Transcriber: Chiara Polesinanti Reviewer: Elisabeth Buffard
Have you ever thought, well, why my mobile device actually looks like that, right?
You know, it is flat, it is cold, it is smooth.
It is something I never liked about mobile devices.
There is something very important with mobile devices.
They are great for communication, they are great for productivity.
And most importantly, now I use my mobile device
to communicate with my friends, with my loved one.
But they are not that good when it comes to mediated communication.
Why? Because it is just a screen, a few buttons and a microphone.
That’s pretty much it.
And to me, this is an issue.
This is an issue,
because when we are interacting in face-to-face with someone else,
well, we are using different channels to express emotions,
we are using gestures, we are using touch,
we are using facial expression,
and all of that, it’s not present in the mobile devices.
And so, because I am a designer working on human computer interaction,
I wanted to radically rethink the form of the device that we know.
I wanted to make the best device for mediated communication.
And so, my starting point was to question, well, what if technology was more human,
actually, literally more human?
What if technology had more flesh and body?
Because, indeed, the human body and the human senses
are incomparable to what technology can provide today.
And I’m not thinking in terms of efficiency or performance,
but in terms of expressivity or communication capabilities.
And so I was questioning what if technology was more human,
had more flesh and body?
And so I was seeing that there is one action,
one thing that is typically human and that is crucial for communication,
and that I particularly love to communicate,
and it is touch and affective touch.
And touch is something we are all familiar with, right?
It's something natural and spontaneous,
and we touch our loved ones, our parents, our friends.
And we touch others to convey emotions.
For instance, if I want to reassure someone or comfort someone,
well, I use my hand, my fingers,
and I gently stroke the skin of someone else.
And most of the time it’s working, it’s very comforting.
(Laughter)
But my question was how to add this particular sense to our device,
or, in other word,
can we use the same language we use during human-to-human communication
for human-to-device communication?
And I am very naive and had a naive and straightforward thought,
I thought, well, I touch using my hands and my fingers, right?
So why not add a finger to a mobile device?
It’s a silly idea, but I did it anyway.
(Laughter)
This is what it looks like.
And what you can see here is the fully functional mobile device,
that is traditionally static, passive and motionless,
and now it has a new form and new functions.
So I gave them with this robotic finger a form to express motion.
I gave them a tool to act upon the world.
And you might ask yourself, well, how can it improve communication?
Well, it can provide, you know, kinesthetic feedback.
It can touch the user on the wrist or the back of the hand.
(Laughter)
And now you can send a remote stroke to comfort the friend.
And you can see, you can feel... it is like that, right?
(Laughter)
And you can see, you can feel that it’s weird,
but we can go even further and explore other use cases.
You know, the phone can come to you and it can crawl on the table.
(Laughter)
It can crawl on the table, the device itself becomes almost human.
It’s very unsettling.
So this project has been shared a lot on the internet and social media,
and people reaction were pretty strong.
Let’s have a look at some of them.
It’s disturbing.
(Laughter)
That this is weird.
It’s creepy. That’s creepy.
And then...
(Laughter)
suddenly it looks like the whole internet was completely creeped out by this device.
(Laughter)
And to be honest, it’s something unexpected.
I was not expecting that.
And something else I was not expecting
is that it generated a lot of online discussion and controversies,
and in that people react on the technology itself.
And that’s where I realized that this project
is maybe more than just a naive design,
but the critical design piece that explores the speculative future
that people might not want.
So what is the lesson I learned building this first device?
When it comes to speculating on design and the form and the shape of devices,
we should avoid the uncanny,
because from a social acceptability perspective,
it’s not something desirable, it’s not working.
But really, you know what I did,
I did what every researcher will do again and again.
I went a bit further.
And what is the only thing missing on the finger I showed you?
Well, it’s just skin and flesh.
So I added skin...
(Laughter)
And this is even more creepy and unsettling.
(Laughter)
And from this point,
I decided to keep exploring this idea of anthropomorphic devices.
And so, something interesting about smartphones
is they are made to be touched,
and it turns out,
we know the best and most natural interface to sense touch.
Well, it's the human skin.
And so the next project that I did,
I developed artificial skin for devices.
And it looks like that.
And have some of them here, that you can see.
And so...
Skin interfaces are realistic skin that goes on top of a device.
So it’s a case basically, right?
And they look like skin,
they feel also like skin.
And most importantly,
well, this surface is capable to detect human-to-human touch vocabulary,
like here, pinching.
You could never pinch a phone like that, and now, well, you can!
And so, as you can see, the prototype is even more uncanny.
And the users, like here, I’m like,
it’s like touching a chunk of dead skin with wrinkle and skin powder.
It's really weird and it feels weird.
I guess you are weird and you are not the only one,
because, again, what do you think happens when I published that?
Well, dumps of roaring and like, it’s creepy,
and people had this super strong reaction, “more creepy”,
and “nobody asked for that”.
(Laughter)
But it’s OK, it’s OK.
(Laughter)
(Applause)
It is really OK,
because it was actually the goal of this project,
to explore a possible future,
and question the shape of the devices
and how we interact with them.
And so, among all those comments, it also opened up some discussion,
does all devices need a cover that feels like human skin?
And people started to question their own relationship with technologies,
and what does it actually mean for human communication.
And so, I showed you two devices that revolve around touch,
but there is not only touch to express emotions,
during face-to-face conversation,
and actually facial expressions are very important,
and eye gaze, eye contact are very crucial,
as the human eyes are the best interface-based organ
to communicate emotions.
And that’s interesting,
because in our surrounding we all have tiny eyes now everywhere.
It’s seeing devices, it’s the cameras of mobile devices
or even they look like the webcam that we used for the past couple of years,
a lot of us,
and because the webcam are essential for video conferences,
and we are very familiar with this typical shape.
But how to redesign the webcam and why?
Well, the human eyes and the webcam share the same purposes, right?
(Laughter)
You know where I’m going.
(Laughter)
And they are seeing their surroundings.
But the interesting thing with human eyes is that they are expressive.
They can express happiness, anger or boredom,
or they can look curious, distracted or focused.
And so to redesign the webcam, well, I decided just to merge the two, right?
So I created this new device,
(Laughter)
that is right there.
And so, this device is called Eyecam.
And it’s a webcam shaped like a human eye.
And so it can move, blink,
and it can replicate the human eye’s movements.
(Laughter)
But it can also, like a human eye, look around, observe people
and actually see.
And so, how can we use this device?
Well, it can control awareness.
It can open or close its eyelid, and it can, like here, wake up on its own.
It is also very expressive.
It can express a variety of facial emotions.
And so something interesting happens during the design process.
So we created several skins with various pigmentation and textures.
And actually, it made us realize how a cam can be a replica of ourself.
And we can imagine maybe just gifting your eye to someone, to a friend,
to a loved one.
And then it can reflect your emotions when you are video chatting
to maybe improve communication, maybe not.
And we can go even further.
And maybe it can highlight the bonding we have with some of our devices,
and we can use that as a pet or companion.
So I know you are all creeped out.
And again, it’s alright, it’s OK, I don’t are not the only one.
But just imagine if all the cameras around us would be shaped like an eye.
I think we will be all of us much more conscious
of the amount of cameras around us
and maybe more aware, more scared
of the cameras that are invading our privacy.
OK, so taking a step back.
You might wonder, like, what is that I just saw today?
This is completely useless and nobody asks for that,
nobody wants that and nobody will never use that.
But first, what is this?
Well, this is an approach called
Provocative design can be used to unveil some issues we have today with technology.
So if you are using our building technology,
well, I encourage you to think and reflect using provocative design.
So those steps are fairly simple.
First, question what is around,
question the status quo that we have with technologies today.
Then don’t hesitate to push to the extreme,
because that's what I did with this project.
And finally, pushing to the extreme can help you to reflect and discuss,
and for instance, here, to reflect and discuss
on what type of interaction you want with other people and devices.
So this is useless.
Well, yes, maybe it can be seen as a bit useless,
and at least I deliberately do things that nobody wants and nobody will use.
And you know what? I even don’t want my device to be like that...
(Laughter)
not at all, I don’t want to have that flesh in my pocket.
Yet, I think this approach is useful and even critical,
because why did you feel weird with these devices?
Because I think you never thought that technology could look like that.
And I think the main issue with that, right now,
is nobody is really thinking the shape or the form of the devices,
and you, me, as customers, we just buy the tech available.
And that’s why iPhone exists in a cold, flat and aluminum minimalist way.
And I think we should expect more from the design of devices,
because the design defines the way we interact.
And if you want to interact in a more human and natural way,
maybe it's time to radically rethink the how the devices look like.
And this is why I built those three devices,
to challenge you in your beliefs,
and make you think of what type of technology we really need
and we really want for society tomorrow.
Thank you.
(Applause and cheers)