i n t e r a c t i v e_t o u c h…

Have managed to both make and save video in processing and are pretty proud.

Also managed to trigger the camera with RFID which is another achievement seen from a certain standard. Now there will be a trickyer part networking it, and making the collage…. And making the experience interesting and fun and social.

At the moment I think we are about to set up a little idea bank. Here are just the thoughts for he moment. the stronger once are getting visualized as we speak. We have categorized the ideas on the basis of what is the main attribute to the idea.

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After fridays midterm review we are in the process of not redefining our project, but to get bak on track of what we really want to achieve. The main idea of the project was to make people interact more with other people and not with installations.

So back to square one….

It really is not that bad but we definitely needs to take a u-turn at this point and se where we are heading this time. Sometimes it is hard to keep track on what we really are looking for.

The starting point for this task was the fascination of RFID being represented in the physical world and to use this fact in a attempt to bring people closer together in the real world.

Following are a lot of thoughts that needs revising and sorting… Read the rest of this entry »

It has been almost a month since my last confession…  Very bad blogging indeed since I find that every time I do blog it helps me to structure my thoughts.   

The physical computing week with Tom went fairly well, but we didn’t actually end up with a working platform prototype or probing device of any sort wich is a shame. But I at least got an better understanding of how to build prototypes I think.

We got Tom to help us with setting up multiple readers that where hooked up to one output which is a starting point for multiple inputs in an aera. And we  (or Tom) also managed to make pictures pop up from the different readers according to person.And the same features using Zig Bees to transmit the data, which I found a little magic in itself.  

Tom also showed us that it is possible for for ex. processing to get information from other sites like facebook. We specifically tried to get the friends list from facebook. This proved to be difficult for, and needs a special library that has not been written yet. But it is possible and that is interesting  

Random encounters , random connections, forced relationship are words that enters my mind as I am going trough the material from the workshop. The idea of working with a social context around uncomfortableness is somewhat interesting but I am not sure if it is wished for/ or needed in that manner.   We are looking into which settings/contexts that could gain on making a somewhat new social object that could ease or make the interaction between people more comfortable or just more fun. Social settings where a lot of people meet, like conferences and festivals could be an interesting starting point. We keep on discussing what a physical Facebook would look like, but more what it would feel like. An observation is that it is much easier to add friends and contacts in the “virtual world” , in the physical world it is a much higher threshold for doing this. One explanation might be that the social object is somewhat more visible in based social settings.  One idea is to make the common ground for people that does not know each other more visible trough the use of RFID, a place where you could perhaps find your shared memories. Some sort of a sharing device. This comes from the fact that most online network are based on sharing of some sort. There are some projects that somewhat deals with this, the photo booth from the Mediamatic workshop is one example.  Other ideas circle around making people interact that otherwise wouldn’t interact.I find it quite hard to get a grasp of this project, but it is all about making choices with is probably the worst thing at least I do. It is the feeling that you are ruling out possibilities that you doesn’t know exists.  Collaboration, sharing, exploration are words that I would like to base the project on.  How can we make people explore and interact with new people and places trough RFID? is maybe a better problem defentition. But this have to be discussed. 

“Human beings do not socialize in a completely random way. There’s a tangible reason for us being together, that ties us together. Again, that reason is called the Social Object. Social Networks form around Social Objects, not the other way around.” Hugh MacLeod at www.gapingvoid.comAnother interesting article about social objects from the same author her.

I am finally understanding that these two concepts are fare from the same. Social objects are the shared or common ground for why a social interaction occurs. The social life of objects are the objects life itself.  Of course can the social life of object be a social object, like is the case with Thinglink.But a given object itself is not a social object per se… So a 2 liter thermos is not in itself a social object, but lets say a shared interest in outdoor activity would be. So social objects are not tangible in that sense.This is probably obvious but I had to get my head around it.