Some of my favorite sites — like Instructables, xkcd and Boing Boing — and others I use all the time — like YouTube and Wikipedia — are a product of and are only possible in an open internet that promotes the free exchange of knowledge.
Even a tiny site like mine is only possible in a world where I’m not in legal jeopardy if I link to a site anywhere online that has any links to copyright infringement (how could I possibly police that?).
Legislation currently pending in the US congress — H.R.3261 “Stop Online Piracy Act” (SOPA) and S.968 “PROTECT IP” (PIPA) — threaten, at a minimum, to significantly undermine our (that’s all of us on the web, people) ability to communicate with each other and encourage collaborative learning through linking to and direct sharing of resources and ideas. At worst, some of our favorite websites could disappear from the web without warning, and without due process of law.
So PLEASE take just a minute to contact your representatives in congress. For more information about what these bills could mean for the internet, there are more resources over at the EFF.
So I went to the TEI Conference last week and had a fantastic time — learning, meeting people, having braingasmic fun. This conference concerns itself with the interlinking of the digital and physical worlds through tangible interfaces, whole-body interaction and interactive surfaces.
There were about 230 attendees from around the world and everyone was brilliant, accomplished and collaborative. Although English was the lingua franca, people were gabbing in German, Japanese, Portuguese, Swedish, Chinese (just to name a few) — a refreshing breeze through my Brocas since I live in very white Vermont.
Of course, right off the bat, I went to the wrong building. Somehow I didn’t know that MIT has built a brand new Media Lab building, a cross between an Apple store and Kubrick’s 2001 — very white with lots of glass, a floor-to-ceiling central atrium with wrap-around labs and walkways criss-crossing from one side to the other. Apparently I have no sense of direction at all whatsoever, because the second I was off the conference floor I was lost. (Though quite happily so.)
I had planned to tweet during the papers, but I couldn’t get past the rudeness of having a computer in my lap while someone’s presenting. I know from first-hand experience that it’s awful to look out at an audience and not find anyone looking back at you. And I didn’t tweet from the hotel because you had to pay for wifi, which I refused to do (yes, I’m cheap).
However, I did shoot a few videos, and this week’s Geek includes a couple that describe the breadth of the work shown at the conference.
The Soft and the Hard
We all use interfaces every day — our phones, microwaves, light switches, cars. We push a button, click a mouse, swipe a finger. We expect them to be where they always are which is, in fact, considered to be good design.
However, what if an interface is temporary, ephemeral? Do we really need to know where it is all the time if we know what it is? And what if the interface requires great care in its handling? Does this make it more precious or the work it accomplishes more dear? These are just a few of the questions that come to mind with the work of Tanja Doring, an integration of art and technology:
With Soumitra Bhat, however, we have a lovely synthesis of music, technology and social impact. He has created TouchTone, an electronic musical instrument for children with cerebral palsy. It’s a clever way of giving these children access to the joy and therapeutic benefits of making music. Normally, their limited physical abilities make it impossible for them to play a musical instrument.
These two innovations describe the breadth of work presented at the conference — from concrete applications of interaction design to more abstract ideas of how we might use the various properties of physical objects in combination with either current or projected computational and/or electronic capabilities.
Stay tuned for more next week — workshops (and kits). The video at the top is just a tease of how cool they were.
I was in Buffalo – the second largest city in New York – this past weekend for a surprise party. About thirty minutes out from my exit off the NYS Thruway, the radio suddenly picked up a station playing polka. Woo-hoo! It’s hard not to get excited by the accordion, an instrument with the amazing capability of expelling single keys and chords while working the biceps.
When I was polka-ed out (hard to believe but it can happen), the next station up was broadcasting yodelers.
Uh huh, yodelers.
Some people might jab at the station finder impatiently, anxious to leap away from those Swiss Miss symphonics. But after the polka, it’s easy to appreciate a little yodeling, which is when I heard “The Yodelling Goldfish” by Joyce Grenfell.
Technology can be too literal and so can I. But words are as devilish and beguiling as the magic that makes the web tangle, so what's a girl to do? Write, of course, and build and...
Some of my favorite sites — like Instructables, xkcd and Boing Boing — and others I use all the time — like YouTube and Wikipedia — are a product of and only possible in an open internet that promotes the free exchange of knowledge. Even a tiny site like mine is only possible in a world where [...]
I was in Buffalo – the second largest city in New York – this past weekend for a surprise party. About thirty minutes out from my exit off the NYS Thruway, the radio suddenly picked up a station playing polka. Woo-hoo! It’s hard not to get excited by the accordion, an instrument with the amazing capability of expelling single keys and chords while working the biceps.
