hello.

From the Chaos Communication Camp comes Open Beacon. It’s basically an open design for actrive RFID:

“OpenBeacon is a free design for an active RFID device which operates in the 2.4GHz ISM band. The device contains a unique serial number, but may have other information. OpenBeacon is designed as a transceiver device and therefore both transmits and receives radio waves. The intention of this project is to offer a wide range of use cases such as visitor or item tracking and wireless remote control with a free self-contained and low-cost RFID design.”

Thanks to Massimo Banzi for the link.

Technorati Tags: electronics, networks, open source, RFID

Ben Hopson has a good site detailing his work on his masters’ thesis at Pratt on designing movements. The videos are very nice illustrations of some simple, expressive mechanical movements.

Thanks to Lesley Flanagan for the link

Technorati Tags: design, mechanics

Johanna Brewer sent this to me. Looks like a fun workshop, I wish I could go.

A Public Inconvenience
The 3rd workshop in the in-between-ness series.

Subterranean, ceramic-tiled bathrooms, plastic temporary urinals or compact, metallic washrooms in transit spaces; public toilets are an often-overlooked space in our urban environment. Technologies designed for the city often try to abstract away from the inconvenient necessities which our bodies require; or, when they are designed explicitly for public toilets, the focus is on supporting the cultural values of hygiene and privacy. What do we miss by ignoring the fact that public toilets are also the site for a variety of social practices?

‘A Public Inconvenience’ will explore the experience and affect of public toilets in an urban environment, in this case Amsterdam. Through observation and engagement we will consider how public toilets are shaped by, and themselves shape, cultural practices, values, and attitudes. And further, how this essential part of the urban fabric contributes to the everyday experience we have of our cities.

‘A Public Inconvenience’ is the third in a series of workshops exploring in-between-ness in urban environments. That is, the places and times that are often on the periphery of everyday life - the journey to work or the time spent queuing in a shop.

To be considered for participation, researchers and practitioners are invited to send us a compelling public toilet story (see The Stories section of the website for inspiration), an optional toilet photograph, a brief biography, and a short rationale outlining your interest in the workshop. This document should not exceed two pages.

Submissions:
Send to karen.martin@ucl.ac.uk by 21st September 2007
Acceptance Notification is 28th September 2007

Further Information:
http://www.inbetweeness.org/apublicinconvenience/

Place and Time:
26th & 27th October 2007
Waag Society, Amsterdam

Organisers:
Arianna Bassoli (The London School of Economics)
Johanna Brewer (University of California, Irvine)
Karen Martin (Bartlett School of Graduate Studies)
Valentina Nisi (Fattoria Mediale)
Martine Posthuma de Boer (Fattoria Mediale)

Technorati Tags: cities, conferences & workshops, design, environment

…at least, my favorite examples of physical computing.

Durrell Bishop’s Marble Answering Machine - A really nice example of using tangible elements not only as memory tokens, but as physical interface. This image has been quoted in many different papers on the web, but curiously, I couldn’t find a link to Durrell’s own version of it. This one comes from a link on Sriam Subramaniam’s homepage, but I think they may have gotten it from Rachel Abrams’ paper.

Toshio Iwai’sPiano - As Image Media - The interaction is quite simple, and even traditional, in computer interface terms (a trackball), but the effect is beautiful.

Tad Hirsch’s TripWire - I love the fact that it’s relevant to the city it was designed for, and attempts to address real political issues in that town with just the right level of seriousness and humor.

Maywa Denki’s BitMan - The behavior seems entirely natural when you play with it, as the little man moves from one side to the next as you rotate the object. The quality of the animation, despite the low resolution, is what makes it work so well for me. They pack so much character into very few bits. Scott McCloud would be proud of them.

In a couple of weeks, I’m off to Innsbruck and Berlin. I’m excited, since I’ve never been to Austria or Germany, so that alone will be worth the trip. In Innsbruck, I’ll be attending the 9th annual conference on ubiquitous computing (aka ubicomp). I’ll only be there for the Sunday, to co-host a workshop on ubiquitous sustainability with Jen Mankoff from CMU, and Allison Woodruff and Jay Hasbrouck of Intel Research. In Berlin (Potsdam, really), I’ll be attending a fritzing workshop run by Prof. Reto Wettach and André Knörig of the Interaction Design Lab at the University of Applied Sciences Potsdam, Germany. Should be a good time. Anyone I know in Berlin who’s got time to visit, let me know.

Technorati Tags: conferences & workshops, personal