Where would computer industry related subjective discussion questions go?

What about this statement of purpose for Human Computer Interaction?

• Dear All, attached is the draft of my PS for my application for HCI. I am from civil engineering background (?!!) but I am quite interested in Internet product development ( I believe in Internet, it did and it will change our life and our world!), especially the interaction design for mobile internet product. Ps: In the following content, the underline one might be deleted. I understand it has a lot of imperfection at this moment. I will keep updating it. If you have time, please have a look and give some comments. Many thanks! :) Yeah, I know I am a little bit silly to do so, but I just want to try a new way of using "cloud intelligence", and a place for me to view the interaction process of my PS. Hey, bro. I have given out my new structure of the PS in the first comment. Please have a look. Thx! -----------------------------content of PS-----------------------------------------   I am from ****, and grow up in a society where its traditional ideology is challenged, replaced by or mixed with its newly occurred competitors. This raises a lot of arguments on the society, and I always wonder how people perceive them and how they develop different conclusions through their own logical system. One observation fascinated me mostly is that people from the same background with similar values, will strongly disagree with each other simply by the influences of different ideologies. However, even though people’s views look so different that no compromise seems able to be made, I find it is not difficult for me to understand both sides of the arguments, logically and mentally. This ability of understanding takes root in my empathy and compassion for humanity, which proved to be essential when I am studying the user experience of internet products. And my care for humanity is one of the most important reasons that I choose to change my major to HCI.   Except for my great interest in humanity, I also showed great talents in painting by wining several prizes domestic and abroad. Before 16, I have taken 6 years professional training in painting, which not only equips me with solid knowledge about color theory and composition, but also enables me the ability to appreciate aesthetics. Later, I spend a lot on time self-learning industry design, mainly focus on the automobile. A good industry design, like the beautiful sculpture like front faces of the BMW series developed by Chris Bangle, always touch my heart deeply. The study of industry design reminds me of how great designs can affect our world and our own functionally and emotionally, which, can be applied to the interaction design as well.   However, as most of the “good” student in **** I focused much more on the science study. I majored in physics in my high school and did quite well. Unlike social science, the beauty of physics is that no matter how complicate the problem is,  it can always provide a clear explanation by logical analysis. Later I chose to enter the civil engineering project offered by ***, since it provides me a chance to explore a different environment in the top university of Asia while learning something related to the physics. Once decided, I will devote myself completely into it. Through the hard working I have gained an outstanding academic record (GPA 3**/4.3). And I also participated in some researches on the cutting edge of this industry, like the undergraduate research fellowship program at ***, and research experience with Phd students at the largest seismic lab at UC ***. These research and study experience do benefit me a lot, especially on my problem analysis and solving skills, but I also find that this industry lacks something important for me, like a human approach. I felt a little bit disappointed when I know that most of work in civil engineering is about following some well-established codes, which I could hardly make a difference.   After knowing that civil engineering is not what I am looking for, I start to make great efforts on searching for my future career. On my third year of undergraduate, I worked as an intern in a local engineering consultant, and my major job was to collect and analyze the public and professional opinions about the local railway development. This working experience, which highly focused on the feasibility study of large scale projects, earned me an interview as a strategy analyst at the mobile Internet department of ****, which is the Internet giant in ****.   Although due to the educational background, I didn’t get the work, this interview gave me a valuable chance to deeply expose myself to the Internet industry- we talked about the product developments, user demands, and making changes to people’s life, all these about Internet fascinated me a lot.   Since then, I have paid great attentions to the Internet, especial the user study of the mobile Internet products. I join the online focus groups and professional communities to learn and discuss about the product developments, participate in the user research and framework planning of the real products, including vertical website, mobile social networking app. I also start to self-study software like Axure and Photoshop, and web architecture. The deeper I go, the more I like the interaction design. Its focus on human and its ability to make positive changes to our life, encourage me to choose as my future career.   As Internet is an industry changes in a very fast pattern, what you are learning in the campus might be outdated in the real world. However, through my own experience on doing user research and product development, especially the interaction design, I find that there is something lacking-which is the systematical and logical understanding about the user demands and behaviors. My passion for systematical knowledge structure started from my study on social science. In my high school, I read a book named < Second Treatise on Government> by John Locke, which outlines his ideas for a more civilized society based on natural rights and contract theory. While the ideas of the author might be biased, this book helps me to address http://... related problems with a systematic framework, which I find extremely important when facing controversial issues like ideas and values. My curiosity of the logical and systematical explanations then continues in my later works. In the railway development project, even though we collect hundreds of public comments through public engagement, I always wondered what kinds of essential demands behinds all these claims should be reflected to the clients. As for the user research, if there is no complete understanding about the user behaviors, sometimes we don’t even know from what kinds of data we are looking for. Even if we collect a lot of data about the user behaviors, without understanding of the physiological and cognizant backgrounds for these behaviors, how can we better integrate these findings into our design? Considering the fast interactive design speed today, I believe, a clear and logical instruction supported by the mature understanding of HCI theory is essential for the product development cycle. It is true that things change fast in this industry, and that is why I always keep an eye on the cutting edge of it. however, I also believe there are some fundamental principles of the HCI that will remains valuable through time, and continue to guide us when we are trying to create innovative and natural interactions on new platforms like mobile devices. As a person who dedicates himself in this industry, I wish I can have a chance to understand basic principles of it and know about the prior work done, to gain a working knowledge of what's gone before, what's been tried and how it's worked out.   The MS program will provide me such a chance to further my education. It is a very dense project so I will get myself well prepared. I am going to finish my undergraduate in December, 2013. Before going to the U.S., I will spend almost half year at the largest Internet user research lab at ***, working as a user research and interaction design assistant. Through which I believe I can collect first-hand information about user behaviors and interaction design process in big company like ***. I will also enhance my technical knowledge in computer science, since I realize some of the interactions and product forms cannot be realized without the advance of technology. At this moment, I am most interested in area like social behaviors on mobile Internet, innovative interactions on mobile devices, and the combination of cloud computing with the mobile phones. I believe at the time I am at the U.S., I will be well prepared for combining the knowledge learned from the work with the knowledge to be learned in the XXX.    --------------------------------------------------------------------------------- I am going to make big changes to this PS since it does not provide solid relationship between my prior work and HCI. The changes might include: 1. Specific observation of the ideology influence. How the empathy on humanity benefit my HCI related work like product analysis. For example, when I am doing analysis about the user of an app, I am able to put myself in different user contexts so as to see the detailed user demands. 2. Add another supporting material: I have developed a public account on an mobile app platform, which is based on my observation of the users behaviors and needed. This account attract more than 100+ followers in the first 3 weeks, and I continue adjust the materials based on the data collected like UV and PV. 3. I believe new product form and innovative interaction cannot be achieved without technical improvement. For example, without cloud storage technology, content sharing on mobile Internet will be limited. Thus, I am going apply HCI with CS track. As a student from non-CS background, I need to prove my ability to tackle to CS problem. Again, many thanks ~~

• Answer:

  Your SOP is a little verbose. I am sorry, I could not read through it entirely and neither will the admissions committee ( Not trying to be snarky). They get a LOT of applications, also the application format in GT allows only a few hundred words AFAIK. Please compress it a lot and redraft.