Usability Research On Video-on-demand Of Digital Television

The contradiction between expanding of information capacity and limitation of information transmission channel is more and more evident. Digitalization is the effective method to resolve this problem. Digital television (DTV) is the necessities of life and an important information receiving terminal, then its digitization is inevitable and should be popularized more quickly and extensively. As the digital technology becomes gradually mature, many interactive features of DTV can be fully expressed. DTV gradually evolves into a multimedia information terminal, which inculde public information transmission, domestic entertainment and interaction. It changes user's habit of watching televison, from passive watching to active participation.Video-on-demand (VOD) is one of the important appliances on DTV, which fully demonstrate interactive features of it. It provides video stream when user needs it without delay. Current VOD only provide limited programmes, with simple interactons. Moreover, there are some delays after demanding.The author conducts research from the perspective of usability. First of all, they identify usability's effect on users' accepting DTV, and then elicit the profound meaning of researching DTV usability. Secondly, based on the current state of VOD, the author uses UCD method to dig user's potential requirements and expectation, and then extends functions of it. The whole research includes two stages. In the first stage, the author uses Heuristic evaluation to conduct comparable usability research on two set-top-boxes, then combines research results of current research and foreign DTV usability experts' research, then provides usability guideline of VOD. In the second stage, the author digs users' potential requirements of VOD without considering technologies. By dint of Alan cooper's goal-directed design, the author adopts in-depth interview and field study to collect user data, then extracts behavior variable and behavior model from each user data, and uses personas and scenario to decipt analysis result. Finally, they design twelve new functions of VOD, and then use Macromedia Flash 8 to present high-fidelity interactive prototype. After that, the author recruits users to conduct usability test on the prototype, then find usability problems to improve the prototype. The research indicates that users have a strong demand on the new functions and have high degree of satisfaction.