Communicating Spaces

Yet, paradoxically, these technologies decrease the sociability of our public spaces. New information and communication technologies are almost universally personal technologies that engage their users with distant events, while alienating them from their immediate surroundings.

How can we revitalize public spaces by integrating social and information displays into our public spaces? How can we use a variety of display devices (large and small displays, visual and auditory media, screens, projections, robotics, etc) and sensors (cameras, Bluetooth, etc) to create spaces that reflect and speak to the interests of the people within them? How can we integrate public spaces with our new electronic senses to create vibrant environments where social, transactional and informational displays are an integral part of the environment?

For the next couple of weeks we'll be thinking about the design of technologies for public spaces.

required readings

• Milgram, The experience of living in cities
• Donath, J. 2008 (DRAFT) Technological Interventions in Everyday Interaction
• Ling, R. 2002. The social juxtaposition of mobile telephone conversations and public spaces.

assignment

1. Read the papers. Milgram's is a classic work on urban life, and urban alientation. The paper draft of mine is about interactive art-works that use vision or other non-keyboard interaction as input. Ling's paper is about the social mores and problems surarounding mobile telephones.
2. As you read Ling's paper, think about what a phone like device could be that is designed to be used among other people - rather than the private dialog intended by the current phone design. Describe or sketch it.
3. Sketch or describe a interactive object, installation, informaion center, etc. that exists in a public space and allows people to interact with it via some communication technology (e.g. phones, SMS, bluetooth, etc) and/or vision. What space do you imagine such an entity? What is its function? What can people do with it? How does it change the nature of the space? This can be a practical implementation or an artistic installation, it can be designed to be helpful, entertaining or provocative. This is meant to get you thinking about these ideas, we'll be followingup on this next week - don't worry about a polished sketch - I am much more interestd in your ideas at the moment than a finished concept.

   Please link your work by midnight on Monday.