PresiShare: opportunistic sharing and presentation of content using public displays and QR codes

Abstract

Public displays have seen a widespread adoption in public places such as train stations, airports and museums, where they are often used to show time tables, schedules but also advertisements or complementary information. But even within organisations or universities, public- and semi-public displays have proven themselves to be valuable means of promoting awareness of current events, latest company news, or upcoming meetings and talks. However, opportunistic sharing of content between mobile devices and such displays remains a challenge. In this paper, we present a novel technique based on QR codes to facilitate interaction with public displays and to simplify user interaction. We investigate how web technologies can be used both on the client-side as well as for the infrastructure itself in order to provide a lightweight and flexible architecture. As a proof-of-concept, we developed PresiShare, a web-based platform for presenting and sharing pictures, music and documents on any display. We have evaluated our approach by conducting a formal user study that analyses the interaction techniques proposed. Furthermore, we report our findings from a live deployment within our research group where we collected qualitative feedback and usage statistics.