Wearing your heart on your sleeve

A wearable technology primer (of sorts)

Alejandro Zamudio

www.alejandrozamudio.com

The contents of Steve Wozniak’s bag. Do we humans really need to carry this much stuff around? (photo by Gizmodo blog)

I. Gambling

Ed Thorp, Co-creator of the first Wearable computer in 1960. http://edwardothorp.com

The first wearable computer was shoe worn and was devised to inconspicuously calculate the outcome of a casino roulette wheel.

Close-up of the shoe computer.

Post PC era?Yes, but...

TheWeight of the past...

Why does the present have to be labeled based on the technology that is dead or dying out?

Mainframe PC Post-PC

Computing Eras

(Mobile?)1960s 1980s

What will be next?

What will come after the mobile era? it can’t be the “post-mobile” era!

Place your bets...

Wearable computing could be an important ingredient in the next wave of computing, and a logical next step for mobile devices.

II. Landscapes

How a desktop computer sees us...

Diagram included in Physical Computing, the seminal Interaction design book by Dan O’Sullivan and Tom Igoe. (2004)

How a smartphone sees us...

How should a wearable computer see us?

How our brains see us

Somatosensory homunculous, first formulated by Wilder Penfield in the 1950s. This model shows what a man's body would look like if each part grew in proportion to the area of the cortex of the brain concerned with its movement.

Where are our boundaries?

Personal Space

Intimate

Personal

Social

Public

In his work on proxemics, Edward T. Hall separated his theory into two overarching categories: personal space and territory. Personal space describes the immediate space surrounding a person, while territory refers to the area which a person may "lay claim to" and defend against others. Taken from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proxemics

What’s the largest organ in the human body?

Image credit: Furryscale (license:CC BY-SA 2.0)

IntimatePersonal

Social

Living Dynamic Rich

Surface

Image credit: Furryscale (license:CC BY-SA 2.0)

Fluid surfaces

Everything has a surface. Surfaces are usually changing, fluid, dynamic, adaptive.Image credit: lagohsep (license:CC BY-SA 2.0)

Interface

Interface: meaningful surface, or the space where 2 surfaces touch and exchange information.

Fabric

Fabrics are interesting in that they are almost nothing but surfaces in contact with our skin.Image credit: ecstaticist (license:CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)

SIXTH SENSE

Sixth Sense

MIT’s Sixth Sense projects takes a literal approach to the “every surface is a potential interface” concept.http://www.pranavmistry.com/projects/sixthsense/

III. Daemons

In Greek mythology, Daemons are invisible creatures that guide and help mortals, without intervening directly.

Eudaemons

The Eudaemons were a group of UCSC students who created (another) gambling-oriented wearable computer in 1979. In his Nicomachean Ethics, (1095a15–22) Aristotle says that eudaimonia means ’doing and living well’. It is significant that synonyms for eudaimonia are living well and doing well. On the standard English translation, this would be to say that ‘happiness is doing well and living well’. (Wikipedia)

Steve Mann

The father of wearable computing. Inventor, teacher and researcher. Full-time cyborg. further references: http://www.interaction-design.org/encyclopedia/wearable_computing.html

Eudaemonic computing

Inspired by the Eudaemons, Eudaemonic computing is about helping people lead better lives. (Computers as good spirits)

1980 mid 1980s early 1990s mid 1990s late 1990s

Evolution of Steve Mann’s wearable computer

A more recent version of Steve Mann’s wearable computer.

Operational modes

Constancy

Always on, always accessible

Operational modes

Constancy

Left: Dome computer continuously records the wearer’s life. Right: Microsoft Research’s SenseCam is based on the same concept.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SenseCam

Operational modes

Augmentation

Augment intelligence and senses

Google’s project Glass is one of the most highly publicized examples of wearable computing with augmentation as a focus.

“The Borgs” from MIT Media Lab were wearable computing pioneers during the 1990s. Some of them are now working on Google’s Project Glass. http://articles.boston.com/2012-07-15/business/32664324_1_microoptical-wearable-head-mounted-displays

Operational modes

Mediation

Encapsulate, filtrate, manage privacy

The walkman is one of the first examples of mass-produced mediating wearable technology.

Attributes

UnmonopolizingUnrestrictiveObservableControllableAttentive

Basically, wearable computers shouldn’t get in the way. Wearer shouldn’t have to worry about the computing part at all.

Self expression

Wearable computing offers many opportunities for dynamic self expression (Image: LED jackets by Cute Circuit)http://www.cutecircuit.com/category/videos/

Personal

Wearable computers are the real Personal computers, as intimate and close to people as underwear!

Quantify

Computers are obviously good at dealing with quantitative information. Wearable computers are already helping us quantify our daily activities.

Feedback loops

Using quantitative information to enable positive feedback loops is second nature to wearable computers. (Image: Nike fuel web interface)

What kind of (wearable)Daemons do we want?

IV. Body

Prosthesis

Enhancement, addition

Some rights reserved by subsetsum

Prosthesis

Enhancement, addition

Prostheses aren’t just to replace missing limbs: Prescription eyeglasses are prosthesis too.

remixing senses

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xNkw28fz9u0

RYOTA KUWAKUBO

Ryota Kuwakubo: With Silifulin, the artist explores the feeling of limbs lost to evolution (tail) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ck5K0A6RZgM&feature=player_embedded

remixing senses

Stelarc

I think metaphysically, in the past, we've considered the skin as surface, as interface. The skin has been a boundary for the soul, for the self, and simultaneously, a beginning to the world. Once technology stretches and pierces the skin, the skin as a barrier is erased."-Stelarc

“The Human body is obsolete”

remixing senses

copyright Washington Post

Oscar Pistorius

In the future it won’t be unusual to see people with some kind of body modification/enhancement that surpasses our bodies’ natural abilities.

Territories

Different parts of the body have specific sensations, different possibilities and meanings. Wearable computer designers need to to know this territory.

Territories

Really close to the hand but unrestrictive, the wristwatch occupies a prime “real estate” in the human body.

Pioneering aviator Alberto Santos-Dumont famously commissioned Cartier a wristwatch to make it easier to check time while piloting an airplane, at a time when wristwatches were only seen as a fashion accessory for wealthy women.

Several wearable computers (specially watches) are in or about to hit the market. Is it a fad or the beginning of something bigger?

Ecosystems

Currently most wearable devices work as accessories or satellites to Smartphones. Will that change in the future?

V. Language

Superpowers

As wearable computers can enhance people’s senses, we need to understand what each sense can do.

Remix

Eyesight is the prevalent sense in contemporary culture, but other senses also offer lots of untapped possibilities...

BrainportExploiting the brain’s plasticity

Brainport is a device for the blind that turns visual information into electrical pulses that can be sensed with the tongue. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xNkw28fz9u0

New ways of reading - RSVP

Rapid serial visual presentation is a method to serially display visual content (images, text) that could be applied to small screens (e.g. wristwatches)

Networking

Body area network

Personal area network

We can use the notions of personal space and territory to create new forms of networking and data transmission.

BCI-BBI

Brain-Computer interfaces or Brain-Brain interfaces are a long term possibility.

Flexible electronics

Our skin prefers soft, flexible materials (like fabric). Technology is starting to catch up with this need. Image: http://2011.lope-c.com/en/picture_downloads/

Smart textiles

copyright Rachel Winfield

Another long term possibility is that computer logic, sensing and actuation can be carried out by the fabric itself without the need of external components.

Uniforms, costumes or bespoke garments?Wearable Computing:

What is the most ethical choice? what do we want? we need to start thinking about this.

Thank you!

Attribution Share-Alike CC BY-SA2012 Alejandro Zamudio | www.alejandrozamudio.com