Fundamental Concepts for Interactive Paper and Cross-Media Information Spaces

While there have been dramatic increases in the use of digital technologies for information storage, processing and delivery over the last twenty years, the affordances of paper have ensured its retention as a key information medium. In this book we review a wide variety of projects and technological developments for bridging the paper-digital divide. We present our information-centric approach for a tight integration of paper and digital information that is based on a general cross-media information platform. Different innovative augmented paper applications that have been developed based on our interactive paper platform and Anoto Digital Pen and Paper technology are introduced. For example, these applications include a mobile interactive paper-based tourist information system (EdFest) and a paper-digital presentation tool (PaperPoint). Challenges and solutions for new forms of interactive paper and cross-media publishing are discussed. The book is targeted at developers and researchers in information systems, hypermedia and human computer interaction, professionals from the printing and publishing industry as well as readers with a general interest in the future of paper.

Beat Signer (www.beatsigner.com) is Professor of Computer Science at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB) in Belgium, where he is co-director of the Web and Information System Engineering (WISE) laboratory. He studied Computer Science at ETH Zurich and obtained a PhD in Computer Science from ETH Zurich. With his team of researchers he is investigating cross-media information spaces and architectures (CISA), interactive paper and augmented reality solutions as well as multimodal and multi-touch interaction frameworks. His research interests further include human-information interaction, ubiquitous and tangible computing, personal information management as well as tangible holograms and data physicalisation. Beat Signer is also a passionate wildlife photographer who likes to travel and explore the world.