I realized then and there that one of the consequences of entering the conceptual age will be that we have to be able to conceptualize and use emotions. In information systems this will be needed to enhance human-machine interaction but also to reason with it in those systems. As I see it now, that could even become an infrastructural component, as I expect time, accountability en context will also. You need it in that case to represent the emotional feelings related to other data. E.g. to represent ‘Client X is devastated as the bank has made her sell her house’.

We currently use emotion concepts already. A clear example is using emoticons in e-mail or msn to prevent others to misinterpret our message. ‘;-) This is a joke. :-( This is not good news.’ We experience the lack of emotion when hearing the robotic voice of an answering service. We need more sophisticated models than these in the future.

When searching for emotion conceptualisations I run into the W3C initiative on emotions, originated in 2007. They have specified use cases and requirements for an emotion (markup) language. Pretty neat stuff.

I also run into EARL, Emotion Annotation and Representation Language, initiated in 2006. This language already has filled in many of the requirements the W3C sees with respect to emotion. It is possible to express complex emotions, mixed emotions and it has regulation mechanisms like for example the degree of simulation or suppression.

The first research has clearly started, delivers results and can be used. Let’s integrate it in our information architect’s practice.

<complex-emotion>
   <emotion arousal=”-0.2” category="pleasure" probability="0.5"/>
   <emotion category="friendliness" probability="0.5"/>

       See you!!
</complex-emotion>

(Or should I better resite a poem here?)

Rijk van Vulpen is enterprise architect at Caerleon.

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