Memory, spaces and a dream

I had a dream yesterday which made me to think about it all through the day today. It sort of open a new way to look at ‘spaces’. Though it started by a physical space but it could be translated to virtual spaces as well. Let me just tell you my dream first:

The Dream

I was dreaming that I had gone to my old school IIT Roorkee and I’m strolling around the campus. But the campus has changed a lot since I studied there. Then I go to the Library and it looks to be ‘modified’; modified in a way that some portion is the older one – one I can related to- and the other is ‘new’ part which I haven’t seen before.

The Library

When I woke up I kept thinking about this Library. All though my dream I was trying hard to “evoke” my memory about the good (& bad) times I have spent in that campus. That Library became the climax. I was seeing two part in a space one which I able to recognize and identify with; one which was giving me “happiness” as I was feeling nostalgic being there. While the other totally alien; one I’m not able to relate to – one that gives me a feeling that I not been here before.

Change dilutes recall (?)

This reminded me of old times when old alumnus used to visit the campus with their families trying to related to the “new” looking campus. It has evolved from their times and they used to find it difficult to evoke their “old time memories”. So I guess we can say that change can dilute the recall. If there are more unfamiliar “looking” things then it would be difficult to related to that space (I guess both physical and virtual).

Lets think

Memories can have a physical space associated with it. When you visit that place it evokes old memories about that place – these memories could either be related to an

• ‘Event’ – eg. I got married in this church.
• ‘Interaction with the space - Active’ – eg. I used to sit here, this was my favorite spot.
• ‘Interaction with the space - Passive’ – eg. There used to be a clock here in our times.
• ‘Socialize’ – eg. Our gang used to come here during the break. (There could be more. But this is what I could think of. )
  

Now these memories give us ‘pleasure or happiness’. It allows us to relive the past – be it good or bad.

What is crucial here is a time gap – “detachment”. You need to move away from the space for a period of time. how much time? Well I guess it ‘might’ depend on :

• Individual,
• Usage of the space,
• importance of the space,
• time spend in that space
• user’s acquaintance with that space.
  

Roll back in time: Product Strategy opportunity for retention segment (?)

Now that I know all of us have associations with the physical spaces is there an opportunity for us to build a product strategy around this? We know most companies are trying hard to retain their users; so can this be in any way help us in building a strategy or design to retain them?

Can a “retro” feel bring some excitement on users getting bored with your social network site. Take them back in time when they had ‘fun’; make them excited again?

Or should a dormant Email account get activated to the an old UI – one which that user was familiar with?

Or does it also indicate that redesigning you site might not go well with your most frequent users? Is this a reason why Google hasn’t done any drastic changes on their search results page?

I guess there is a lot to research & experiment upon to get some sense of how a physical space and virtual space is related emotionally or rather psychologically. But I do see some connections in the way we need to think about product strategy and design (UI). The whole approach to Redesign could change for products which have regular users for a very long time if people associate with virtual spaces