Joel Ross

I'm a graduate student in the Informatics department at the University of California, Irvine. I am advised by Bill Tomlinson, and am part of the Social Code Group

I study social computing, ubiquitous systems, and human computer interaction. In particular, my research studies how games and game dynamics can be used to support awareness and behavior change towards environmental sustainability. My past research has looked at participatory culture, crowdsourcing and distributed work, human computation, and mobile device interaction, and I have a significant side interest in computer graphics and animation. See the publications and research sections for more details.

I earned my B.A. in Mathematics and English from Colorado College, where I focused on computer graphics, narrative theory, and film.

My recent curriculum vitae (pdf).

• TA for INF 42: Informatics Core II, Winter 2012
• Instructor for ICS 139w: Critical Writing, Summer Session II 2011
• TA for ICS 139w: Critical Writing, Summer Session I 2011
• TA for ICS 62: Game Technologies and Interactive Media, Spring 2011
• TA for ICS 139w: Critical Writing, Summer Session II 2010
• TA for INF 162W: Organizational Information Systems, Winter 2010
• TA for INF 161: Social Analysis of Computerization, Fall 2009

Guest Lectures:

• "Serious Games and Gamification". Fall 2011.
• "Pervasive and Mobile Game Technologies". Spring 2011.
• "Persuading Using Pervasive Games". Fall 2010.

Courses Designed:

• ICS 60: Computer Games and Society

• Ross, J., Simpson, R., and Tomlinson, B. (2011). "Media Richness, Interactivity, and Retargeting to Mobile Devices: A Survey". In: International Journal of Arts and Technology, 4(4), 442-459. (local)
• Ross, J. and Tomlinson, B. (2011). "Negabehaviors and Environmental Sustainability". In: Journal of Sustainability Education, 2(1). Online.
• Tomlinson, B., Yau, M.L., Baumer, E., Ross, J., Correa, A., and Ji, G. (2009). "Richly Connected Systems and Multi-Device Worlds". In: PRESENCE, Teleoperators and Virtual Environments, 18(1), 54-71. MIT Press. (local)

Peer-Reviewed Full Conference Proceedings:

• Ross, J., Shantharam, N., and Tomlinson, B. (2010) "Collaborative Filtering and Carbon Footprint Calculation". In: Proceedings of the 2010 International Symposium on Sustainable Systems and Technology (ISSST). Washington D.C.: IEEE.

Peer-Reviewed Short Conference Proceedings and Workshop Papers:

• Tomlinson, B., Ross, J., Andre, P., Baumer, E., Patterson, D., Corneli, J., et al. (2012). "Massively Distributed Authorship of Academic Papers". To appear in alt.CHI session of CHI 2012 extended abstracts on human factors in computing systems.
• Ross, J. (2011). "Pervasive Negabehavior Games for Environmental Sustainability". In: Doctoral Consortium session of CHI 2011 extended abstracts on human factors in computing systems. (1085-1088). Vancouver, Canada: ACM. (DOI)
• Ross, J. and Tomlinson, B. (2010). "How Games Can Redirect Humanity's Cognitive Surplus for Social Good". In: ACM Computers in Entertainment (CIE). Vol 8. No 4. ACM. (DOI)
• Silberman, M.S., Irani, L., Ross, J. (2010). "Ethics and Tactics of Professional Crowdwork". In: XRDS: Crossroads, The ACM Magazine for Students, 17(2). ACM. (DOI)
• Silberman, M.S., Ross, J., Irani, L., and Tomlinson, B. (2010). "Sellers' problems in human computation markets". In: Proceedings of the ACM SIGKDD Workshop on Human Computation (HCOMP '10). (18-21). Washington D.C.: ACM. (DOI)
• Ross, J., Irani, I., Silberman, M. Six, Zaldivar, A., and Tomlinson, B. (2010). "Who are the Crowdworkers?: Shifting Demographics in Amazon Mechanical Turk". In: alt.CHI session of CHI 2010 extended abstracts on human factors in computing systems. (2863-2872). Atlanta, Georgia, USA: ACM. (DOI)

Technical Reports

• Ross, J., Amsel, N., Beckman, R., and Tomlinson, B. (2010). "EcoPath: Adding Spatial, Social, and Gaming Contexts to Personal Tracking Systems". Social Code Report 2010-01.
• Ross, J., Zaldivar, A., Irani, L., and Tomlinson, B. (2009). "Who are the Turkers? Worker Demographics in Amazon Mechanical Turk". Social Code Report 2009-01.

• Games for Assessing Understand of Complex Causal Networks (less...)

  As part of the Causality Project, I am exploring how computer games can be used to measure and improve players' understanding of the causal relationships that make up complex systems, such as those surrounding topics in environmental sustainability. This research involves the development of a computer game in which players attempt to navigate the maze-like causal paths among environmental concepts (e.g., how driving can eventually lead to sea level rise). I am evaluating the ways in which the strategy that a player uses to navigate this maze corresponds to his or her mental model of the complex causal system, comparing this measurement to existing techniques drawn from systems dynamics. This research introduces a novel form of a "game with a purpose" that can be used to measure human understanding of complex systems, with the potential to improve the assessment and teaching of systems thinking.
  
  I am also developing the baseline visualization for the Causality Project.

• User-Generated Game Design in Pervasive Thwarting Games for Persuading Sustainability (less...)

  This research focuses on the domain of serious games and games for change: how computer games can be used as tools for solving societal problems. In particular, I am interested in how pervasive games--games that move beyond the computer screen and integrate the virtual world and physical world, such as through mobile devices--can directly influence player actions and behaviors by framing everyday activities as in-game actions that are subject to game rules and limitations. My research looks at how players perform user-generated game design by developing and negotiating "house rules" or obstacles for one another in the context of a pervasive game for change. This allows players to determine what aspects of a broadly defined game they can most effectively act on in their local context; games can be "scaffolded globally, built locally" for encouraging behavior change. I am developing and testing a scaffolding pervasive game through which players can perform this game design, targeting behavior reduction for environmental sustainability (how a game can encourage players to stop performing actions that negatively impact the environment). In this game, players perform game design by creating challenges or obstacles for one another (e.g., "do not drive a car this week"); overcoming these obstacles in effect involves players changing their behavior. My research seeks to improve our understanding of how people casually perform the complex, computational process of game design, and how they are able to negotiate the development of rules and obstacles for one another.
  CHI 2011 Doctorial Consortium Poster
  
  Would you like to try out Thwarthog? Feel free to download the rules and cards (and let me know what you think)!

• EcoDefender (formally EcoPath) (less...)

  Many technological systems aim to support pro-social goals such as environmental sustainability by enabling personal data tracking and increasing individual awareness of behaviors and actions. Because these methods emphasize quantifiable data and understanding of quantitative models, gamification seems particularly well-suited for motivating self-tracking. To explore the effects of adding game components to personal informatics systems, we have developed EcoDefender--a pervasive game that is designed to encourage players to perform and track environmentally preferable actions. EcoDefender is an Android-based mobile phone game that uses self-tracked pro-social behaviors as inputs to a location-based "tower-defense" game. In this game, players directly perform sustainable actions in order to defend a virtual, futuristic version of their real surroundings; players attempt to hold back the encroaching flood of sea-level rise by using their performed actions to build and power protective force-fields. The game uses an augmented reality system to allow players to "see" into this virtual future and witness the benefits of their tracked actions, adding a motivating gaming context to the process of personal informatics. By exploring the application of this form of gamification to personal informatics systems, we seek to inform the design of future serious games that can harness personal data tracking for encouraging direct pro-social behaviors.
  2010 SocialCode Report (on EcoPath)

• The Better Carbon Calculator (less...)

  A popular way for people to understand their environmental impact is by using an online carbon footprint calculator. Although there are a variety of such calculators available, the majority share the same form of user interaction. We analyze how, with this mode of interaction, most calculators focus on the environmental impact of individual actions without drawing attention to the broader impacts of those actions on the surrounding community and world. To address these problems, we present the Better Carbon calculator, which uses collaborative filtering and location-based calculation to provide an individual footprint estimate while simultaneously affecting and improving the estimates for other people in a user's community. This method also allows Better Carbon to be more extendable, as additional forms of impact can be considered without requiring additional user effort. Better Carbon can thus provide quicker and easier footprint estimates, and help the process of calculating a carbon footprint create stronger linkages within the communities of its users.
  Better Carbon can be found at www.bettercarbon.com; On Facebook at apps.facebook.com/bettercarbon
  ISSST 2010 paper, ISSST 2010 slides

• Who are the Mechanical Turkers? Explorations of Mechanical Turk Workers (less...)

  Amazon.com's Mechanical Turk (mturk.com) is an online system in which workers are paid small sums of money to work on projects that, while quick and easy for a human, are very difficult for computers to perform correctly and efficiently--for example, identifying and object in an image or categorizing data. Furthermore, workers have little or not context for the work they perform through this highly mediated system. In this project, we explore the question of who are the Mechanical Turkers, looking to identify the kinds of people who work on MTurk and understand the reasons (both intrinsic and extrinsic) for their participation. We are also considering how the ubiquity of monetary rewards may shape the interactions with and potential exploitations within this crowdsourcing system.
  alt.CHI 2010 paper, alt.CHI 2010 slides, 2009 SocialCode Report

• Mobile Cinematography & Retargeting to Mobile Devices (less...)

  Mobile devices such as mobile phones are becoming more ubiquitous and gaining more capabilities, leading to their increasing use as portable media players. However, the great majority of produced visual media is targeted towards devices with larger displays and greater hardware capabilities, making it difficult for these media to be presented on mobile devices. These differences will only increase as multimedia becomes more and more interactive, such as with increasingly popular mobile games. In this project, we are exploring methods for retargeting visual media to mobile devices, considering how such methods have been applied to text, still images, and video content, and considering implications for the retargeting of games and virtual worlds.

• Crowd Chess (less...)

  In order to begin explore how the wisdom of crowds may be harnessed for human computation and the benefits it may have for such systems, we are investigating the ability of distributed human computers to play a game of chess.

• Peer-to-Peer Sensor Sharing (less...)

  As mobile devices become more ubiquitous, we are likely to see the spread of computational systems for urban sensing and other forms of context identification. However, there has not yet been sufficient consideration of how to reduce the potential environmental impacts of such systems. In an attempt to combat these foreseen impacts, we apply the concept of sustainable sharing to urban sensing, envisioning a distributed mode of interaction in which users can automatically share locally sensed information with other collocated devices. We present simulations and survey findings that demonstrate the viability of such a peer-to-peer interaction, as well as indicate key challenges for deployment such as privacy concerns. Due to energy requirements, sensor sharing using current technology may not yet make urban sensing more sustainable. However, our findings suggest that sharing capabilities and functionality can eventually be a viable interaction mode for environmentally sustainable urban sensing.

• GreenScanner (less...)

  More and more, people desire information that enables them to reduce their environmental impact during their daily lives. Although numerous services that offer this information have appeared, current "expert"-driven methods are unable to deal with the vast scope of determining the environment impact of every consumer product. Furthermore, few of these services are able to provide information whenever a user my desire it, such as at the point of purchase. In this paper, we suggest that participatory culture may allow for large-scale environmental impact information via distributed data gathering and analysis. We developed a vision of ubiquitous environmental impact information enabled by participatory culture, in which information for all products is provided by all people and is available at all times.
  The prototype can be found at www.greenscanner.net

• Notes on getting started in Blender 2.49 (written for ICS 62, Spring 2011)
• Reminders about common grammar mistakes (written for ICS 139w, Summer 2011)

• coloradocollegegame - an attempt to create a 3D, extensible gaming engine (See also my explanations on 3D Graphics and Quaternions)
• Stock Downloader - a program to download historical stock data from Yahoo!, written for the CC Investment Club