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Variability of user interaction with multi-platform news feeds

The development of the World Wide Web (WWW) and the proliferation of web enabled devices have allowed various news agencies to enrich their traditional method of distribution of news through TV, radio and print with simultaneous broadcast through the Web. The varying nature of devices through which the Web is accessed warrants different ways to feed the same content. This precipitates some variation in the way users interact with the news feeds. In this article, we investigate how mental models and information scent affect this variation and user interaction on the whole. In particular we were interested in how mental models changed when users moved from one platform to another and the role of information scent in maintaining, creating or changing mental models. We present results from a preliminary survey conducted to capture the current news gathering behavior of the general population. We also present observations about mental models related to multi-platform user interfaces from a study where users accessed the BBC news site from a laptop, a PDA and a cell phone. Our observations show that the users' mental model of the domain remains largely independent of the platform used.