Chris Fahey has documented who rides the New York subway each morning -- hour by hour. For example:
3:00-4:00 AM
Drunks of all sorts, club kids, and winos. Late night workers, busboys, getting off their shifts. Only a handful of people per car. 6:1 male/female ratio.4:00-5:00 AM
Transit workers changing shifts. Maybe 6 people per car. All male.5:00 AM - 6:00 AM
Blue-collar laborers, minorities, immigrants. Half the car is asleep. Maybe 20 or 25 people per car. 9:1 male/female ratio.
There is also an hourly study of subway population on the 1/9 line and a great cartoon treatment of the demographics by stop on the F line.
Why are their not similar kinds of studies of how people actually use wireless devices? Wouldn't it be useful to categorize the purpose of work related wireless phone calls? How do wireless carriers and device manufacturers decided what device features to support? Shouldn't they want to know what kinds of wireless mediated interactions are done by people on the job, on particular jobs?
What is the average content of a work call for a construction manager for example? Given that almost every construction manager carries a cell phone and pays at least $50 to $70 per month to use it just for voice, you would think we had a pretty good idea what it was being used for. Is that $50-70 per month being well spent? Could the wireless voice work be done more effectively using other wireless data approaches? What other tasks could be done given the investment in the voice device and the monthly airtime?
I don't think anyone knows. Do any of my readers? Do any of you know of studies of wireless users and how they use their devices, particularly in a work setting?
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