Ingrid Piller interviewed Piers Kelly about message stick research. You can listen to it here or on podcasting apps. Ingrid also wrote an excellent accompanying blog post: “What can Australian message sticks teach us about literacy?“
“Now imagine aliens landing on earth and starting to collect mailed letters. […] They might also miss that the artifact itself is not particularly important. What matters is that the bill spurs the recipient into action (i.e. payment) and leads to a conversation about water consumption. Of course, they might also be more enlightened and take a holistic view and understand that the text is just a prop that enables us to do things with words.”