Project Torino<\/a>. And you said this was sort of a serendipitous, if not accidental, project for you. Tell us all about Project Torino. This is so cool.<\/strong><\/p>\nCecily Morrison: So, Project Torino is a physical programming language for teaching basic programming concepts and computational learning skills to children ages seven to eleven regardless of their level of visions, whether they\u2019re blind, low vision, partially sighted or sighted. It\u2019s a tool that children can use. And it was, indeed, a serendipitous project. We were exploring technology that blind and low-vision children used, because we have a blind child. And at the time, he was quite young. He was about 18 months. And we really wondered how many blind and low-vision people were involved in the design of this technology. And we thought, what would it look like if these kids, these blind and low-vision kids that were in our community that we now knew through our son \u2013 what would it look like if they were designing the technologies of tomorrow, their own technologies, other technologies? So, we decided to run an outreach workshop teaching the children in our community how to do a design process and how to come up with their own ideas. So, we brought them together. We had a number of different design process activities that we did. And, you know, they came up with amazing things. We gave them a base technology based on Arduino that turns light into sound. And we just walked them through a process to create something new with that. And they came up with incredible things that you\u2019d never think of. So, one young girl came up with an idea of this hat \u2013 very fashionable hat, I have to say \u2013 which adjusted the light so that she could always see, because she had a condition where, if the light was perfect, she could see almost perfectly, and if the light was just a little bit wrong, she was almost totally blind. So, it was quite difficult for her in school. We had another child who created this, um, you might call it a robot, which was running around his 100-room castle which was imaginary, I learned, in the end, to find out which rooms had windows, and which rooms didn\u2019t have windows because, at the age of seven, he had told me very confidently that his mom had told him that sighted people like windows, and he should put them in the rooms with windows. So, we were really excited about how engaged the children were, the ideas they came up with were great. But it was an outreach workshop, so when we were finished with the day, we thought we were finished. And that week, a number of the parents phoned me back or emailed me and said, great, you know, my child has come up with several new ideas. They really want to build them, so, how can they code? And I thought, gosh, I have no idea! Most of the, you know, languages that we would use with children of that age group, between seven and eleven, are not very accessible. They\u2019re block-based languages. So, I asked around, did anybody know? We tried a few things out. We tried putting assistive technologies on existing languages, and we discovered that this was a big failure. The first time I made a child cry, I was a little bit sad, a little bit depressed about that. So that was definitely not the right direction, but I was having lunch one day with a colleague of mine who works in my group as a hardware research engineer. And I said, you know, is there anything out there that we could hack together, just to enable these kids to learn to code, give them the basics before they\u2019re ready to code with a text-based language with an assistive technology when they\u2019re a bit older? And the answer was, well, not really, but actually, I think we can build that. I think we\u2019ve got a bunch of the base tech there already. So, we got a bunch of interns together and off we went.<\/p>\n
Host: And\u2026 where is it now?<\/strong><\/p>\nCecily Morrison: It\u2019s been a very exciting journey from that first prototype, which was really a good prototype, tested with ten children, to a second and a third prototype which was then manufactured to test with a hundred children. And after an incredibly successful beta trial, we are partnering with American Printing House for the Blind who will take this technology to market as a product.<\/p>\n
Host: Wow. How does it work?<\/strong><\/p>\nCecily Morrison: How does it work? It\u2019s a set of physical pods that you connect together with wires. And each of these pods is a statement in your program, and you can connect a number of pods to create a multi-statement program which creates music, stories or poetry. And in the process, with different types of pods, we take children through the different types of control flows that you can have in a programming language.<\/p>\n
Host: And so, this is not just, you know, the basics of programing languages. It\u2019s computation thinking and, sort of, preparing them, as you say, for what they might want to do when they get older?<\/strong><\/p>\nCecily Morrison: Yeah, so I think whether children become, you know, software engineers or computer scientists in some way or not, a lot of the skills that they can learn through coding and through the computational learning aspect of what we were doing, are key to many, many careers. So those are things like breaking a problem down. You\u2019re stuck; you can\u2019t solve it. How are you going to break it down to a problem that you can solve? Or, you\u2019ve got a bug; it\u2019s not working. How are you going to figure out where it is? How are you going to fix it? Perhaps my favorite one, and perhaps this is just a beautiful memory I had of a child with one of those a-ha moments, is, how do you make something more efficient? A physical programming language can\u2019t have very many pods. And I think, in our current version, we have about twenty-one pods. So, you have to use those really efficiently. That means, you have to use loops if you want to do things again, because you don\u2019t have enough pods to do it out in a serial fashion. And I remember a child trying to create the program with Jingle Bells. It was just before Christmas. We were all ready to go off on holiday, and she was determined to solve this before any of us could go home. She\u2019d mapped it all out, and she said, \u201cBut I don\u2019t have enough pods for the last two words!\u201d I said, well, you know, we have solved this, so it must be solvable. So, she\u2019s sitting there and thinking, and her mom looks at her and goes, \u201cJingle Bells, Jingle Bells\u2026\u201d And all of a sudden, she goes, \u201cOh, I get it! I get it!\u201d And she reaches for the loop and puts it in a loop. But I think those are the kinds of moments, both as a researcher, which are just beautiful to see when your technologies really help someone move forward. But also, the kind of thing that we\u2019re trying to get children to get at, which is to really understand that they can do things in multiple ways.<\/p>\n
Host: Who would ever have thought that Jingle Bells would give someone an a-ha moment in technology research?!<\/strong><\/p>\n(music plays)<\/strong><\/p>\nHost: So, let\u2019s talk a bit about some rather cutting-edge, ongoing inclusive design research you\u2019re involved in, where the goal is to create a deeply personal visual agent. What can you tell us about the direction of this research and what it might bode for the future?<\/strong><\/p>\nCecily Morrison: I think, across all of the major industrial research labs and industrial partners in technology, there\u2019s a lot of focus on agents, and agents as being a way to augment your world with useful information in the moment. We\u2019ve been working on visual agents, so visual agents are ones that incorporate computer vision. And I think one of the interesting challenges that come from working in this space is that there are many, many things that we can perceive in the world. You know, our computer vision is getting better by the month. Not even by the year, by the month. From when we started to now, the things that we can do are dramatically different. But that\u2019s kind of a problem from a human experience point of view, because, what\u2019s my agent going to tell me, now that I can recognize everything and recognize relationships between things, and I can recognize people? Now we have this relevance problem, is what am I going to surface and actually tell the person which is relevant to them in their particular context? So, I think one of the exciting things that we\u2019re thinking about is how do we make things personalized to people without using either a lot of their data, or asking them to do things that require a deeper understanding of computer science? So, that\u2019s a real challenge of how we build new kinds of algorithms and new kinds of interfaces to work hand-in-hand with agents to get the experience that people want without having to put too much effort in.<\/p>\n
Host: So, I want to talk about a topic I\u2019ve discussed with several guests on the podcast. It\u2019s this trend towards cross- or multi-disciplinary research, and I know that\u2019s important to you. Tell us how you view this trend \u2013 even the need \u2013 to work across disciplines in the research you\u2019re doing today.<\/strong><\/p>\nCecily Morrison: Well, I can\u2019t think of a project I\u2019ve ever worked on in technology that hasn\u2019t required working across disciplines. I think if you really want to impact people, that requires people with lots of different kinds of expertise. When I first started doing research as a PhD, I started right away working with clinicians, with social scientists, with computer scientists. That was a small team at the time. The Torino Project that I\u2019ve just discussed, we were quite a large team. We had hardware engineers, software engineers, UX designers, user researchers, social scientists involved. Industrial designers as well. Everyone needed to bring together their particular perspective to enable that system to be built. And I feel, in some ways, incredibly privileged to work at Microsoft Research where I sit on a floor with all those people. So, it\u2019s just a lunch conversation away to get the expertise you need to really think about, how can I get this aspect of what I\u2019m trying to solve?<\/p>\n
Host: Hmm. You know, there\u2019s some interesting, and even serious, challenges that arise in the area of safety and privacy when we talk about technologies that impact human health. You\u2019ve alluded to that earlier. So, as we extend our reach, we also extend our risk. Is there anything that keeps you up at night about what you\u2019re doing, and how are you addressing those challenges?<\/strong><\/p>\nCecily Morrison: No doubt any technology that uses computer vision, sets many people into a worried expression. What are you capturing? What are you doing with it? So, I\u2019ve certainly thought quite a lot, and quite deeply, about what we do and why we do it. And I think working in the health and disability space has been a really interesting space to work with these technologies because you can see, on the one hand, that they can have a profound impact on the lives of the people that you\u2019re working with. And when I say profound, I don\u2019t mean, you know, they had a nicer day. I mean, they can have lives and careers that they couldn\u2019t consider otherwise. That said, we are, no doubt, with vision technology, capturing other people. But for me, that\u2019s one of the most exciting design spaces that we can work in. We can start to think about, how do we build systems in which users and bystanders have enough feedback that they can make choices in the use of that system? So, it used to be that users of the systems were the ones that controlled the system. But I think we\u2019re moving into an era where we allow people to participate in systems even when they\u2019re not the direct user of those systems. And I think Assess MS was a good example, because there we were also capturing clinical data of people, and we had to be very careful about balancing the need to, for example, look at that data to figure out where our algorithms were going wrong, and respecting the privacy of the individuals as there\u2019s no way to anonymize the data. So, I can assure you, we thought very hard about how we do that within our team. But it was also a very interesting discussion with some of our colleagues who are working in cloud computing to say, you know, there\u2019s a real open challenge here which hopefully won\u2019t be open too much longer, about how we deal with clinical data, how we allow machine learning algorithms to work on data so not everyone can see all of the same data. So, it\u2019s certainly top of mind in how we do that ethically and respectfully, and of course, legally, now that we have many legal structures in place.<\/p>\n
Host: Cecily, tell us a bit about yourself. Your undergrad is in anthropology, and then you got a diploma and a PhD in computer science. How and why did that happen, and how did you end up working in Microsoft Research?<\/strong><\/p>\nCecily Morrison: Well, I suppose life never takes the direction you quite expect. It certainly hasn\u2019t for me. I did a lot of maths and science as a high school student. But I was getting a little bit frustrated, because I really liked understanding people. And what I really liked about anthropology was it was a very systematic way of looking at human behavior and how different behaviors could adjust the system in different ways. And that, to me, was a little bit like some of the maths that I was doing, but just with people. Sort of solving the same kind of problems but using people and systems rather than equations. So, I found that very interesting. I went off to do a Fulbright Scholarship in Hungary. I was studying the role of traditional music, in particular bagpipe music, in the changes and political regimes in Hungary. And, as part of that, I spent a couple of years there, I found some really interesting things with children. I started teaching kids. I started working with them on robotics, just because, well, it was fun. And having done that, I was then seeing that, actually, there could be a lot of better ways to build technology that supports interaction between children in the classroom. So off I set myself to find a way to build better technologies. I figured I needed to know something about computing first. So, I thought I\u2019d do a diploma in computer science. But that, again, distracted me when I was given this opportunity to work in the healthcare space and I realized that really what I wanted to do was create technology that enabled people in ways they wanted to be enabled, whether that be education or health or disability. So, I ended up doing a PhD in computing and then, very quickly, moving into working in technology in the NHS. And soon after that I came to Microsoft to work on the Assess MS project.<\/p>\n
Host: So, you have two boys, currently 11 months and 6 years. Do you feel like kids, in general, and your specific boys are informing your work, and how has that impacted things, as you see them, from a research perspective?<\/strong><\/p>\nCecily Morrison: Again, one of the serendipities of life, you can get frustrated with them, or you can take them and run with them. So, I have an older child who was born just before I started at Microsoft, who is blind, and I have another 11-month-old baby who\u2026 we call him a classic. We have the new age and the classic version. And it very much has impacted my work. Seeing the world in a different perspective, taking part in communities that I wouldn\u2019t otherwise have seen or taken part of have definitely driven what we\u2019ve done. So, Torino is certainly an example of that. But a lot of the work I\u2019ve done around inclusive design is driven very much by that. And I think, interestingly enough, in the agent space, we have done some work with people who are blind and low vision because, at the time we started working with agents, typical people were not heavy users of agents. In fact, most people thought they were toys. Whereas for people who are blind and low vision, they were early adopters and heavy users of agent technologies and really could work with us to help push the boundaries of what these technologies can do. If you\u2019re not using technology regularly, you can\u2019t really imagine what the next steps were. So, it\u2019s a great example of inclusive design where we can work with this cohort of young, very able, blind people to help us think about what agents of the future are going to look like for all of us.<\/p>\n
Host: So, while we\u2019re on the topic of you, you\u2019re a successful young woman doing high-tech research. What was your path to getting interested? Was it just natural, or did you have role models or inspirations? Who were your influences?<\/strong><\/p>\nCecily Morrison: (laughs) Well, I think, as maybe some of the stories I\u2019ve said so far, you could see serendipity has played a substantial role in my life, and I guess I\u2019m grateful to my parents for being very proactive in helping me accept serendipity and running with it wherever it has taken me. I think I\u2019ve been very lucky to have a boss and mentor, Abby Sellen, maybe people may know from the HCI community, who\u2019s been amazingly adept at navigating, building great technology and navigating the needs we all have as people in our own personal lives. I\u2019m sure there have been many other people. I take inspiration wherever it\u2019s offered.<\/p>\n
Host: As we close, Cecily, I\u2019d like you to share some personal advice or words of wisdom. What you\u2019re doing is really inspirational and really interesting. How could academically minded people in any discipline get involved in building technologies that matter to people, like you?<\/strong><\/p>\nCecily Morrison: I think knowing about the world helps you build technologies that matter. And to take an example from the blind space, I\u2019ve seen a lot of technology out there where people build technology because they want to do good, but they don\u2019t know how to do good, because they don\u2019t know the people they\u2019re designing for and building. We have lots of techniques for getting to know people. But I think in some ways, the best is to just go out and have a life outside of your academic world that you can draw inspiration from. Go find people. Go talk to people. Go volunteer with people. To me, if we want to build technologies that matter to people, we need to spend a good part of our life with people understanding what matters to them, and that\u2019s something that drives me as a person. And I think it then comes into the way I think about technology. Another thing to say is, be open to serendipity. Be open to the things that cross your path. And I know, as academic researchers, sometimes we feel that we need to define ourselves. And perhaps that\u2019s important, although it\u2019s never been the way that I\u2019ve worked. But I think there\u2019s also something about, you can be incredibly genuine if you go with things that are really meaningful to you. And being genuine in what you do gives you insights that nobody else will have. I never expected to have a blind child, but I think it\u2019s been incredibly impactful in the way I approach my life and the way I approach the technology I build. And I don\u2019t think I would have innovated in the same way if I had not had that sort of deep experience of living life in a different way.<\/p>\n
Host: Cecily Morrison, thanks for joining us today.<\/strong><\/p>\nCecily Morrison: Thanks very much.<\/p>\n
(music plays)<\/strong><\/p>\nTo learn more about Dr. Cecily Morrison and how researchers are using innovative approaches to empower people to do things they couldn\u2019t do before, visit Microsoft.com\/research<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Episode 60, January 23, 2019 – Dr. Morrison gives us an overview of what she calls the \u201cpillars\u201d of inclusive design, shares how her research is positively impacting people with health issues and disabilities, and tells us how having a child born with blindness put her in touch with a community of people she would otherwise never have met, and on the path to developing Project Torino, an inclusive physical programming language for children with visual impairments.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":37074,"featured_media":562770,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"msr-url-field":"https:\/\/player.blubrry.com\/id\/41170250","msr-podcast-episode":"","msrModifiedDate":"","msrModifiedDateEnabled":false,"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[240054],"tags":[],"research-area":[13556,13554,13553],"msr-region":[],"msr-event-type":[],"msr-locale":[268875],"msr-post-option":[],"msr-impact-theme":[],"msr-promo-type":[],"msr-podcast-series":[],"class_list":["post-562767","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-msr-podcast","msr-research-area-artificial-intelligence","msr-research-area-human-computer-interaction","msr-research-area-medical-health-genomics","msr-locale-en_us"],"msr_event_details":{"start":"","end":"","location":""},"podcast_url":"https:\/\/player.blubrry.com\/id\/41170250","podcast_episode":"","msr_research_lab":[199561],"msr_impact_theme":[],"related-publications":[],"related-downloads":[],"related-videos":[],"related-academic-programs":[],"related-groups":[913161],"related-projects":[830104,295553,370961],"related-events":[],"related-researchers":[{"type":"user_nicename","value":"Cecily Morrison","user_id":31356,"display_name":"Cecily Morrison","author_link":"Cecily Morrison<\/a>","is_active":false,"last_first":"Morrison, Cecily","people_section":0,"alias":"cecilym"}],"msr_type":"Post","featured_image_thumbnail":"","byline":"Cecily Morrison<\/a>","formattedDate":"January 23, 2019","formattedExcerpt":"Episode 60, January 23, 2019 - 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