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the researchers face-to-face. Using a web-based
questionnaire, the user experience data could be
collected immediately after each theatre visit, thus
minimizing recall problems. All users returned
their online questionnaires within a couple of
days after the theatre visit. On the other hand, the
parking application users met the researchers in a
feedback seminar right after the trial, when they
returned their phones to the research team. This
provided a perfect opportunity to give the users
the paper questionnaires which they could return
when they left the seminar. However, not every-
one had time to fill out the paper questionnaire,
and they were subsequently requested to fill the
questionnaire through a web interface. 43 users
filled the paper questionnaire in the seminar, and
five users filled the web questionnaire right after
the trial period. In the restaurant and pub trials the
request to fill out a feedback questionnaire was
sent to the users by email immediately after the
trial ended, and the majority of the users replied
within one week (only four out of 39 used more
than a week), and more than half responded on
the same day that the request was sent (20 out of
39). A summary of the number of test users in
each context and the data available through final
questionnaires is presented in Table 2.
All the users were adults, the youngest being
22 years and the oldest 72 years. The average age
was around 40 years. The gender balance was
equal for parking and restaurant application users,
but for the theatre, females outnumbered males
(76% of the users were females), whereas in the
pub context males outnumbered females (88%
male users).
Even though the log data and questionnaires
provide the primary source of data used in the
analysis, we also did some additional, context
specific data collection especially for capturing
data that could help in understanding the subjec-
tive user experience. The users of the parking
application were interviewed after the trial in a
feedback seminar. Eleven users volunteered for
the interview. The interviews were recorded. The
average time of the interview was around ten min-
utes, the majority of which was used for exploring
issues related to the parking application, not to
information tags. Also, the users of the parking
application were able to send feedback during
the trial using a feedback form in the Web. The
total number of feedback forms received during
the parking trial was 26 - most dealing with the
parking application itself. The theatre visitors
were observed in actual use situations by attend-
ing the theatre visits with the users. Observation
was done during one selected evening, when the
researchers visited the theatre and at the same
time, trial used the services themselves to get a
first-person experience in addition to observing
other users and the responses of bystanders. After
visiting the theatre, the researchers verbalized
their own experiences and observations through
an open-ended questionnaire. Usability testing
was performed in the restaurant pilot. A total of
five users used the service in the restaurant, and
the testing session was videotaped. In the usability
test, the users followed a predefined test script,
i.e. they all performed the same activities in the
same order. Also, personnel of each establishment
were interviewed for their interpretation of user
Table 2. Number of users for each trial and reply rates for the final feedback questionnaire
Total #
users
# of returned
questionnaires
Questionnaire
return %
Questionnaire type
Time of returning the questionnaire
Parking
51
48
94%
paper combined with web
when users returned the phones
Theatre
141
101
72%
web
within a couple of days after the visit
Restaurant
27
23
85%
web
mainly within one week after the trial
Pub
19
16
84%
web
mainly within one week after the trial
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