Smixd Wiki

Welcome to the SMIxD Wiki
This wiki collects dynamic design patterns related to interaction design of social media. Basically the aim is to describe how low-level design components (e.g. mutual relationships/connections; or privacy settings of content; or means of reacting to other's contributions) can form behaviors, strategies and attitudes towards a certain social media application. This pattern collection thus very much builds on Crumlish and Malone's collection of design patterns of social media -- they serve as the basis of already described low-level patterns. Thus, you will find many links to their pattern site from this site.

The wiki is created by interaction design students at Chalmers University of Technology in Gothenburg, Sweden, as a part of the course “Interaction Design of Social Media”. Main teacher, supervisor and contributor is Dr Sus Lundgren, sus.lundgren@chalmers.se.

Current patterns
In case some wordning or terminology used in the patterns is unclear, check out the Vocabulary

Patterns related to connections
 * Awaiting Critical Mass
 * Befriending Dilemma
 * Friend Surfing
 * Friends Via Events
 * Hiding Connections
 * Re-Following
 * Peer-Pressure

Patterns related to profiling
 * Secondary Channel
 * Identity Stasis
 * Maintaining A Facade
 * Maintaining A Reputation
 * Protecting Privacy
 * Relationship Status Dilemma
 * Self Censoring
 * Showing Off
 * Targeting Insiders
 * Identity Theft

Patterns related to sharing content
 * Adding Devious Information
 * Attention Seeking
 * Boosting Content
 * Buffering Content
 * Crafting Content
 * Fear Of Failing
 * Language Dilemma
 * One Site, Multiple Accounts
 * Perceived Audience
 * Posting As Time Killing
 * Reward Hunting
 * Spamming
 * Stage Fright
 * Co-Creating Content
 * Stealing Content
 * Edit-War
 * Meming

Patterns related to viewing or commenting on content
 * Avoiding Notifications
 * Information Hunting
 * Low Effort Reaction
 * Proximity Matters
 * Rumoring
 * Unintended Stalking
 * Untrue RSVPs

Other patterns
 * Auction Sniping
 * Bleed
 * Gaming The System
 * Misusing Other's Account
 * Old Habits Die Hard
 * Tamagotchi Syndrome
 * Giving Up Or Giving In
 * Voting To Moderate Ranking

What is a design pattern?
A design pattern can be described as a common solution to a certain design problem or design need. Patterns are often described in terms of: a meaningful name; a short description of the problem the pattern solves, or the design component it is; when to use it; why it should be used; other patterns it is related to; and examples. Basically a pattern can be seen as a design tip or a design tool. In itself it is only so-so useful, but in relation to other patterns, forming a design language, it is a very useful design tool.

The pattern concept is attributed to the architect Christopher Alexander who in the late 1970ies wrote the two seminal books A Pattern Language (1977) and The Timeless Way of Building (1979). Alexander’s patterns were related to architecture, but the notion of patterns has been picked up within many other disciplines since. Whereas Alexander’s collection deals with explicit problems (e.g. that it is problematic to have long sterile corridors) and suggested solutions (e.g. to allow lots of natural light to illuminate the corridor; or to furnish the hallway with art; or possibly widen the corridor into smaller rooms every once in a while) later collections are more neutral, describing patterns in terms of design components (as for instance Björk & Holopainens game design patterns or Tidwell’s GUI design patterns) or design demands, and how to meet them.

Within the fields of Human Computer Interaction and Interaction Design several people have investigated and written patterns creating a language. Thomas Erickson (2000) advocated a “lingua franca” for interaction design and others followed. Jan Borchers (2001) discusses patterns in general and presents a pattern language specific for interactive music exhibits in his book “A pattern approach to interaction design”. Also, patterns within specific areas of interaction design have been collected, e.g. patterns on web usability (Graham 2003) and user interface design (Tidwell 2005).

Read more
Patterns related to interaction design: Borchers, J. (2001) A pattern approach to interaction design, John Wiley & Sons, ISBN: 0 471 49828 9; Crumlish, C. & Malone, E. (2009) Designing Social Interfaces, O'Reilly; Graham, I. (2003) A Pattern Language for Web Usability, Pearson Education; 1st edition; Tidwell, J. (2005) Designing Interfaces. Patterns for Effective Interaction Design, O'Reilly.

Alexander's original works: Alexander, C., et al (1977) A Pattern Language, Oxford University Press, New York, ISBN 0-19-501919-9

Gameplay design patterns: Björk, S., Holopainen, J. (2005) Patterns in Game Design. Charles River Media, ISBN 1-58450-354-8. Current wiki for these patterns: http://gdp2.tii.se/

Patterns in object oriented programming: Gamma, E., Helm, R., Johnson, R., Vlissides, J. (1994) Design patterns Elements of Reusable Object-Oriented Software, Addison-Wesley, ISBN 0201633612

Mechanic, dynamic and aesthetic patterns
LeBlanc has studied how gameplay structures influence gaming, and a s a reault he has introduced the layered Mechanics-Dynamics-Aesthetics (MDA) model. The first layer consists of the game mechanics, which LeBlanc compares to the code of a computer program. From the mechanics emerges the second layer, the game dynamics, which is how the game behaves or “runs” when it is played in the same fashion a running program can have be seen as a process having certain behaviors. Dynamics thus often result in interactions between user and game (e.g. moving), between users but mediated by the game (e.g. trading) or lastly even user-user interaction regardless of the game mechanics (e.g. experienced players giving novices advice). From the dynamics one reaches the aesthetics of the game, described as “the desirable emotional responses” – i.e. the emotions and phenomenological content of the game which LeBlanc draws a parallel to the requirements of a program.

In this wiki, we will focus on the dynamic and possibly also aesthetic patterns related to social media. For instance, the mechanic design solution that one cannot in Facebook direct messages to only a certain group of friends, gives rise to the dynamic pattern One Site, Multiple Accounts. This is a strategy some users take on, having one "personal" profile on Facebook, with one set of friends, and then a more "public" version of themselves (in the form of a second user account) which everyone can befriend. Note how Google+ solves this with thier "circles"-solution. (Then again, Facebook may deliberately keep this in order to squeeze out a few extra user accounts to brag with!).

Read more
LeBlanc, M. 2006. Tools for Creating Dramatic Game Dynamics. In Salen, K. & Zimmerman, E. (eds.) The Game Design Reader: a Rules of Play Anthology, pp. 438-459, MIT Press.

Hunicke, R., LeBlanc, M. and Zubek, R. (2004) MDA: A Formal Approach to Game Design and Game Research In: Proceedings of the Challenges in Games AI Workshop, Nineteenth National Conference of Artificial Intelligence