Personal Computer Exercise 2

For this exercise, obtain a collection of colored dot-stickers. If multiple people are participating in the exercise, each person should use their own distinct color of dot.

Similar to Exercise 1, please avoid the use of personal computers/devices for the duration of the exercise.

Lap One: As a group, walk someplace, or walk through the building or room you are situated in. Without explaining yourself or providing rationale, place stickers on surfaces/objects that would make great computers

Lap Two: Retrace your footsteps or complete another lap of the space you are situated in. Explain your decisions, and discuss surfaces that seemed popular for their perceived computational ability.

Personal Computer Excercise 1

Buy a piece of clay the day prior to the exercise, or if mess is a worry, a disposable stack of loose leaf papers and a fat marker and maybe some scissors.

The day of the exercise, leave all personal electronics, devices, and as-is computers home. Your job is to use your blank slates (clay, paper, some impressionable material) to interpret and respond to times of computational need.

Record each state your blank slate faux computers take on. Repeat as often as desired.

Which physical forms are actually beneficial for daily-use personal computers?

Being a Body

Assume the identity of something huge and inhuman ... a company, physical infrastructure, a non government organization, etc.

Gather a set of random resources and a single goal, these are uniquely yours.

Consider how to implement your given resources to reach your goal, and what you might need from others.

When the time comes, trade resources with someone representing/embodying another infrastructure.

Write/tell a short story about this interaction, and how your infrastructure does, or does not accomplish its goal.

Sightseeing Interfaces

Go outside of class and walk around.

Take into account public structures and places where people put their hands and feet. Additionally, take into account structures that afford for people with disabilities — these are of utmost importance.

Observe the commonality of these "touch" surfaces. What aspects do they have in common? What is their relationship to the human form?

Take note of public forms that seem to be most harmonious with the human body. Also take note of forms that don't fit the human body well.

Replicate aspects of this public form into another object, another interface, etc. Put another way, transpose forms from one context to another.

Observe these new forms you and your peers have created. Discuss how and why they relate to the human body.