In the course of my research on the output side, I’ve noticed some interesting projects raising public attention by touching very sensitive political issues and putting them literally into the middle of the street. I realized how easy it is to get public attention in a terror-anxious and technology-ridden world by the simplest hardware mashups. Graffiti Research Lab, who just hit the media again with their laser tagging project L.A.S.E.R. in Rotterdam, dedicated quite a lot of their more recent projects to issues concerning the climate of public opinion in the U.S. as it changed through September 11 and its aftermath. Quite simple in its core but somewhat appealing by its do-it-yourself flavour, GRL’s makeshift Homeland Security Advisory Towers installed all over Manhattan are one of their most funny and remarkable coups. The fact that even such simple messages raise attention to the authorities (as it is proved by the end of the video) illustrates how effective technology-fed public interventions can be in order to stir up discussions and hopefully make people stop and think for a moment.

Since even if we still thought that tossing LED throwies and putting up interactive wallpapers were no more than geeky streetart chic with no substantial effect to the outside world only a couple of weeks ago, the Aqua Teen Hunger Force Boston Bomb Scare should have taught us a better lesson by now.

Not excactly new anymore, but a) still in Beta and b) still impressive as an example for the direction web-fed mapping techniques are heading is Google Ridefinder. The service, which can be found in the Google Labs section, builds on the Google Maps vizualization environment displaying the position of cabs run by selected taxi companies in a dozen different cities all over the US. Thanks to GPS units on board of corresponding vehicles, the well-known markers map their coordinates technically in real-time.

Now GPS is everything but a new technology, and it’s even not a big deal anymore to get your own positioning device and take it on a ride. But I think there’s another, more subtle reason why people get attracted by applications that bring real world representations onto their desktops. Computer technology, i.e. processing power and bandwith in particular, has developed to a stage where data visualization tools increasingly rely on geospatial reference systems to make information available.

These technologies do not bother with the requirement of creating virtual reality environments of ever increasing detail anymore, but understand that the real world is complex enough to be represented but at the same time bears an unrivalled familiarity in terms of orientation and navigation. The fact that the majority of data that became disembodied in the hypertext universe actually have a geospatial reference on a semantic level, points to the idea of rearranging digital information by giving them a place in the real world, and hence creating new organization patterns for the never-ending torrent of ubiquitous information we face as a result of the Anytime, Anywhere Information Age.

Taking the taxi scenario as an example again, artistic projects such as Cabspotting give a first impression of what this information-enriched world outside the computer might look like. Making these hidden data layers accesible in a useful manner will be one of the major tasks of Information Visualization soon to come.

Okay, after a few weeks of rather low activity, I’ve decided to get a grip and feed this blog more regularly than before. I will try to use it as a platform for my Master thesis research at FH Potsdam, in the hope of creating a self-propelling motivation tool. Pinky promise.

So speaking of Masters, in the light of upcoming Transmediale, we relocated our weekly selfhelp circle for Interface Design M.A. students with inspiration trouble to the C-Base headquarters, where dorkbot.bln promised a night of “people doing strange things with electricity”. Régine of WMMNA held the short opening speech, followed by the only project presented that I found interesting and inspiring, and hence the only one I will mention here. MTC, or Multi Touch Console, is exactly what the name implies: A kiosk application for multitouch interaction. The whole thing consists of a compact table containing an infrared camera that tracks touch and motion events on the table surface, and a projector displaying respective graphics on it in response. Image creation, video mixing and output are managed by the self-written avg platform, an XML/Python-based screen layout engine that can be used with a variety of input media from mouse and keyboard to complex touch screens, and supports the display of up to ten videos at 60fps as well as camera input, text rendering and so on. Check out their website for all features or getting in touch with the creators.

The software is entirely open source and licensed under LGPL, and people are encouraged to get in touch with the team in case they have an actual demand in some application context.

It is common practise to present quantitative information about the state of a city by means of thematic maps, where a topographical city map is superimposed by mosaic-like layers of small area units, with each unit displaying a distinct color, texture or brightness according to the value they represent. Maps like these are well-known from the media, for instance as a tool to illustrate the distribution of crime incidents. Their advantage is that they provide a good overview of the situation on a global scale at first glance. On other hand, this kind of representation does not repsond to our physical location.

I think about a small mobile device that subtly tracks a certain value as it changes over time and space in the urban landscape. For example, a simple radio sensor could track the presence of radio wave signals emitted by WiFi base stations or mobile phone towers, and give us a hint on our exposure to electrical smog. On a secondary level, such a device could be fed with location-dependent data thematic maps are created with, as mentioned above. So while being in the city we could get hints on topics like air quality, crime rate or the common popularity of the area we are moving in. Instead of a complicated numeric display the device could simply provide a qualitative interface for a general impression of the surrounding circumstances, for instance by changing its color, temperature or physical shape.

The idea assumes a hopefully-near-future scenario of freely available, area-wide radio networks such as NYC Wireless. or freifunk that make it possible to seamlessly connect to the Internet while being on the go in the city. Additionally, it builds upon the assumption that the boom of collaborative thematic maps provided by Google Maps where users attach information tags to a virtual map and at the same time create a reference to the real geographical space, will continue. A vivid example for this kind of collaborative thematic mapping that could be exploited for mobile applications again is the Houston Crime Map Project.

This is a two-dimensional graphic represenation of encoded information, called a Datamatrix. Developed in the late Eighties, it is basically an extented version of the (still) more popular barcode, but with a siginificantly higher storage capacity per area. In Germany it gained some popularity being part of STAMPIT, a web-based service to create mail stamps with your PC and printer. Another, far more interesting application for the Datamatrix than making black and white stamps is the Semapedia Project that started in late 2005.

The idea behind Semapedia is to take something into the real world that people do online for quite a while now: Tagging things. Similarly to Flickr, where users can tag their pictures (i.e. attach descriptive keywords to them), Semapedia enables them to do the same with physical objects. A web-based interface on Semapedia’s website processes the URL to the Wikipedia entry of a certain place into a Datamatrix-encoded version of the respective article. After printing the matrix sheet and putting it up on the spot, cell phones equipped with a camera and a software that can read the matrices are able to decode the information, and retrieve the article text from Wikipedia.

Manufacturers of most popular cellphone brands support software extensions for their camera phones to read and decipher datamatrices, and more recent models are readily shipped with the plugin. On the other side, Datamatrix is an open standard, meaning that everyone can produce code tags. Swiss-based company Kaywa, for instance, features a Datamatrix Generator on its website. Beyond tourists exploring cities without guidebooks one can think of a whole range of possible applications for Datamatrix stickers, from bus timetables to event listings to information on bike or car sharing networks. The city as a networked media space provides more than enough opportunities.

PS: The decoded datamatrix information at the top of the article is a quote by Bill Gates that reads “We’ve got to put a lot of money into changing behavior”.

Edit 29/10/06:
A research group at Sony Labs has developed a visual tagging system based on the Datamatrix technology in 2000. The project called CyberCode focuses on several application scenarios for Datamatrix tags in the physical environment creating conncetions between the material world and its augmented digital layers. One interesting approach to the research field of Augmented Reality was a digital camara that decodes information from Datamatrix tags on CD cases or paper files it is directed at and superimposes them as plain text on the camera display. Jun Rekimoto and Yuji Ayatsuka from the University of Tokyo summarize project goals, application scenarios and key technologies in their abstract CyberCode: Designing Augmented Reality Environments with Visual Tags.

The discussion about the merger of materiality and virtuality is as old as the efforts to simulate our world by means of digital technology, hence the October print issue of de:bug magazine features a series of articles on developments in design and media that illustrate the term Virtual Reality from quite diverse perspectives. One article deals with two ambitious projects, Berlin 3D and Reality Maps, which both pursue the target of rendering the entire city of Berlin into a digital 3D model where those familar with the city’s geography cannot only recognize eye-catching sights such as Brandenburger Tor or our beloved TV Tower, but will finally be able to track down a single housing block, their favourite bar or the bus stop they use every morning. A showcase screenshot published by Berlin 3D in an earlier stage of development features a scenic view over the central district from a window-cleaner’s perspective dangling off the Bahn Tower’s steel and glass facade. While the surrounding area here still consists of plain grey solid (most buildings meanwhile have individual textures featuring doors, windows and aircon generators) it already allows us a look inside the fully equipped office on the other side of the window pane.
Not too surprisingly, according to the article several businesses evinced interest already: Just imagine yourself walking down your street, entering a shopping mall and buying a blockbuster movie from the Virgin Megastore with your credit card - without leaving your desk.