Assumptions

The research began with assumptions gathered from speaking with and running a workshop with stakeholders. This was to understand how to frame what to ask research participants and guide the conversation. The research assumptions is not a list of hypotheses to prove but a guide to enquiry and a way to explore issues that may be present in the gap between experts and non-experts.

• Users have a particular set of primary functions for which they use their mobile devices which differ from the same activities on the desktop

• People use mobile browsers differently than on the desktop

• Many people use mobile devices more than desktop devices to use and share different types of media and certain types of files

• Most users are aware of the concept of P2P but not aware that they may have one time used it or how it might make their technological lives better

• P2P is understandable as a concept, but it's applications are not

• Most experts and developers in P2P have some knowledge of who their users are and what their needs are

• Besides sharing through messaging, cloud services are the standard by which users understand files and media going between different users

• Users are aware of privacy, but their understanding and approaches to it vary drastically

• Infrastructural services on mobile devices, such as battery life and bandwidth are essential to all users