The Pathways are ongoing initiatives at the heart of each MEX event agenda. Each Pathway provokes the creation of new ideas in specific areas of user experience. This is achieved through a combination of pre-event essays in our newsletter and a mixture of speaker sessions and practical workshops at the MEX events. Currently we are focused on Pathways 2, 5, 9, 10, 11, 12 and 13. Stay up-to-date with development of each Pathway via the MEX blog, email newsletter and Twitter feed.

1. How will multi-touchpoint services evolve beyond simple content replication to deliver experiences greater than the sum of their parts?
2. How do interactions within multi-touchpoint experiences vary across displays (e.g. physical screens and free space projection) and inputs (e.g. such as 3D cameras and biometric sensors)?
3. What are the basic building blocks of information in a multi-touchpoint experience? What kind of architecture allows these blocks to be displayed in the most appropriate format for each touchpoint?
4. How can users take control of an enriched digital identity, beyond a simple username and password, and make it portable across different touchpoints?
5. Is a level of technical knowledge about the characteristics of cloud connectivity an essential skill for designers creating multi-touchpoint experiences? When can the cloud be relied upon as the fabric of experiences and how can design compensate for its inherent unreliability?
6. What techniques provide the best experience for simultaneously consuming immersive media and receiving notifications across multiple touchpoints?
7. How does a designer research and map an experience across multiple touchpoints?

1. What is the best way to design for multiple users' needs, including patient, carer and healthcare professional, in a single product experience?
2. How will the user experience differ across customer-prescribed, doctor-prescribed and co-operative mobile health scenarios?
3. Which techniques can be used to convey the implicit trust and reliability of the healthcare profession in the mobile user experience?
4. How much can be learned from existing inclusive design techniques to ensure mobile health products are usable for the elderly and disabled?
5. How can positive design techniques motivate users of mobile healthcare products to move from thinking 'I am unwell' to 'I am helping myself to get better'?
6. What are the most effective ways to gain the empathy essential to designing good mobile healthcare experiences?
7. How should user-centric design processes evolve when the consequences of failure have such serious health implications?

1. Have today's smooth, glass touchscreens caused designers to forget the senses of sound and tactility when developing user interaction sequences?
2. How can all elements of the user experience - visual, tactile and audible - adapt in response to changes in the ambient environment? How should the priority afforded different senses change in response to context?
3. How do cultural attitudes to sound and tactility vary? How can these variances be reflected in mobile interactions?
4. If the presence of sound and tactile elements within the user experiences increases, will interactions which lack these feelings seem incomplete?
5. Which tools can be used to include sound and tactility within predominantly visual prototyping?

1. How do hardware additions enhance the core user experience of a device?
2. How can simple, physical materials combine with software to add a level of smartness?
3. What is changing the economics of developing accessories for niche requirements? What is the impact of high volume individual handsets such as the iPhone? What is the role of pre-production, product-centric funding platforms such as Kickstarter?
4. What inspiration can be found in the history of mobile accessories?
5. When does the experience justify expanding a software product into a combination of hardware and software. What are the differences between user-centred design processes for hardware and software?

1. How can designers create good user experiences for the emerging interaction class of short-range connectivity events?
2. Which new experiences will be enabled by short-range connectivity, beyond the established ideas of touch to pay, share and connect?
3. Is it possible to identify and improve upon the existing, analogue benchmarks against which short-range digital interactions must be measured?
4. How does the users' visual focus change when making short-range, physical connections?
5. Which aspects of the experience occur on the personal mobile device and which aspects occur on the object the user is connecting with?
6. Are tactile and audible elements more important than visual design in short-range interaction experiences?
7. What opportunities exist for face-to-face usage scenarios where digital interactions replace or supplement the traditions of human contact?

1. How can improving understanding of the brain's inner workings inform the design of more natural user experiences?
2. Why can humans perform some actions instinctively but find other actions take practice and concentration?
3. At what age and why do these behaviours start to emerge in the cycle of a user's life?
4. How do innate behaviours vary according to language, culture and gender?
5. Is it possible to create new behaviours that feel as natural as our innate abilities? How can we educate users to try new things in the least disruptive and most rewarding way?
6. Are digital experiences prompting the development of a new gestural language for users?

1. Why do users feel like the digital world is constantly shouting for their attention? What are the quiet design principles which can help turn down the visual volume?
2. Does reducing the quantity of information with quiet design deliver a more satisfying experience? Can a gentle rain shower deliver as much water as a surging river?
3. Does the proliferation of screens in users' lives enable designers to offload elements of the experience from the primary devices?
4. Does the unobtrusive and distributed nature of quiet design allow for playful new interactions which would otherwise compromise a traditional interface?
5. Which existing appliances provide inspiration for the new interfaces of quiet design?

1. Why is the efficiency of mobile services becoming increasingly important despite Moore's Law and advances in network capacity, processors and resources? Where are the pain points in the age of network austerity?
2. Is the quality of experience proportional to the quantity of data transferred over the network? Does simplifying always lead to the simplistic?
3. How can alternative channels circumvent the limitations of cellular networks?
4. Do practitioners need an evolved design language to deliver the best experiences, in the most efficient way, without the legacy of old world metaphors?

1. Does face to face interaction over the same device change the dynamics of interface design?
2. Which activities are best suited to multi-person, simultaneous usage and what benefits are derived from sharing the experience?
3. If users are engaged in a mirrored activity on a single device, how can an effective UI design separate certain elements of their experience while unifying others?
4. How will the interaction characteristics change as the number of people engaged in simultaneous use rises from 2 to 3, 4 and beyond?
5. Will simultaneous usage of the same device enable digital collaboration to evolve from simple social applications to more complex creative scenarios?

1. How does combining 3D input mechanisms with 3D displays create more natural interactions and overcome visual strain?
2. What new experiences are uniquely enabled by 3D and more relevant to customers' lives than today's technology-focused demonstrations?
3. Does the ability for mobile devices to perceive 3D allow them to understand and interact with the physical environment?
4. Does the ability to represent visual depth in interfaces better reflect our natural, multi-dimensional brain processes?
5. Can lessons from early pioneers of 3D in gaming and data visualisation inform the future of interface design?

1. How can we derive inspiration for new form factors from improved understanding of lifestyles, materials, other industries and the natural world?
2. Will the form factors and interaction mechanisms of the future be defined as much by software-controlled haptic effects as by physical dimensions?
3. What lessons from successful slate designs can be incorporated into other form factors?
4. What form factor possibilities are created through new sensor technologies and the ability to turn almost any surface into a touch panel?

1. How do sustainable values influence customer purchasing decisions and the ongoing user experience of digital products?
2. Is the current average of a 20 month handset replacement cycle sustainable? Could a new business model enable customers to extend the lifetime of their devices for 5+ years?
3. What renewable materials provide a new aesthetic in device design and respond to users' desire for sustainable products?
4. What techniques optimise power consumption in applications and services?
5. How can sustainable energy sources be integrated into the design of mobile devices? What lessons can we learn from markets where mains power is rare?
6. How do services uniquely enabled by mobile devices and wireless technology help customers to live more sustainable lives?

1. How does ubiquitous access to new sensors such as touchscreens, gestural input and location tracking change the expression of human creativity?
2. What does artistic experimentation at the boundaries of digital technology teach us about mainstream user experience requirements of the future?
3. How does mass person-to-person communications facilitate new creative experiences through co-operative working?
4. Will person-to-person communications enriched with new channels, such as haptics, emerge as a new form of artistic expression in itself?
5. Are the text-based 'Status Updates' espoused by Facebook and Twitter the zenith of emotional expression or can human moods be better expressed?