Artist Natalie Jeremijenko created the “Dangling String” which I found to be an interesting concept expressed in a unique and artistic fashion. The part I found most fascinating was how the artist made something that’s traditionally invisible, visible. This led me to think about how to surface other invisible facets in our lives.

I think that a real time display of one’s electricity usage would be useful and could also be displayed in a non-intrusive and aesthetically pleasing manner. For example, homeowners, corporations and those trying to live a more eco-friendly life are typically concerned with their monthly electricity bills. One way to monitor it more efficiently would be to have a visual and dynamic display of its usage. Similar to the “Dangling String,” the display would need be a clam technology, traversing seamlessly from one’s periphery, to their center of attention and back again. This way, the user is subtly aware of their electricity usage, their impact on the environment, and they may even be motivated to make changes.

I think it’s also important to note that typically, electricity usage is monitored and read from a box located outside of one’s home or building. The information is displayed using indexical signage and generally, it’s rare for someone to spend time interpreting the data. Instead, most people receive a monthly bill without fully understanding the scope and breadth of their electricity usage. By bringing this invisible item first into one’s periphery and then into the center of one’s attention, this display could influence change and enable people to monitor and improve their electricity usage.

A definition typically requires a narrow focus and a precise description. However, Fishkin takes the opposite approach in his attempt to define tangible user interfaces. Perhaps part of the challenge in narrowing the scope of TUIs begins with the first word of the acronym. He calls the word “tangible” “a multi-valued attribute” (Fishkin, 348) and, in an attempt to improve the TUI’s broad definition, he developed a taxonomy with two axes.

Throughout Fishkin’s article, I thought about various TUIs and realized that most of what existed when this article was published were either art forms or items of practical use; nothing stuck out to me as an everyday, useful, and enjoyable product. While a TV remote is incredibly useful, it’s only relevant when you’re watching TV. Most of his other examples attempted to bridge the gap between motion and engaging some aspect of our senses (i.e. movement and increasing a sound or a situation where rotation changes what one sees on a display like in the Great Dome example).

When I think of a TUI, I think of something that’s useful and practical in our everyday lives. While this use case may not have always been true, I believe the start of these practical and enjoyable TUIs began with products like MP3 players which first debuted in 1997. Although they may now seem outdated, MP3 players and iPods were revolutionary. They allowed a person to scroll through a digital library of their music using just their finger, creating what I believe to be a pure and useful TUI.

I think Fishkin’s taxonomy was helpful as it described the wide landscape of TUIs and the various environments they fit in. However, I felt that each category within embodiment could be adjusted to include just about any useful tangible object. Because the category is so large, it seems as though almost any item from our current environment has a home on the list. In order to improve this, I think narrowing the scope of what can be included within the embodiment axes of a TUIs taxonomy would be helpful.

With regards to metaphors, I agree with Fishkin’s argument that “once parts of an interface are made physically tangible, a whole realm of physically afforded metaphors becomes available (Fishkin, 349). He also goes on a define a metaphor, in a TUI sense, with the precision required of a definition. There’s no ambiguity about what could be classified as a metaphor (when referring to TUIs); there’s a clear “yes” or “no” response to whether “a system effect of a user action [is] analogous to the real-world effect…”(Fishkin 349). This axes and definition helps to narrow the scope of the wide-ranging world of tangible user interfaces.

source: https://goo.gl/images/C2OUlI

In 1996, McCullough argued that computers are “inherently a tool for the mind and not for the hands” (McCullough, 7). And, 20 years later, his theory doesn’t deviate far from the truth. While computer technologies have advanced substantially since his article was published, a majority of the work we do using computers still remains an intellectual task.

Currently, I’m in a position where I’m able to interact with new UIs, tools, and applications and I agree with McCullough’s prescient statement. Photoshop for example, is a tool that many graphic artists and designers use to bring their visions to life. However, using a product like Photoshop begins as and remains an intellectual endeavor. The only role hands play during the creation of digital art remains in the clicking and moving of the mouse.

Imagine creating a sphere or a cube using Photoshop. First, you need to create the basic shape. But then, you would need to figure out how to make a 2D object appear to have three dimensions. To do this, you would need to shade the image properly and create perspective using lines or curves to create the 3^rd dimension. This entire process is an intellectual pursuit, relying solely on thinking through the problem.

However, if you were using clay to make a sphere, you would be able to feel corners or spikes in the clay and you would round them out by smoothing the edges with your thumb. You would also feel the cool temperature and the slippery personality of the clay and you would be able to feel the roundness and the weight of the shape. Furthermore, you would also be able to feel and guide the formation of the a sphere thereby creating an intimate connection with the piece. This experience of designing with clay or any other physical medium engages one’s senses and creates an emotional connection with the final product.

While digital tools may afford us various advantages like speed, efficiency, and the ability to make changes quickly, there is a sterility in the perfection of the final product. Perhaps the most ironic part about hand-made, tangible products is that their unique characteristics, the ones McCullough wants to preserve, are actually intangible qualities: a human’s touch and a human’s mastery of a skill. As McCullough said, “…hands bring us knowledge of the world. Hands feel. They probe. They practice. They give us sense, as in good common sense…” (McCullough, 1).

(Photo source: https://i.ytimg.com/vi/nZsMgWnyhf4/maxresdefault.jpg, https://i.ytimg.com/vi/HWvxrzQGtA0/hqdefault.jpg)