optimizing the familiar stranger
TRANSCRIPT
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N-Building in Use
N-Building Cell Phone App
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s y o f w w w . d
a b s d e s i g n . c
o m
I m a g e c o u r t e s y o f a s q u a
r e . o
r g
research topic:
Optimizing the Familiar Stranger
N-Building
The N-Building, located near Tachikawa sta-
tion in Tokyo, Japan is an example of a building used
as the mode of connection between strangers. In this
case, the façade of this building designed by Terada
Design Architects and Qosmo, Inc. remains static and
passers by are able to scan the building, which itself is
a large QR code, using their cell phones. Immediately,
the cell phone user is connected to an application de-
veloped specically for the building to be able to see
up to real time Twitter feeds, Flickr pictures, and gen-
eral comments made by the users inside the building.
The application reads as an elevation of the
building with cartoon characters situated on differ-
ent levels dependant on their location in the building.When the outsider chooses one of the characters, he
is able to see that person’s comments through the on-
line application in speech bubble form. The outsider is
also able to browse shop information, make reserva-
tions, and download coupons for the stores located
inside the building.
This interaction begins to highlight similar inter-ests between interior and exterior strangers through
a virtual connection. There is potential for this pro-
cess to expand to highly specic connections, such
as transportation needs. Eventually, people could be
scanning the train station or airport to get up to date
travel times, weather conditions, but even more im-
portantly begin to connect with those traveling with thesame purpose. Perhaps, strangers will notice that fa-
miliar stranger who consistently rides the same train
as them every day and begin a connection based on
that commonality.
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Blinkenlights, Berlin 2001
Blinkenlights, Berlin 2001
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s y o f s c r a t c h b o o k . c
h / c a t e g o r y / b l i n k e n - t v
/
I m a g e c o u r t e s y o f b l i n k e n l i g h t s . n
e t
research topic:
Optimizing the Familiar Stranger
Blinkenlights
Blinkenlights is an example of a building used
as a mode of connection between strangers using a
dynamic façade. The original installation was created
by Thomas Fiedler and Tim Pritlove at Haus des Leh-
rers, Alexanderplatz in Berlin, Germany where the up-
per eight oors of the building were transformed into
an interactive display.
Users on the street are able to control 144
lamps, each located behind a single window of the
building, by computer or cell phone over the internet.
By connecting to the site, users were able to play old
arcade games such as Pong on the building façade
against other users, or strangers. Passers-by werealso able to place their own love letters on the screen
using their mobile phone to relay a message in the
most public of ways.
The similar interest of gaming allowed strang-
ers to connect in the most public realm using Blinken-
lights. This same idea could continue further to begin
further interactive displays such as notes or questionswhich can be uploaded to the building facade and dis-
played for the entire public. Perhaps there are conver-
sations which occur on the facade itself. Passers-by
could stop and watch the conversations which would
provoke further conversation with those in the gener-
al vacinity. This starts to look at a variety of aspects;
proximity of location, shared interest, and forced ser-
endipity with people who see the same caption on the
building in which both nd interesting.
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Reminiscent of motion photography
Aperture Prototype
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d e r i c e y l . d e
I m a g e c o u r t e s y o f w w w . f
r e d e r i c e y l . d e
research topic:
Optimizing the Familiar Stranger
Aperture Building Facade
Aperture is a dynamic wall used to physically
connect strangers passing by each other in public
space. Arranged in a matrix, iris diaphragms vary in
diameter dependent on incoming light intensity; creat-
ing a dynamic translucency.
As a person passes in front of the wall, the di-
ameter of the aperture opens to allow complete trans-
parency through the wall. This feature allows passers-
by to inuence transparency based merely on their
own movement; creating a new channel for commu-
nication. As one person walks by one side of the wall,
another person can sense it through the opening of
the iris and see the person’s silhouette.
This new mode of connection and transparen-cy allows for strangers to experience each other in a
completely new atmosphere. The wall in fact informs
each person that another exists; opening itself for the
two to connect. It also poses a new type of ‘jail cell’
where the two users can communicate with each other
when in contact with the wall however they are still in
seperate realms of space; much like that of jail celland adjacent hallway.
In the far future, we may be able to watch the
city much like a theather; where buildings are the
stage and the users are the performers as they move
throughout the building.
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Hole in Space, Los Angeles 1980
Hole in Space, New York 1980
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research topic:
Optimizing the Familiar Stranger
Hole in Space
Hole in Space was a set of two screens; one
placed in Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in New
York City and the other in The Broadway department
store located in the open air shopping center in Cen-
tury City, Los Angeles. The purpose of the two screens
was to create a virtual, real time connection between
people on opposite coasts of the United States.
This public communication experiment lasted
three days in November of 1980; creating an unex-
pected encounter for passers-by in both cities be-
tween life size screens in respective cities. Suddenly,
the passer-by could see, hear, and speak with a life-
sized television image of a stranger on the other sideof the country as if running into a stranger on the same
sidewalk.
No signs, logos, credits, or explanations were
posted and no self-view video monitor to distract the
phenomena; creating a true unexpected pedestrian in-
tersection and connection to a stranger. Hole in Space
suddenly detached the distance between both citiesand created an unforseen pedestrian intersection.
This technology has the potential of further con-
necting individuals over states, countries, or even con-
tinents. It can increase awareness of varying cultures
and create unexpected friendships between dissimilar
religions and classes. It also has the potential of con-
necting lost friends and family, but also creating new
friends which you stop and talk to on a dialy basis dur-
ing your walk home from work. The familiar stranger
goes from local level to world wide level.
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Swix Ski Product with added software
Swix Computer Software
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research topic:
Optimizing the Familiar Stranger
Talsmann: cross country skiing in
china‘Talsmann’ concept of introducing cross coun-
try skiing in China is a way of virtually connecting
strangers throughout China through means of RFID
tag embedded ski products. The concept came from
understanding the Chinese culture of collectivism and
desire of belonging to a group of informed individuals
from whom they can identify with.
Cross country skiing is not a well known activity
in China, and for cross country skiers, there’s a desire
to belong to a group and get information from people
who are familiar with the topic. The result was a Swix
service where all Swix cross country ski products were
the rst touch points of connection. Through RFID
tags in the product itself, users could access instruc-tions, user-driven forums, recommendations, current
conditions, and routes. The products have an identity
within a larger virtual system so strangers can connect
on the similar hobby of skiing and location.
This project shows future trends of integrating
service infrastructure into physical spaces. This proj-
ect steps towards creating situated software that af-fect people’s behavior and activities in public space by
means of stranger connection. Soon, products from
cars to basketballs could have RFID embedded tags
for users to compare problems, reactions, or com-
ments from the product itself.
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Connected Products
Build-A-Bear Real Time Map
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s y o f S t a c y M o r t o n
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research topic:
Optimizing the Familiar Stranger
Connected Products
The idea of connected products is a way to
physically connect strangers through objects as the
mode of connection. RFID tags within objects/prod-
ucts may begin to enable objects to have identities
and connection to a larger network.
Cell phones could play a part in the network
connection by locating the objects on a real time loca-
tion sensitive map to allow the owners of these objects
to meet, share, discuss, or exchange issues regarding
the same product.
Some ideas of this theory have already been
imagined by toy companies such as Neopets and
Build-A-Bear where they have created a virtual pet for every physical counterpart, allowing a network of vir-
tual strangers to connect through means of their pet.
However, imagine a world where one could
bring up a map on their phone, see the general lo-
cation of all the Build-A-Bears in a mile radius, and
set up play dates based on the bears (and childrens)
similar interests. This same idea could be used for ev-erything from common books to meet and discuss the
book’s ideas to yoga mats to meet up with a group for
a yoga session.
The major problem with this idea is the issue of
privacy. By having RFID tags embedded in our every-
day products, individuals will be able to be located at
all times, making it almost impossible to ever escape
the public realm and be completely private. In order for
this idea to thrive at its full potential, a system in which
person identity and exact location is muted must be
in effect.
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Personal.Aura and Hello.Wall
Hello.Wall Display
I m a g e c o u r t e s y o f N o r b e r t S t r e i t z ,
T h e D i s
a p p e a r i n g C o m p u t e r
I m a g e c o u r t e s y o f N o r b e
r t S t r e i t z ,
T h e D i s a p p e a r i n g C
o m p u t e rresearch topic:
Optimizing the Familiar Stranger
Personal.Aura; Hello.Wall
Personal.Aura, along with Hello.Wall and View.
Port, was created by Norbert Streitz in 2001 to create
a system of technology in which a personal transmit-
ting identication device is used to connect individuals
through a wall as a separate source of reading the
data. The Personal.Aura mobile device enables us-
ers to control their appearance deciding whether theywant to be “visible” for remote colleagues, and if so, in
which “social role” they want to appear in by alternat-
ing varying ID Sticks.
View.Port is the artifact to connect Personal.
Aura with Hello.Wall. View.Port is portable sensing
technology which acts as an RFID reader to transmit
information from the ID Stick to the wall.Hello.Wall uses special light patterns to commu-
nicate information from the Personal.Aura in an ambi-
ent and unobtrusive way. In this system, co-workers
in a business setting are able to look in a single spot
(Hello.Wall) to see which co-workers are available for
physical communication, virtual communication, or not
available at all. This system can also be used betweentwo ofces in different locations to determine availabil-
ity of co-workers in different ofces.
This technology is great in that it allows indi-
viduals to sense specic personal information of oth-
ers to determine whether or not they should connect.
However, it seems that the Hello.Wall is an added step
in that you can only look in one location, the wall, to be
notied of those in which you should talk to.
This system is inteded specically for a work
setting, however could also be incorporated into a city
setting to connect perfect strangers.
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Serendipity Alert
Serendipity Online Profile
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e d i a . m
i t . e d u
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i t . e d u
research topic:
Optimizing the Familiar Stranger
Serendipity
Serendipity is a mode of physically connecting
two strangers who match in terms of proximity and in-
terests developed by MIT’s MediaLab in 2004. It is a
cell phone enabled program in which the phone itself
is the transmitting identication device which not only
relays information, but also receives it.Serendipity consists of a central server contain-
ing an individual’s prole. These proles are similar
to those found on a social media site, however the
user is also able to provide weights that determine the
importance of each category when calculating a simi-
larity score.
When the bluetooth identier (BTID) in theuser’s cell phone senses another BTID, the phone
queries a database for a user’s prole associated with
that discovered BTID address. If the prole exists,
another script calculates a similar score between the
two strangers and if this score is above both users
set thresholds, the script returns the commonalities,
along with additional contact information, back to therespected phones.
While this technology is currently geared to-
wards matchmaking, it can be used for several other
purposes as well. It can sense buiness potentials, two
strangers currently reading the same book, or even
old high school friends that happen to pass by each
other thirty years later.
This type of BTID software can also simply be-
gin conversation between two people in close proxim-
ity, such as a coffee machine, to begin talking about
work related or social affairs.
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Banjo App Interface
Banjo App Interface
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u s i n e s s i n s i d e r . c o
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research topic:
Optimizing the Familiar Stranger
Banjo App
Banjo is a cell phone app that acts as a mode of
connecting two strangers dependent on their physical
location. The application was rst conceived upon the
creator realizing an old friend of his had been at the
same airport terminal as him without either of them
knowing it.
To enhance the familiar stranger physical con-nection on the go, Banjo can easily discover whether
a contact is nearby or whether someone with similar
interests and a potential future colleague or business
relationship is in the vicinity.
Banjo uses real time GPS location of the us-
er’s cell phone to pin point them on the application.
The app then shows, on a real time map, friends or potential friends with similar interests. Banjo also al-
lows the user to “pre-visit” a location ahead of time
and see where people are gathering, what places to
avoid, or the happening places to eat. Banjo mixes
business with pleasure through cell phone GPS and
social media.
This technology can eventually be used to op-timized to connect independent strangers merely on
background or personal taste. We may one day be
able to type in “To Kill A Mockingbird” and see a map of
all individuals in the general vacinity who have or are
reading that book to be able to spark conversation on
that specic topic.
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Grindr App INterface
Grindr App Interface
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research topic:
Optimizing the Familiar Stranger
Grindr
Grindr is a cell phone app that acts as a mode
of connecting two strangers of the same sexual orien-
tation dependent on their physical location. The ap-
plication allows a gay male cell phone user to make
use of GPS technology and instantly locate another
guy male in his area.Grindr can be used to check out who is cur-
rently on the scene, nd a local who’d like to show you
around while on a trip, or see who’s looking to meet up
in the neighborhood.
The app utilizes GPS technology built into any
mobile device to map out which guys are closest to
the user’s current location. From there, the user candecide to share stats, show off a photo, send an in-
stant message, or reveal a current location on a map
to meet up. Grindr is a highly specic app to connect
gay men based on location and preference.
This technology can eventually be used to op-
timized to connect independent strangers merely on
background or personal taste. We may one day beable to type in “To Kill A Mockingbird” and see a map of
all individuals in the general vacinity who have or are
reading that book to be able to spark conversation on
that specic topic.
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We Are Forest
We Are Forest In Action
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research topic:
Optimizing the Familiar Stranger
We Are Forest
We Are Forests is an overly scripted means
of forcing stranger virtual and physical interaction
through an art piece. Conceived by Product of Cir-
cumstance, this work begins to look at a way of con-
necting strangers through voice in the public realm,
focusing on the question, “what would you whisper in
a stranger’s ear?”.Audience members participated in a public
market space using their cell phones as a means of
connection to a custom software. The software re-
corded their voice and then played it back to everyone
else on the network (in the art piece). A mixture of pre-
recorded texts and ‘curated’ audience contributions
create an every changing narrative over the courseof the piece. Participants slowly begin to notice each
other as they make their way through the public mar-
ket, until at the end live singers appear amongst the
crowd in the market and sing the words the audience
have been speaking throughout the piece.
What is most interesting in this piece is the
use of voice. Although this is specically an art piece,perhaps future technology allows strangers to upload
voice clips to a central server in real time of what they
are experiencing in the city which others within the vi-
cinity can listen and respond to.
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Mobile Dinner
Mobile Dinner
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research topic:
Optimizing the Familiar Stranger
Mobile DInner
Mobile Dinner is an overly scripted means of
forcing strangers from different cities to connect vir-
tually through urban screens. Designed by Johanna
Bruckner, a European dinner on a 50 meter long table
takes place in front of an urban screen in two publicspaces, such as a square in one city and a plaza in
another.
A mix of invited guests and passers-by dine and
communicate with the other table in a subsequent city
via a live stream. The installation experiments with
the play of private and public space by connecting the
very private setting of a dinner with public space andtechnology, forming unique social behavior and con-
nections between strangers.
This project poses the opportunity of poten-
tial urban media facades as a relationship terrain.
Screens such as these seen at the end of the table,
could instead be incorporated into building facades,
public plaza displays, or even the sidewalk itself to
being a form of communicative architecture between
two cities through intercultural dialog. This starts to
become much of the same processes of those looked
at in the Hole in Space.