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December 17, 2004

5-minute video about BuddyBuzz, our lab's invention for reading

After months of working in secret, we could finally share our lab's invention for mobile reading at Stanford's Media-X Conference. We call our innovation "BuddyBuzz." You can find a 5-minute video of our presentation at http://vodreal.stanford.edu/mediax/041201/fogg.ramWe've got lots to tell about BuddyBuzz, but our workload has prevented us from writing very much. So the online video and the few things below will have to do for now.The quick overview: --BJ Fogg, Director of the Stanford Persuasive Technology Lab---------[Some slides from our presentation]buddyBuzzImage OverviewOfBuddyBuzz    

 

 

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December 12, 2004

Kid Culture & Legislation for Cellular Telephones

A few weeks ago, New York Times Magazine featured a spread on "The Thoroughly Designed American Childhood" with many articles focused on persuasion towards youths and their gatekeepers (e.g., parents). The Thoroughly Designed American Childhood
Also, here are some articles on the influx of mobile phone users since 2000 and some new legislation enacted for camera phone voyeurism: Report: Mobile phone users double since 2000 New bill targets some peeping Toms

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December 11, 2004

Buy Blue

In the credibility and disclosure department, here's a website that shows where corporate retailer's donations end up... so you, the consumer, can make purchasing decisions based upon political preference. The site has an obvious bias, although it acknowledges that not all "blue" companies are paragons of virtue. It states as a long-term goal reduction of corporate contributions across the board. The data comes from Open Secrets and the FEC. Buy Blue Our goal here is to provide you information on who gave what to what political party this last election cycle. There are many factors which will eventually pertain to the "Blue-approved" label, however with buying season upon us, we quickly wanted to give people SOMETHING to go off of. Political donations and their effects are but one of many factors we will look at when a company is taken into consideration. We understand that there are Blue-contributors which have less than savory business practices, and we will be focusing on "the big picture" in the coming weeks. Sometimes there is just no choice as to who to can buy from and we wholeheartedly encourage buying from local and independent businesses wherever and whenever possible. The long term goal is to help reduce corporate money from politics; this is not a geographical boycott.

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Yahoo Web Beacons

Yahoo is using something called "Web Beacons" that utilize cookies on your machine and listening agents on certain websites to track your usage and determine whether you have opened particular emails. Yahoo Web Beacons (from Yahoo's privacy policy)

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Can video games be more effective than anesthesia?

It appears so: http://www.cnn.com/2004/HEALTH/12/09/hospitals.gaming.ap/index.html

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December 09, 2004

Students and Online Sources

The Associated Press reports that professors and others are worried over students’ reliance on online sources and their methods of assessing the credibility of those sources. They find that students think going to a physical library to find a good source is often out of the question or thought to be too much work. And their choice of online sources may be poor: “For instance, 63 percent of students asked to list Microsoft Corp.'s top innovations only visited the company's Web site in search of the answer.” The article also partially addresses the apparent advantage that children and young adults have over older people when it comes to accessing credibility online. I wonder how credible the views in the article are: the small amount of hard data included was gathered in unreliable ways, the rest of the article relies on anecdotal reports that are not very convincing, and it doesn’t at all address the huge archives of academic sources traditionally only found in print that are now available to most college students from their personal computers. The article does briefly mention the new challenge web users in assessing the credibility of wiki sources:
"Another potential minefield is the growing phenomenon of collaborative information assembly. The credentials of the people writing grass-roots Web journals and a committee-written encyclopedia called Wikipedia are often unclear. Nevertheless, some Internet users believe that such resources can collectively portray events more accurately than any single gatekeeper. "In many ways, the greater diversity of information is healthy." (Consumer WebWatch, part of Consumer Reports, which is quoted in the article, collaborated with the Persuasive Technology Lab on a web credibility study reported on here.)

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How narratives persuade: By showing cause-and-effect relationships

Our lab has been investigating how computers can use narratives to change people's attitudes and behaviors. As a result, a recent New York Times Magazine article by William Safire caught my attention. He outlines how political strategists talk more and more about the power of narrative in winning elections. My biggest take away from the article was a definition of narrative that matches our lab's thinking: Narrative is "the representation of events and characters in some causal or at least noncoincidental sequence" (Safire quotes Jim Phelan, editor of a journal called Narrative). In other words, narratives show us causal relationships: a --> b, x --> y, and so on.Let me go a bit further and get on my soapbox for a paragraph or two . . . I believe we humans are hardwired to absorb narratives, because through narrative we learn about causal relationships; we learn how things work in the world. This has adaptive value. But it can also cause problems. We absorb narratives so readily, it's difficult to counteract a false narrative, a story that shows a false causal relationship. For example, if I tell a story about how eating organic blueberries caused me to grow to 6'3", that idea is going to stick in your head. It will be hard for you to erase the relationship in your mind between organic blueberries and growth. That's why, I believe, so many cultures developed strict rules about telling falsehoods--or bearing false witness, if you will. Once told, these falsehoods cannot be completely erased; at the very least they leave a residue that clogs our thinking.

In today's world the narratives embedded in TV sitcoms, commercials, and pro sports have displaced traditional narratives. This is unfortunate because the traditional narratives had value for successful living (if they weren't useful, the narratives wouldn't have survived through the ages). Most narratives fed to us by popular media ("buy brand X and people will fall in love with you") fail to show causal relationships that have value for our communities or cultures. We don't have much control over TV narratives, but each year we become more capable of creating computer-based narratives with global reach. And that's exciting. The mobile phone platform seems especially promising. As a result, I've challenged one of my graduate students to focus on how narratives can be conveyed through mobile phones. If this resonates with you, get in touch with us.

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How do you encourage self-persuasion?

Eliot Aronson describes an excellent account of self-persuasion in his book, Age of Propaganda. During WWII, a curious agency called the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Committee on Food Habits realized it had a problem: People were throwing away most meat and eating only the desirable parts. Because there were shortages of certain high-protein foods, they enlisted social psychologist Kurt Lewin to persuade greater consumption of the undesirable parts (kidneys, intestines, etc). He gathered a group of housewives together and gave them a credible lecture on the benefits of eating kidneys, intestines, etc. Then he split the housewives into 2 groups: Group 1 simply received the lecture and went home. Of these women, only 3% served intestines. Group 2 was asked "Do you think housewives like yourselves could be persuaded to participate in the intestinal meat program?" As they discussed this, slowly but surely they came up with reasons and ideas to encourage eating intestinal meat--all the while, it turned out, persuading themselves. How do we know? Compared to the 3% of women serving intestinal meat in Condition 1, 32% of these women saw the benefits and served intestinal meat to their families. Self-persuasion is a subtle, technique that allows individuals to create cognitive arguments to support a position they hold. It's difficult to do--but it's one of the most effective strategies out there. What about contemporary examples?
AmazonUploadPics.png

Amazon's New Persuasion Technique: Sharing Your Customer Images After you upload pictures of you using your product, guess what happens?
-You become more committed to the product
-If you had any doubts about the product, this helps to erase them (we seek out confirming information after making a decision)
-You probably show your friends! Very clever.

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December 08, 2004

legal persuasion

Here's an interesting PR release about a new book. It's all about how lawyers persuade juries in the age of information and new media. http://www.mysan.de/international/article12488.html

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What can you believe on the web?

A reporter called this morning to talk with me about web credibility. His question: What can you believe on the web? There are many ways to answer this, but here's one viewpoint I offered: You can believe what you *want* to believe -- nothing more, nothing less. This has been true throughout history. Fast forward to today . . . .The web accentuates our human frailties in processing information. A quick web search will usually support whatever preconceived ideas you have. In other words, you'll find information that confirms your expectations. As a result, today's web makes it much easier to believe what you want. I told the reporter this is bad news. He agreed. 

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December 07, 2004

SorryEveryBody.com and its use of Anonymity

It has been noted that SorryEverybody.com has a very personal feel. It presents the faces of thousands of Americans and their hand written apologies to the rest of the world. sorryeverybody.jpg SorryEverybody.com’s persuasive use of anonymity fosters such a personal feel. The site itself never reveals it creator’s identity; we only see his partly obscured face in this picture. There is no “Who we are” page. Only recently does the description of the up coming book reveal he is James Zetlen, a USC student. The site does not indicate if its sponsored or owned by any particular organization. It appears to be a work of a small group of individuals. The main page’s use of the first person and thanks to “Andrew, Andy, Aristotle, Charles” and six others reinforces this impression. There is no login or registration. At no time, does the site request your email address. The site doesn’t even create a Web browser cookie on your machine. You can contribute pictures to the site anonymously. The submission page has only one button, “Upload for review” and a single check box to optionally release the picture for inclusion in the book. Would this site be as compelling if it was hosted by MoveOn.org or the DNC? Would it be so popular if you had to register to browse the gallery? Would as many people have contributed pictures if they were required to provide a Microsoft Passport first? Would the pictures be as powerful if they where accompanied the contributor’s Amazon Wishlist? The use of anonymity persuades you to post a personal, sincere apology. The contributors’ anonymity make the apologies feel very genuine.

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blah.com

I recently stumbled across blah.com (http://www.vzw.blah.com/about_blah.htm) which is a service started in Rio de Janeiro by Telecom Italia Mobile and apparently makes exlusive deals with wireless carriers around the world to offer this service. The incentive for the wireless carrier is that the service is designed to persuade people to send more text messages with that given carrier. It's not exactly clear from the website what all the services are, but basically you can submit a profile, look up others all over the world with specific interests/characteristics (social networking-style), and connect with them to text message, play a networked soccer match against the person on your phone, and so on. They even have global rankings for these cell soccer players on their website. I suppose it's sort of a facilitated global pen-pal system for the 21st century. It already seems to be effective at getting people to sign up and send text messages, as they claim 3 million registered users internationally, over 16 carriers in 10 countries, and they really play up such diversity on the website. Of course in the US, they only offer it to Verizon customers, so it seems to me like a good way of both providing a cool value-added service to persuade people to choose Verizon (or whoever the local carrier is) as well as pay for more text messages.

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December 06, 2004

Unity

For me, the most persuasive aspect of imsorryeverybody.com is the unity it represents. It's wonderfully interesting to see each of the faces, representing people from all walks of life, different backgrounds, cultural origins, etc. sending the same message to the world. The creativity of each of the individuals in differing their version of the same message further enhances this feeling of unity through the display of disparity. The message, being the connection link of commonality between all these people, seems to be able to carry tremendous weight--it is able to persuade people that "America" is really sorry.

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December 05, 2004

Apologies Accepted

Less than a month ago, a new website appeared on the web. Apologies Accepted was created as a response to the website Sorry Everybody. The world took notice, and replied in kind. While America may have favored Bush by 51%, the world seemingly favored Kerry by a much wider margin. ApologiesAccepted gives a face to all these foreign citizens who the majority of Americans will never meet. If I put my picture on SorryEverybody, I imagine that I would at first feel empowered. That I was announcing to the world that I, along with nearly half the country, didn't support Bush. I can also imagine, however, that I would quickly become dissatisfied with the situation again. After all, what difference did my picture really make? Seeing ApologiesAccepted may change that feeling, though. I would see that there were people all over the world who saw and appreciated my sentiment, and backed me up in my feelings. I would feel connected to them, and feel better about my place in the world. Just shows the persuasive power of social interactions.

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December 04, 2004

I may be in the minority about SorryEverybody.com...

...but I don't find it to be particularly persuasive. I agree it's clever and it has an interesting purpose. But a great example of persuasion? After I looked through the site, I wondered: Would anyone really change their attitude or behavior because of this site? Would it even lead to a small dent in our cognitive walls? I'm unconvinced. In fact, the primary people I think might be persuaded by SorryEverybody.com are those who posted their very own pictures online. Seeing that you are part of a larger, fervent community will reinforce your beliefs. The site owners are trying to communicate the idea that many Americans are "aghast and dismayed." It's classic informational influence. Fair enough, and I think the point comes across a bit. But if I were on the other side of this argument (thinking Americans were xenophobic and supported a reckless/incompetent administration), I know how I would cognitively classify this: "Oh look at this site with a bunch of crackpots--they're obviously on the fringe, so I'm going to ignore them." Changing political opinions is hard. SorryEverybody.com does uses some clever techniques: personalizing the message with pictures, using emotion and a novel medium, and creating a self-reinforcing community of members. But it's still just one message that appeals mostly to its own (already persuaded) members. To persuade--or even initiate contemplation about changing!--there has to be much more.

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Facial Expressions

The use of facial expressions on Sorry Everybody is central to its persuasive power. People are so strongly moved by images of faces that the accessibility of and popular desire to use a system that allows people to share their faces and messages with the world is a significant development in long distance communication among strangers. It is quite impressive that faces can have so much effect even when one realizes the very real performative aspect to the affectation of a particular expression—many of the expressions are assumed in very specific and presentation-driven ways.

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December 03, 2004

SORRYEVERYBODY.COM

When I first started looking through the gallery entries on sorryeverybody.com, what struck me first was how varied the entries were, both in terms of age and location, as well as economic status(or superficial perception of). I think something that helps this site succeed as a persuasive tool is that such a varied range of computer users exist now, and that the number of users is continuing to grow as computers (and access to the internet) become more affordable around the globe. As this trend continues, I see sites that allow for a personal, yet globally reaching, message to be sent internationally helping to bring about understanding between people who otherwise would only have nationalistic perspectives on each other. I see it allowing, as sorryeverybody.com does, creating a link to the international community for those who choose not to, or are unable to, travel internationally. The use of photographs is especially important to this end, since pictures make the message infinitely more personal. Most blogs allow for anonymity, which can damage the credibility of posted messages. But the use of pictures--especially those with handwritten messages-- eliminates this. Just try and get someone from the Stanford Review to pose for a shot with a “I’m sorry Bush won” sign. I would argue that even those photos that are not hand personalized might be convincing enough, in a similar way to how flattery can be an effective tool even when it is obviously insincere. Just as a thought to where sites like this could take us, I Imagined the following: sorryeverybodyFutureEdition.com allows me to send a photo or audio (or video) reply to postings via cell phone. I Imagine what it would be like to have just posted a photo apology and checked the box allowing for one daily response to come through my phone, and minutes later getting a phone call from a fellow student in France, or wherever, just calling to say "hey, I saw your post, I'm glad there are people like you in America, I just want you to know I appreciate it, and that not everyone here blames you either." I think the persuasive potential for this kind of communication is enormous, and once communications technology make it possible, I think it will certainly influence the way we think and act.

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December 02, 2004

About SorryEverybody.com

So I visited the site a couple of days ago, and I do have to say that the site impacted me. The biggest part was just seeing the handwritten notes, at this point it is definitely novel to take a picture of a message that you created. It is very powerful to see a handwritten message attached to a very sad face of an actual person. With this overall commentary, I have two specific points that I wanted to bring up. Though it was a moving experience and I did spend sometime on the site, I wonder how many posters actually feel relieved that they were able to upload something. Like I think it would be interesting to see how bad the people feel after they posted their image. Do they not feel sorry anymore? After posting do they feel the same as if someone accepted their apology, or as someone that offered an apology but was never given a response? I think that might make for an interesting study. The only other thing I wanted to point out came from this picture...
se2000.JPG
It seems as if within all of the apologies about the election, it occurred to me that this person might have been saying sorry to a specific person? It almost seems that way, and as I started thinking about it it seems as a novel way to not only apologize to the world, but apologize to a significant other for something wrong that they may have done. Almost as if you're putting some picture or an apology on one of those jumbotrons. I think this type of picture & message apology could evolve into a medium of expression for apologies to loved ones, and I'll be interested to see its effectiveness and how other people perceive these types of public displays of forgiveness.

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SorryEverybody.com -- a new form of (persuasive) conversation

Not everyone agreed with me last night in our lab meeting. I announced that the most significant captology example from 2004 had finally emerged: SorryEverybody.com.  (The most significant example from 2003 was, ironically, America's Army--a video game by the U.S. Army to recruit new soldiers.)I'm enchanted with SorryEverybody.com. I've spent lots of time on the site. I've looked at photo after photo of Americans offering apologies to the world--some bewildered, some angry, some sad. Interspersed among the American apologies I found photos of people accepting apologies and offering comfort. And that's why this web site is important. SorryEverybody.com has launched a new form of global conversation, one that aims to promote peace. I like that.If our lab ever creates a captology Hall of Fame, I'm likely to nominate SorryEverybody.com to take a spot along with other stellar examples of persuasive technology, such as America's Army, Amazon, and Baby Think It Over. I'll write more about SorryEverybody.com later; the site is more psychologically sophisticated than it appears. But before I wax professorial, let's see what other members of my lab have to say. We won't all agree, of course. But I believe that by looking at SorryEverybody.com closely, we can discover new ways the web can change people's attitudes and behaviors.  --BJ FoggSome sample apologiessad womanfamily apologizingsenior apologiesA sample reply

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December 01, 2004

Target Shopping

For the post-Thanksgiving shopping rush, Target offered a free wakup call service so shoppers could get as early a start as possible. A mix of celebrities and characters were offered, and the site has commercials advertising each one as they compete for your attention. Target WakeUp Call I heard through the grapevine that the service had huge signup but that many of the calls were made late.

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Target Shopping

For the post-Thanksgiving shopping rush, Target offered a free wakup call service so shoppers could get as early a start as possible. A mix of celebrities and characters were offered, and the site has commercials advertising each one as they compete for your attention. Target WakeUp Call I heard through the grapevine that the service had huge signup but that many of the calls were made late.

Posted by Aditya Johri at 08:31 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Target Start-of-Shopping-Season Wakup Call

For the post-Thanksgiving shopping rush, Target offered a free wakup call service so shoppers could get as early a start as possible. A mix of celebrities and characters were offered, and the site has commercials advertising each one as they compete for your attention. Target WakeUp Call I heard through the grapevine that the service had huge signup but that many of the calls were made late.

Posted by at 01:19 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Pentagon Using PR Campaign to Plan War Campaign

The technology is media rather than computers, but here's a lovely article about the Pentagon's use of PR and misinformation as a tool of war. PR Meets Psy-Ops in War on Terror "The Pentagon in 2002 was forced to shutter its controversial Office of Strategic Influence (OSI), which was opened shortly after the Sept. 11 attacks, after reports that the office intended to plant false news stories in the international media. But officials say that much of OSI's mission — using information as a tool of war — has been assumed by other offices throughout the U.S. government."

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