Welcome to “Connected Limerick”24/09/10

“Connected Limerick”24/09/10

The Experience of Place and

The Digital Layer

Luigina Ciolfi

We are going to talk about place

Place as a physical entity

Place as a carrier of meaning, a setting for experience

We are going to talk about Limerick

Limerick as a physical entity

Limerick as what it means to us, the setting for our experience

Our experience of Limerick is different from what it was only a few years ago

How is the Digital Layer making things different?

First, let’s think about place

Why place?

We are always en-placed

How do people interact with and experience technology that is connected to the environment they inhabit?

How do we bring all these aspects of experience together, the physical and the digital?

“the scene of an experience of relations with the world” (Auge’, 1995)

QuickTime™ and a decompressor

are needed to see this picture.

QuickTime™ and a decompressor

are needed to see this picture.

“To live in a place means to experience it, to be aware of it in the bones as well as in the head. Place, at all scales from the armchair to the nation, is a construct of experience; it is sustained not only by timber, concrete, and highways, but also by the quality of human awareness” (Yi-Fu Tuan, 1975)

Place is about experience

Personal: identity, memory, emotionCultural: community, history, knowledge

Social: collaborative, interactional, interpersonalPhysical: sensory, accommodation, perception

So, how about technology?

The presence of technology and of new possibilities for interaction gives new meaning to our experience of place

It affects the physical nature of place, changes the qualities of physical/sensory experience

It affects our perception of it, our knowledge of what is possible, of what it can be accommodated

Allows for a layer of digital information, of digital presence, digital agency to be added to our experience of place

What can we do to a place with technology?

-Change its physical features by means of new materials for handling, visual and auditory information displays;

-Affecting personal experience through providing the possibility for new activities and modifying existing ones, evoking individual responses and memories;

-Engendering and supporting new chances for social interaction, communication and collaboration;

- Impact culturally influenced qualities of an environment or even change them to some extent.

Let’s start with an exercise

Think of you own experience of Limerick as a place with a digital cloud

Draw a map of an experience of Limerick that connects the physical and the digital city

Think of how it has affected you personally, culturally, socially and physically

Share with everyone