Public Interfaces Final

Public Interfaces with Jake Barton, Ian Curry

Students had the task to critically examine interaction design for public spaces. With this class, they went out in the field to understand urban spaces to design social objects that encourage participation. The design solutions are intended to have an impact by improving the behavior and experience in which cities are being used.

• John Finley, Colleen Miller : City Karma

  

  City Karma is an attempt to make the city a nicer place to live by giving New Yorkers a chance to share positive stories.

  We created a feedback loop of good karma through Twitter, a text messaging system, and a website to collect and display all of the messages. To complete the loop, the website would be displayed in public areas to let people know what their neighbors are doing to help their city. Our hope is that such a system would encourage citizens to “pay it forward” with their own good deeds and posts.

• Beatriz Vizcaino : Pop Box - Local Pick Up Points

  

  Pop Box is an initiative to improve pick up and delivery networks in the city through the implementation of new pick-up points managed by local businesses. The system is integrated through a web service for users to discover the locations, pay for the service and check the status of their orders.

• Gene Lu, Derek Chan, Evinn Quinn : Post Up

  

  Post Up is an interactive interface set up at various bus shelters in the city that gives New Yorkers a venue to report contextualized civic problems. They can also vote on or subscribe to problems that have already been posted, which are fed into 311’s database. When a problem is resolved, the person that reported the problem along with everyone else that subscribed to it will receive a “problem resolved” text message.

  Users interact with the display by texting their problems to a phone number designated by Post Up. When the text goes through, the problem appears on the display along with a corresponding number. Users can then vote for the problem by texting its corresponding number to the phone number mentioned earlier. When a vote is submitted, the display is updated providing immediate feedback for users.

  Whenever a problem is posted or is voted on, the user’s phone number is recorded by the system so that whenever the problem is resolved, those users are informed with a reply text. After a problem is resolved, it is then placed into a “Problems Resolved” ticker at the bottom of the display.

• Kristin Graefe, Jeff Kirsch : Storefront Democracy

  

  Storefront Democracy allows community members to have a voice in their neighborhood, using a publicly accessible interface to create an opportunity for submitting ideas and voting on community issues.

  We prototyped a projected installation for a storefront that allows passers-by to text ideas regarding their neighborhood. Those ideas are immediately visible, and others can vote on them. After a week, the top three ideas will be discussed at a regular neighborhood meeting. People who submit or vote on ideas would be kept updated on times and locations of board meetings, and invited to attend.

  Storefront Democracy raises community awareness of issues being considered and decided, allowing for a multitude of voices to be easily heard and engaging community members in the existing process.