Edinburgh Napier University

  In this paper, we reflect on our experiences of designing, developing, implementing and using a real world, functional multi-touch enabled interactive collaborative environment (ICE). The paper provides some background theory on blended spaces derived from work on blending theory, or conceptual integration. This is applied to the ICE and results in a focus on how to deal with the conceptualization that people have of new collaborative spaces such as the ICE. Five key themes have
emerged from an analysis of two years of observations of the ICE is use. These provide a framework, TACIT, that focuses on Territoriality, Awareness, Control, Interaction and Transitions in ICE type environments. The paper concludes by bringing together
the TACIT framework with the principles of blended spaces to highlight key areas for design so that people can conceptualize the opportunities for creative collaboration that the next generation of interactive blended spaces provide.