Designing Large-Display Workspaces for Cooperative Travel Consultancy

Abstract

This paper discusses the design and first deployment experiences of an interactive large-display workspace for face-to-face travel consultancy. The stickiness of client preferences, the asymmetry of information about the solution space and the emotional colouring of client choices, make this complex cooperative process difficult to perform. To support such collocated consultancies we propose a large-display system providing a shared visualization of information resources that can be manipulated jointly by both parties. The use of natural touch interaction and multimedia resources furthers emotional involvement of the user. Results of a preliminary evaluation suggest that such a large-display workspace can greatly improve the cooperation process and both customer and agent satisfaction.