Observations

The Observations task-module of the Ambithink interface will allow users to upload things they see in the world, and synthesize them to develop areas of opportunity for idea brainstorming. This part of the interface has not been prototyped here yet. It will include ways to add, edit, and sort clouds of observed data (including photographs, links to websites, etc.). Many users may not be interested in this phase, but it is potentially the most important for strategic design. Observations could be general (based on personal interests), or tagged as part of a specific project or area of need. For demonstration purposes I have performed this process using postit notes.

Example: Observed Trends in Technocultural Awareness

As initial research for my thesis development I was interested in developing innovative perceptual robotic and virtual reality experiences. For three weeks I took extensive notes on this topic everywhere I went, focusing on the following areas of interest: intriguing concepts and discussion topics; university seminars and activities; personal fascinations, brainstorms and streams of thought; advertisements, publicity, films, movies, magazines, online experiences and other forms of mass media content; repeated conversations with interested professors, colleagues and friends; and observations of things that people such as myself seemed to enjoy doing. These notes were placed unorganized on boards, and then synthesized into groups based on similarity.

Nine clusters of trends were identified, representing a cross-section of my area of interest for this particular project. These trends are important because they represent areas of opportunity for innovation. In the next phase, for example, brainstorm topics will be identified to help generate concepts based on these opportunities.

The finished Ambithink system would help me synthesize all of this information and write concise descriptions of each trend area to help me keep track of what I have observed. The overview descriptions of these trends I came up with are provided here, for example. From each of these trend areas, brainstorm topics were generated to help me develop innovative ideas that responded specificially to these areas of need.

For example, in the case of Multimodal Fantasy Futures, the following questions were identified: "How could perceptual robotic technologies be used to..." probe experiential narrative fictions?; design for the kids of tomorrow?; incubate fantasy?; and create surreal, transcendent, breathtaking experiences? A second round of synthesis grouped these 52 key questions into clusters indicating seven major areas of action. Brainstorming ideas based on these questions is performed in the following task-module (Opportunities).

The brainstorm topics identified at this stage of the process were: "How could perceptual robotic technologies be used to..."

i) Explore the outer limits

Speak with aliens

Believe in mysteries

Conjure new forms of life

Create surreal, transcendent, breathtaking experiences

Design new kinds of emotions

Revel at the complex beauty of nature

Evoke compassion for the artificial and natural world

Fall in love

ii) Engineer the perception of change

Innovate

Mediate creative change

Embody brand experience

Engage in the commerce of beauty

Make money

Design human intuition (universal heuristics)

Perform cheap, illicit, technoart interventions

Shock the system

iii) Investigate consciousness

Confuse and elude the senses

Unchain expectations from perceptions

Deprive the senses

Experience mindfulness

Heighten embodied awareness

Map awareness

Distill the essence of being

iv) Make meaning

Map systems of influence

Open the source

Raise and challenge ethical questions, beliefs & concerns

Investigate symbologies, archetypes, languages and signs

Be useless

Incubate fantasy

Touch the heart

v) Pioneer multimodal interactivity paradigms

Allow user-identity extension (and play)

Orchestrate drama

Force evocative multimodal juxtapositions

Probe experiential narrative fictions

Exploit visceral reality

Seamlessly interact with the virtual

Question conventional cyber-etiquette

Provoke, excite, stimulate and arouse

vi) Save the world

Do good

Fight for a cause

Stop global warming

Spread wellness

Empower others

Enable emotional choices

Express individual and cultural identity

Design for the kids of tomorrow

vii) Be bad*

Kill eachother

Expand our ego

Eliminate the soul

Extinguish humanity

Do evil

*note: The intent of this category is to explore and understand the ethical issues involved with the design and development of new multimodal experiences, not necessarily to develop them (unless they so extremely dangerous that not developing them first would be dangerous).