A LinkNYC Headline From Hell, and Other Thoughts

This headline-from-hell crossed my retinæ yesterday from a LinkNYC kiosk in my area. I had no idea what this was in reference to, and in its headline-only context-free presentation I had no way to know. You can’t click on it, you can’t scan a barcode for more information, and after a few seconds it disappears and you might not ever see it again. In this case I obviously have not kept current on hit movies in the theaters, so this headline looked like some kind of stilted Haiku.

One easy way to quell the confusion would be to simply include what department this headline is from. If I knew this was from “Entertainment News” I might have been better able to dismiss this particular headline without feeling like an idiot, since I rarely follow entertainment news. Then again I don’t know that news from Niger would be any more relevant if it included a “News From Niger” tag line.

Other than this I did not give much attention to LinkNYC last week. I cracked some ribs and have been laying low until that heals itself. In case you’re just tuning in I have kept an eye on LinkNYC since it was announced, since anything calling itself the “payphone of the future” would certainly interest me. My attitude toward these kiosks has vacillated. Some days I loath them, other days I can’t get enough of them. But more importantly I feel like I am the only person writing about these kiosks who actually uses them and whose opinions on their workings are informed. Maybe it doesn’t matter what I think. What am I saying? I am certain it does not matter what I think, that is if relevance is defined by whether or not I expect anyone at CityBridge or the Smart City yes team to listen or care. I can’t help ask if anyone at LinkNYC even realizes that we shared the spotlight on that “CBS Sunday Morning” spot last year. I did not know they were on the bill until after I had recorded my segment, and I don’t think knowing ahead of time about their presence would have had any influence on my decision to appear.

Because I enjoy metaphorically beating my head against a wall I attempted to initiate contact with someone at Beta.NYC, an entity unknown to me until a few weeks ago when I spotted their “testimony” at an oversight hearing regarding LinkNYC. A few claims about LinkNYC made during this delivery were new to me. CityBridge is, according to the speaker, contributing a portion of its LinkNYC ad revenues to help fund WiFi connectivity throughout the Queensbridge and Mott Haven NYCHA buildings. I had never heard of this and find it surprising that such a gesture would not be promoted or even mentioned by CityBridge. I happen to have followed the story of WiFi at the Queensbridge houses and I never heard reference of its deployment involving any entity other than the Spot On Network.

I had other questions for those folks but I guess my money’s no good there. I never heard back and guess I should not have expected to. One question I have never seen asked of CityBridge is what happened to the advertising-free kiosks that were supposed to be placed on every single block in purely residential areas. This was part of the promise of free WiFi everywhere in the 5 boroughs, a promise which will almost certainly never be met.

I also want to know if the bewilderingly confusing MTA bus arrival countdown function is ever coming back, and in a form that is useful. With none of the fanfare that greeted its arrival the bus countdown feature seems to have been removed.

I also look forward to the promised release of “real-time” data that will monitor the LinkNYC network and show how many of the kiosks are not working. I find it baffling that the network was actually built without this functionality, but I also question how much information can be gathered. Can they remotely determine when the touchscreen functionality of a tablet does not work, even when the screen is turned on? Can they tell when a phone call appears to have connected to the number called but the person called only hears silence? Can they tell when my favorite LinkNYC bug is present, where searches people entered into the mapping app remain visible for anyone to see? These are among several common bugs I encounter with the kiosks, bugs I will be interested to see documented in the forthcoming “real-time” data.

Since no one from the Smart City will interact with riff-raff like me I guess I’ll just continue talking to myself, giving away ideas for ways to make the so-called “payphone of the future” a little more useful, or engaging.

There is such creative potential with these things, but one fundamental item these kiosks need on their physical surface is a static, non-disappearing informational placard that explains what these things are, who put them there, and what amenities they offer. I can report from observation that a lot of people do not know why these kiosks exist or who put them there, with a lot of people making the erroneous assumption that they are paid for by taxes.

Summary information explaining LinkNYC’s purpose is found by tapping the “About” tile on the tablet screen — if you can find it, that is. The “About” tile is hidden beneath the fold when the tablet works, and not available at all when the tablet does not work, as is often the case. A physical placard seems like something that should not be a feature. It should be a requirement.

Yesterday I tapped the “About” tile on a kiosk and from there was sent to the Link.NYC website. I was amused to see a warning from the kiosk’s very own website that its web browser was out of date.

Not only is the browser out of date but it also has “severe security issues” such that these kiosks could “get a virus by just viewing a malicious website”, all this according to browser-update.org, a project I’d never heard of before.

Evidently someone at Link.NYC installed a small bit of JavaScript on their site that detects web browsers and alerts visitors using legacy versions to upgrade. I could not actually find that little piece of JavaScript in viewing the source code for Link.NYC from a desktop computer but it must be in there somewhere. Browser-update.org suggested I upgrade this kiosk’s browser to Firefox, Opera, Chrome, or Samsung Internet. None of those links worked because, of course, you can’t get to the open Internet anymore, not much of it at least.

As these kiosks stand today it’s as if their function and purpose should be self-evident, which I think illustrates a bit of Smart City hubris. Early on in the program CityBridge sent out what they called “ambassadors” to explain to citizens what Link kiosks were and how to use them. I don’t know if they still do this. A physical placard explaining what these things are would also save room for more ads on the 55″ screens, since it could render unnecessary the screens informing us that free WiFi, 311, etc. are available.

The advertising panels could also benefit from having some kind of countdown clock or visual cue that the screen is about to change to something else, with a row of barcodes across the bottom. The barcodes could function like advertisement afterglow, a smaller version of the full screen ad giving someone who saw something interesting disappear from the screen a chance to scan for more information. Obviously this assumes they have a smartphone and are adept at scanning barcodes. The only other way to see an ad again is to stand and stare at the screen for an indeterminate length of time until it reappears.

But what of the ads? Has anything so far changed compared to the old payphones? I think I saw an ad fly by for a movie, and I think the ad said that the movie was showing at a nearby theater, and I think it actually said something about the movie starting in 10 minutes. If that really happened then it is unlike anything possible on most payphones’ static ad panels, save for the handful of payphones in Times Square that had LED screens on them several years ago. But I only saw it once, and for just a few seconds before something else appeared. Beyond that I’ve seen a few animations and moving video but most of the ads so far might as well be static.

OK, done talking to myself about this for today. Onward.