Outcomes: View Now
Having developed a shared understanding of what the internet of things is (or might be), now we’re going to explore and discover the kinds of ‘internet appliances’ that have inspired the field. As part of this exercise you’re going to search for meaningful connected products, inspiring prototypes and exciting design possibilities, and report back on what you find. Together, we’ll develop a large database of connected products to inform our work in this course.
The goal is to broaden your understanding of the field and deepen your knowledge of prior work that’s relevant to this project and to the course. You’ll be expected to select a couple of works and report on your findings with a critical perspective.
By the end of this exercise, students will:
have identified and rigorously review one precedent projects that relate to the course
helped co-create a set of exemplars to draw on as part of their own explorations;
have increased their ability to describe the domain of connected products.
Report on an ‘internet appliances’ (or Internet of Things devices/projects/prototypes/examples) you haven’t seen before, has had some impact or influence (as you define it), and is relevant to the course and you find particularly interesting.
The emphasis here is on discovery. Explore news sites, blogs, aggregator, as well as conferences, journals and scientific papers to find exciting examples of the Internet of Things vision. This could equally be a historical example which informed the kinds of products and scenarios we encounter today, a breakthrough product which has had impact or influence, a current and state-of-the-art consumer device, a cutting edge research prototype, or a speculative proposal for a future device. There’s also no constraints on the sources or places you can look but some starting points are listed below.
No two students may submit the same example. Claim early and make sure you review each others work before posting.
Create a Post in the #discoveries channel on slack (see this guide on submitting your work for discovery exercises.
Important: Title your post with the name of the project and include the following label at the end for grading purposes “#producthunt” e.g. My example name #producthunt
In the post, embed a video and/or images of the project, and write a short critical reflection on the project (about 200 words) in which you:
Briefly describe the project (a couple of sentences) and who made it.
Describe why you selected the project (what is interesting, inspirational, innovative, etc. about it)
Describe why you believe it’s an important or innovative example of an IoT device
Critique the project - what are its shortcomings; how could it be made better, what did they get right and what didn’t they get right and why, etc.
Draw relationships to other work: What inspired or informed it? How does it compare to other work? Why is it influential and what has it influenced?
Note: Create a separate post for each example.
Note: Follow the instructions carefully as these projects require you to follow the posting instructions to receive full grades.
By no means an exhaustive list! You should explore beyond these!
Conferences and Research
ACM International conference on Tangible, Embedded and Embodied Interaction (TEI)
INST-INT- “assembles an international roster of acclaimed creators to explore the intersection of art, technology and interaction.Expect a broad investigation into creating interactive experiences involving space, architecture, and bodies, all aided by high and low tech.”
Labs and Agencies
Northwestern’s TIDAL Lab
Copenhagen Institute of Interaction Design (CIID)’s Current Projects
CMU’s CodeLab
Steve Wilson’s (not maintained) site contains multitudes of tangible and reactive projects
Online Aggregators and new Sites