Sleeping With Technology Paper
I love Kickstarter, and the results form 2011 are even more impressive then 2010, success rate raised 3 %, 46 % of the launched project get succesfully pletched. But read all about it on there result page! And give some attention on the presentation and design of this!
Europe is not flexbel in crowdfunding, this is one of the reasons why Kickstarter is not here yet.
©Nighthawks - Edward Hopper - 1942
While I was working on a content/semiotic paper I wanted to work with the painting of Edward Hopper - Nighthawks. I was reading about Michel Foucault's vision on prison and the analysis of Panopticum view, and somehow Facebook came in mind. Facebook as a virtual diner, but also as a Panopticum.
The vision that Edward Hopper brings here, or illustration that sets you thinking about loneliness, isolation and voyeurisme, is something we can transport to Facebook. Everybody has a lot of friends or so called friends, sometimes we have never seen them, and they are friends of friends, and we don't really know them in real life, if we ever get to see them. The separtion of private and professional is very blurred here in the Walled Garden of Facebook. What are people doing at Facebook, hanging around for hours, some more active then others, watching peoples updates, how do feel people about all of this, the need to connect all the time, the jealousy that pops up ones in while, for not being in a moment with friends who have a lot of fun seen by the photos they post. The pro's and contra's of Facebook. Researchers write about this being Alone Together from Sherry Turkle is handling this subject in great detail overtime, and how we came so far and what it does to us. People are alone in front of a screen, being alienated in a way from the real world, or have a different life on line compensating for their real life.. lots of positive and negative things we can say and evaluate overtime in the world of Facebook. And surely it will go into different phases of its existence.
The Walled Garden concept and the power of Facebook brought me to the idea of Michel Foucault structure of a Panopticum as an applicable model for Facebook philosophy.
Creating discipline in society, controling a society. Disciplinarity is a kind of network with a variety of power mechanisms.
A first serie of discplinary technics, is about controlling the space.The individuals are gathered in one place. This is exactly what Facebook does.
A second technic, the space is split in different cells, this is your Facebook profile.
The third, each individual has a fixed place, this is your Facebook ID.
The space architecture creates visibility and recognition, each behavior can be controlled anytime anywhere. This is also what Facebook does, all the updates are checked, posted images are checked, inappropiate content will be deleted, what Facebook thinks is inappropiate of course. And all this is ranked based on the posting activity of profile X, Y, Z. The more active you are, the more your newsfeeds will be feeded towards your friends or circles.
A procedure to know, to control and to use. The discipline organizes an analytic space.
Facebook users are a representation of themselves, a sort of personal imagebuilding, who they would like to be and not who they really are. There is a form of being anonymous.
In Nighhawks we see the same posure. There are no doors in Nighthawks, so basicaly you can not leave.
Well try to leave Facebook, and you will see what emotional blackmail is put on you while doing that, you can leave in many ways, but all of them are trying to seduce you to stay. People are locked up in there own little virtual world where there is a lot of power, and the power is not on the user side!
Door: Christel De Maeyer, Manager The Studios - Howest Posted on http://www.mediainnovatievlaanderen.be/post/13106655232/toekomstvantv When I have time I will translate in English! In de jaren 70-80 zat iedereen gekluisterd voor zijn tv, het altaar van de huiskamer. Ik herinner me nog het moment toen de televisie in de huiskamer kwam. The big moment. Met familie en vrienden zaten we uren naar dat kastje te kijken. Veel was er toen nog niet te doen. In het begin was het allemaal in zwart/wit, pas later kwamen de kleurtjes het allemaal opfleuren. Bij de opkomst van televisie in de jaren 50-60 zag men de tv als een bedreiging voor film in de cinema. Maar film in de cinema is zo een andere dimensie, een ontsnappen van de wereld, de donkere kamer met het grote beeld en de magische setting, de stilte, het grote reuzescherm. Televisie bracht een venster op de wereld, het zou mensen een ander wereldbeeld geven, alhoewel televisie toen nog een heel lokaal gebeuren was. In de jaren 90 begon het allemaal al stilletjes aan te veranderen. Bij het opkomen van internet was er plots een ander venster op de wereld. Een veel ruimer beeld op de wereld. En meer nog, je kon er altijd naar toe, gelijk wanneer, als telecom het toeliet ook overal. Misschien was het soms wat traag, maar het bracht een hele verandering met zich mee. Deearly adopter zat al snel voor zijn computer gekluisterd om al die informatie op het net te bekijken, die toen ook wel nog schaars was. Mid jaren 90 kwamen de eerste buzz-woordjes over interactieve tv, en hoe dat alles zoveel beter zou maken. Het nieuwe wonderkind, de walled gardens, de mediabedrijven hun volgende kaskraker, over hoe dat nieuwe betaalmodel ging werken, en of de gebruikers überhaupt wel interactief zouden zijn, of gingen ze gewoon lui vanuit een zetel verder kijken naar de lineaire televisie. Verschillende toekomstscenario’s werden uitgedacht tijdens de Milia conferenties in Cannes ten tijde. Heel veel opwinding over nieuwe mogelijkheden. Diezelfde jaren 90 was er ook een andere grote, opkomende, markt. Er werd namelijk tonnen content geproduceerd in CD-rom producties, meestal in samenwerking met mediagiganten die daar het geld voor hadden en ook de rechten om afgeleide producten te maken. Dit is een kleine zijsprong die niet onbelangrijk is in het toekomstige verhaal van het altaar. Die CD-roms waren als het waren interactieve documentaires, en beetje bij beetje werden die ook crossover met toegang tot het internet. De CD-rom kende een stille dood op het einde van de jaren 90, toen het internet meer en meer aan volwassenheid won. Al die CD-rom content kan nu misschien herleven, op tablet PC’s en in een online omgeving. Is dat niet het transmedia verhaal van vandaag? Een stille verschuiving naar de platformen van de 21’ste eeuw. Het internet groeit na de eerste bubble nu snel op en wordt een massamedium. Mede dankzij de breedbandmogelijkheden die er vandaag zijn wordt het ook een visueel medium. Videotoepassingen zijnthe next big thing. Digitale televisie wordt geïntroduceerd in 2005. Er is meer dan 10 jaar over gegaan vooraleer er een publieke introductie – met primaire toepassingen – is. In vergelijking met alle geopperde ideeën en geteste producten blijven de meest succesvolle toepassingen ‘het programmeren’ en ‘de pauzeknop’. Neen, de rode knop is niet succesvol en zal ook geen lang leven kennen,.. wordt daar eigenlijk nog ooit over gesproken? Na primitieve digitale televisie volgt de opkomst van the cloud, intelligentesmartphones en tablets. Mijn regelmatige bezoekjes aan opstartende bedrijven in Silicon Valley bracht me bij Efe van The Auteurs. Efe zijn bedrijfje werkt aan filmdistributie via het internet. Ondanks een mager aanbod in het begin, biedt The Auteurs met hoge kwaliteit streaming vandaag het platform voor wie alternatieve film wil bekijken op zijn computer. Ondertussen is de naam veranderd naar MUBI, is de dienst ook geïntegreerd in het platform van Belgacom Digitale tv en bereidt Efe zich voor op distributie via tablets. De films worden verkocht aan 5 euro het stuk. Starling TV, een opstartend bedrijf in NY, experimenteert in dezelfde periode met eerste initiatieven rond social tv, een combinatie van digitale televisie, smartphone- en tablet-toepassingen. Ook de projecten die de laatste 2 jaar uit het vrt medialab zijn gevloeid tonen geloof in nieuwe vormen van televisiekijken. Verschuivingen in de consumptie van content zijn al aan de gang sinds mid jaren 90 en de evolutie gaat verder: smart tv’s komen er aan, de portals naar de cloud staan nog maar in hun kinderschoenen en adaptie van nieuwe technologieën door de bevolking gaat steeds sneller. Een boeiende tijd om in de mediasector te werken, met veel uitdagingen zowel op technologisch als sociaal vlak. In de toekomst zal een geïntegreerde media hub/client het ‘altaar’ in de huiskamer vervangen. Deze hub zit in een draadloos netwerk en vormt een centrale unit die toegang geeft tot media in de cloud. Naar gelang je goesting zal je gelijk waar en wanneer media kunnen beleven. De schermen zullen groot en klein zijn naar gelang de tijd die je hebt om te besteden aan mediaconsumptie. Het is aan de kijker om te bepalen of die al dan niet gevolgd worden volgens een standaard programmatie of op een uitgesteld tijdstip, evenals de laag van interactiviteit. Dit brengt me tot mijn ultieme droom waarin de gebruiker zelf bepaalt via wat voor een formaat of type scherm hij of zij de media beleeft. Televisies, smartphones of tablets doen er dan niet meer toe - we zullen de schermen kunnen tekenen op een muur. Echte schermen waarin we vervolgens informatie kunnen opvragen of films kunnen bekijken waar en wanneer we dat wensen. Een vorm van sixth sense, fluid interfaces. Tot dan genieten we van filmpjes zoals deze.
Last week I was at DocFest, Sheffield UK, doing a session on Digital Influence. The speaker after me, really had a very nice story about digital infuence in practice. Lucy was not aware that she was applying the dragonflyeffect, (focus, grab attention, enable people and take action), but she really succeeded to use the social movement at its full potential.
We all know that content is super important, it has to be high quality, and it needs to be focused, so it is simple to understand and to follow. This lady Lucy Cooke, is a filmy maker, writer and froglover, but I think she now also loves sloths :-)
Lucy wanted to do a documentary on Frogs, but didn't got the money together, so she decided to just leave and do her thing, I always admire that with people! And this is how the endearing story came a live about saving animals and how things can go really fast in a virtual world, if you communicate well and have interesting stories to tell.
I'm not gong to repeat her blogpost, but you can read all about Lucy here and the story of slothville, it is a fascinating story, how Lucy got a contract to film a serie now on sloths and how she got contacted by Simon and Shuster to write a book! Enjoy the story!
Meet the sloths from Lucy Cooke on Vimeo.
A curious week, the launch of IPAD 2, and the commotion on the Apple app store and terms that Apple sets to publishers, the new rules of facebook in selling profile information.
What have these 2 in common. Yes a walled garden. Remember the digital tv discussions in the mid 90's (interactive tv), a lot mediacompanies saw their potential in the walled gardens. But it didn't really happen then. Now the telecom parties take that over, Belgacom TV and Telenet have their own walled garden in a way. And maybe we are going back to this system.
I'm not fan of a walled garden, and more for open systems, but having a few meetings in the creative sector this week, I feel that there is a lot of material for debate. On one hand these walled gardens give opportunity to gain money on what you offer there, finally. Let's face it, the app store from Apple is really working, and a 1 euro app is bought fast. The open model might return to a free model as the internet is.
Remember the days when Microsoft delivered Explorer in their operating system, and all the commotion around that. Wondering if the EU can now say that Apple need to change its model.
And what about Facebook, the most powerful social network of all, with 'places' active all over the world, will foursquare and gowalla have a long live, maybe if they can keep one step ahead or have an more added value then Facebook places. If you want to do something online, and want to connect with the connected, Facebook is your place to be right. It forces itself in your professional or leisure life either way. Together with LinkedIn they rule. Will Facebook stay? Well it might not, but the social netwok will, maybe in other model in the future.
All excited things to think about, and curious how it will evolve.
Some figures about facebook
I'm using ZEO since the end of August. The ZEO device made me even more punctual on my rytmes during the day, and stimulated me to track my activity during the day and evening.
What is ZEO
ZEO gives you an analysis of your sleep, and reports in ZQ. ZQ is the sum of your light sleep, REM sleep, DEEP sleep, times in wake and how long in wake. You can score higher ZQ by optimizing REM and DEEP, and total sleep in general. You lose ZQ points with times in wake.
How does this works
ZEO consists of a headband and a ZEO device, which are wireless connected to each other, during the night data is transfered to the ZEO device by tracking your brain waves. I usually upload my data every week and then check where I need to optimize my sleep. Because the tracking is an enabler to optimize your sleep. On the website myzeo.com, you can set your goals and start working on your sleep fitness program.
Sleep fitness
A lot of people came to me, since I'm using this, talking about their sleep, and telling that they don't sleep well. There are a lot of sleep disruptives possible, and mostly you know them of course. It is about changing habits and create discipline to work on that. The Zeo together with the online personal sleeping coach helps you define the disruptive elements, and make you really aware about them every day, also because the daily reporting (ZQ) on your ZEO device tells you are on your way or not, and really shows you what is going on, and when it is going on.
Sleep is very personal?
Sleep might be very personal for people, especially if you don't sleep well. There can be tons of reasons of course, you might worry about family, work, have anxiety or have crying babies (but that is hopefully temporary), or snoring husband or wife. Posting your sleep data to a website may go a bit far you might think, but by doing this, you get lots of more info, also from other people, and you can start talking about it, and share exepriences, it will create a sence of community feeling 'not being alone' with your sleeping problems or habits. We will learn form each other to get a better life.
So far my findings:
ZEO helped to measure my sleep, and to get to know what is going on at night, I must say I always have been fascinated about this. I like to sleep, have wonderful dreams, sometimes a bit weird, but I like dreaming. And when I have long DEEP sleeps I really feel it! I don't use any sleep medicine, I sometimes smoke a joint, and it highers my REM a bit, but in general it does not have a high impact on my sleep. Where as alcohol is really bad for sleep.
My friend and I are exchanging ZQ scores, and we talk a lot about our sleep, this makes it also fun! We exchange our dreams and so on. To share this with someone more intimate, stimulates to really work on it, and make it kind of a competition.
ZEO made my schedule more rigid, I try to go to bed at the same time, and get up by the same time. I did this before ZEO as well, but not so conscious.
Exercise regurarly: practicing Tai Chi twice a week, and cycle or run once a week.
Work related exercise:
- Try to avoid annoying people, who irritate you, try to stay happy and constructive (this is also for your private life, filter on people you spend time with)
- Avoid stress, if you do have stress, exercise more, this always helps for me. Try to find out what makes you stressful, and do something about it. It might be little things.
- Keep things in control and be organized. This might be for everybody different, but running different projects, it is easy to lose control, and stay organized keeps my life easy and manageable.
- Keep a balance between private and work. Not always easy, but challenging.
- Go with the flow, things just happen sometime, and sometimes you can do something about it and sometimes not.
What's next:
- Predicting my sleep analysis.
- Optimizing my DEEP sleep.
- Keeping my total sleep hours (min 8 hours a night)
- My average ZQ is 75, would like to be in 80's.
Last week we had our Design for persuasion conference for the 2nd time. It was again a big success, with international top speakers from different markets and different insights.
This year's edition we also had a workshop with Jason Hreha and Dr. BJ Fogg. The workshop went more in depth on how to understand the Trigger, Ability and Motivation handling, and if these elements come together it is very likely we can change a behavior with a person. We also discussed the behavior grid, and different types of behavior, existing behavior, and what we would like to change to it. Also learned that abstract discussions about behavior has not much sense, better to put it into an example, so everybody in th group knows what you are talking about, and in addition maybe create a vocabulary so everybody understands what you are talking about. This applies for other topics as well, not only in the behavior change world!
BJ created a framework, where we can work with in a more easy way, to identify behavior types, and to map your own target group too, so you can understand better, and think more CLEARLY on the target groups and what you want to achieve. During the conference he worked and talked more on this to the broader audience.
Two other sessions that I really loved were the ones on Mobile development Frontline and Text to change. As we are thinking, in our developed world on the next killer app for mobile, there is some interesting work being done in the development countries like Africa en Asia. Things we should really think about when we are trying to get in the mobile market here. Because let's face it SMS was and still is the killer app for Mobile right. Everybody can see, view and do something with it. And not everybody has a smart phone device, not even in our 'developed country' :-)
When I went trough the evaluation of these sessions they scored a bit less, because the audience did n't perceived it as a persuasive topic, but they are so wrong. In development countries this is not a luxury product but a necessity, the people finally can talk to each other, get medical help and assistance, e-learning possibilities, so there you definitely talk about behavior change for the good! If I was a mobile developer, I would really follow this, because this will be examples for our market too. It is not about showing of technology possibilities, but really doing useful work with it.
Product design as a persuasion tool, Fabio went trough a series of very nice products that were designed for better well being, and pro active help in the healthcare sector. It was a whirlwind presentation, but I liked it because it gave a good overview of different products that are on the market in this sector. The presentation also tapped into the closed medical world, and how we as patients, using these new tools, will have maybe even a better view, and have more data then they have on us, to analyze our behavior and do something about it when you feel you have too. Needless to say, if you are seriously ill, you need to contact your doctor. But some devices really help to understand a bit more about yourself.
Following Fabio's presentation, I would like to tap into myZEO presentation. ZEO is a device that analysis your sleep. You can synchronize the data to a website, and after a few weeks you have some data to work with. The ZEO will generate a 'ZQ' score, that is the sum of your Light, REM, DEEP, times in wake sleep. In addition it also tells you how much time it took to get you to sleep.
I've been doing the sleep experiment for several weeks now, tried different things out that can influence your sleep, because it is all depending on your daily and nightly activities of course.
The rules of a good sleep, are definitely a regular life, not to much stimulation at night before you go to sleep. And to optimize your sleep is just realizing that. My average ZQ is 75, which is very good, and a bit above normal. But I think I can do even better if do more outdoor exercise during the day, and I mainly need to work on my deep sleep.
This being said, if i score into 80 and more, I feel very crispy and alert, and my first 4 hours of a day are super and very active, physically and mentally!
We closed with another session with BJ to learn more about the different path behaviors and how to use them with your target audience. The main message is about putting 'Hot triggers' into the daily habbits of your clients, if you think about this, you will learn a lot!
Another tagline you should keep in mind:
The mobile and platform competition that is going on, will be won by those who can implement 'HOT Triggers' in their platform, and subtle change the way we behave.
And remember all things that started small got big one way or another and if they didn't, think about it, failure is an option too (if you don't try, you have nothing right :-).
WIll keep you posted on our next edition on 'Design for Persuasion'
I'm working and following the digital wave for many years 1989, a little over 20 years. I've been working mainly in a multimedia area and media in general. From floppy to mobile.
RIght now I'm running a business accelerator 'The Studios' at Howest in Kortrijk. It is a unique experience and a joy to work with young dynamic people all the time.
Organizing a yearly conference on Design for Persuasion together with DR. BJ Fogg director from the Persuasive technology lab at Stanford University.
