[-empyre-] Welcome to Anne Balsamo our guest moderator for May, 2012:, Designing Culture: The Technological Imagination at Work

[Anne Balsamo]

Hi Jon,

Thanks for the question:  yes, the term ³public interactives² is one that I
have been using for the past several years to describe my research and
design work.  I may have made it up...it just made sense to me. ;-)

As part of this research, I am creating a taxonomy of public interactives
that include "genres" such as URBAN SCREENS, WALK-UP GAMES, INTERACTIVE
MEMORIALS, and RESPONSIVE ARCHITECTURE (among others).  I¹m documenting the
critical and analytic work that discusses these emergent media forms.

The definition you quote is mine. The definition asserts the important
antecedents (of this mode of interactivity) that are part of the histories
of 1) public art, 2) modes of public communication, and 3) cultural and
entertainment venue interactive applications/devices.

I use the term PUBLIC INTERACTIVES as a broader concept that encompasses
instances of all of these genres of interactive experience because I believe
that we will see a fantastic proliferation of such interactives in the near
future when the phantasm of ubiquitous computing (pervasive computing)
materializes in the form of computationally enabled walls, surfaces, and
built environments.

Obviously, many urban spaces are already being transformed in this way, from
the scale of the building (URBAN SCREENS) to the scale of the body
(interactive directories).  I have concerns about this proliferation....of
the sort that worries about the prevalence of AR spam: Kelichi Matsuda¹s
video on Augmented (hyper)Reality for example:

http://vimeo.com/14533403

I investigated the range public interactives-on-display at the Shanghai
World Expo, to identify some of the new forms of interactive experience we
might see more commonly in the future, especially in highly mediated urban
settings. See for example the ³architectural cinematic experience²--the walk
through imax film‹that was the centerpiece for the Saudi Arabian pavilion.
Donated to the city of Shanghai in 2011, the pavilion is now called ³The
Moon Boat.²

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wCNti_r2BGo

I originally developed a course on the "History and Design of Public
Interactives" several years ago because I felt that it was important for
students in the MFA game-design program at USC to expand their imaginations
BEYOND the small screen (the desktop, the mobile device, or the tv).

More recently I've been working with students in a Communications
School--where the interest in public interactives also involves questions
about urban planning and public policy (i.e., public broadcasting
programming, digital districts).

In my current context, I don't have access to art, design or
media-production students. But I'm always trying to find students who are
interested in learning how to design meaningful interactive experiences that
would augment cultural experiences in public spaces that take form as
interactive walls or interactive memorials (for example).

anne



On 5/2/12 6:38 PM, "jonCates" <joncates at gmail.com> wrote:

> hi Anne + all
> im looking fwd to this discussion, hearing the positions articulated &&
> thinking / feeling through these topics...
> speaking of which the term "PUBLIC INTERACTIVES" is new to me. Googling around
> for it i found links to yr work Anne + the following dfn: 
> 
> "PUBLIC INTERACTIVES - significant cultural technologies that subtly shape the
> technological literacies of the future. PUBLIC INTERACTIVES are devices that
> serve as the stage for interactive experiences in public settings such as
> museums, theme parks, outdoor art spaces, civic plazas, and urban streets.
> PUBLIC INTERACTIVES are an emergent form of public communication designed to
> engage people in conversations with digital media for the purposes of
> information exchange, education, entertainment, and cultural memory. PUBLIC
> INTERACTIVES are an art form that evokes new experiences and perceptions
> through experiments with scale, mobility, built space, and modes of human
> engagement in public spaces." 
> 
> Anne, is the above yr defn? is this a phrase that you have developed /
> deployed to explain / position yr work ? if so, can you discuss
> the necessity of the term in terms of articulating yr specific interests /
> commitments? 
> 
> also, i found the defn on yr blog:
> 
> http://www.designingculture.net/blog/?p=435
> 
> + other links, so im wondering also about this in relation to yr teaching. is
> this a concept that informs / structures yr teaching? is it a necessary or
> useful distinction to make / teach i.e. in regards to categories /
> nomenclatures / taxonomies such as New Media Art, Interactive Installation,
> Public Art, Serious Games, etc? 
> 
> looking fwd...
> 
> // jonCates
> Associate Professor
> Film, Video, New Media & Animation dept
> The School of the Art Institute of Chicago
> http://systemsapproach.net
> 
> 
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