Last night arrived pretty suddenly! We had little under a week to have all things ready for a meeting of tech platforms. Hyves (the largest social network in the netherlands) gave us access to their API. We used it to present photostreams of their users detected within the radius of our bluetooth scanners. It’s a kind of location-based service, where, with your consent, your presence triggers your lifestream via photos to be remixed with those of others in proximity to you.

The reaction of the audience was noticably more positive than previous daytime or nighttime outtings. This time the audience was engaged and they were hungry for…well…….themselves! I wander what the VJs thought as the random selection of photos was hilarious.

Kudos definately go to roomware team members for pulling this off. Also great to test Tom’s completely rewritten code.

Thanks for the photo Boris. Here’s also a screenshot:

Having previously viewed this, it was a pleasure to see Alexandra’s posting over on the tinker blog on this project. It’s a wonderfully simple solution to crowd interaction in a space where it’s harder to speak than gesture. It also brings people together in the most elegant of ways.

“ZYGOTE is a lightweight inflated ball, illuminated from within, that responds to pressure applied to its surface. Interacting with the ball is simple: punch it, bounce it, squeeze it, or tap it and the ball’s internal LEDs react instantaneously. Dozens of balls released to an energetic audience at a major music concert, transform the environment into a multi-sensorial, interactive playground, actively engaging the crowd in a shared experience. Each ball also can act as both an input and an output device by being networked to a central computer. This allows for more complex interaction, as the crowd can modify the graphics on a screen, make the balls light up in unison, or even affect the music.”

Well almost…Following our last workshop which was held at the offices of Robert and Wakoopa, we decided that it was time to start developing “in the wild”, in more real world situations. We are looking for partners with locations who are open to experimentation and willing to work together. What we can offer is a team of eager developers and a evolving presence-based server technology which can be rolled into different use-cases. We will listen to your needs, explore possibilities together and do what most web-developers already do or should be doing, which is listening to users and iterating new improved designs. User-driven design methodology sounds quite wordy, but it cuts through a lot of assumptions that might often lead nowhere fast and take a long time to change course.

Space 1:
We are looking for a quieter location, where you might find people reading, talking without needing to shout.

Space 2:
The other location is a more nightlife-like space. Perhaps a bar with music. The sound level has to be high enough to not be able to hear other people talk (intermittantly) thus providing design limitations which the team will need to work around. We hope to eventually explore clubs, but baby steps first.

We are working from amsterdam. If you feel left out of this research, drop us a line, if you are willing to set up yourselves than we can start experimenting in other cities too. Software update for roomware server is soon to follow.

With a new server, and Trac running to coordinate work on the code base, we aim to take this project to the next level.

We do want to invite design students on board to earn credit for collaboration. You will get the opportunity to explore open-source practises, and bring your creative juices into contact with real situations rather than the white box of the lab and classroom.

(picture of Roomware Server running FlickrPickr at ApacheCon 2007)

It seems fitting to show you all this video which outlines how the Amazing Rolo with his Wii controller is used to vibe with loop driven music. Might be cool for Laptop based Djs wanting to leave the podium and cruise with the crowd. Also you should know that team 1 of the Roomware project based in Amsterdam will be focusing efforts on applications and implementations within the Nightlife space. We are setting up a monthly evening at a small bar with DJs/Vjs and crowd to experiment and test out our warez in the wild. Seemed like the right move given that the “users” know what they want probably better than we do.

via Play