment and enaction as a more externalist vision of cognitive science and philosophy of mind, introducing concepts such as new prospects for the paradigm of interaction. The effort of this paper will be to look for ways to understand how we can translate and apply Embodiment and Enaction in order to improve human-computer-interaction and consequently the interaction design practices.

In keeping with the conference theme of rigour and the authors' interest in sustainability and interaction design, we describe the confluence of design-oriented notions of interaction design and HCI-oriented notions of interaction design in terms of understanding the present and making choices about possible futures. We comment on the variety of research modes in this confluence and then take up the issue of how disciplinarity, multidisciplinarity, and interdisciplinarity operate and fail to operate as boundary crossing mechanisms for these ...

In recent years, information and communication technology has taken on whole new meanings in Western society and everyday life: from productivity tools for industry and administration, to everyday household activities, major entertainment sectors, new modes of communication and cohabitation, digitally enhanced pervasive infrastructures and more. In this situation, interaction design is emerging as a new and challenging design discipline. It has a design-oriented focus on human interaction and communication mediated by digital ...