Encountering the strange and delightful in audio space
Two Cents is an audio vending machine that encourages audio interactions between friends and strangers. Using rapid prototyping and lean user research approaches to validate ideas, my team designed a site-specific installation for the ITP graduate community within 6 weeks with the goal of creating a conversational space that kept users coming back for more. It was an instant hit with the community, and we met our goal of designing an experience with an effective hook and loop behavior for conversation.
The experience
Users have two interaction options: 1) Leave a message 2) Listen to a message. Users can insert a coin to receive a random audio message and also call a Twilio phone tree to add a message to the 2Cents machine for someone else to hear.
2Cents features four categories of messages that can be changed and customized. The four that were presented in the first prototype was encouragement, ass kicking, wisdom, and random, categories that reflect the needs of the installation environment (in this case, ITP's graduate student space).
Users can insert any coin and press an arcade button to hear a randomly selected message from the phone tree.
Developing an MVP with rapid prototyping
My team was interested in addressing the challenge of creating audio conversational spaces instead of visual/textual conversational spaces such as online forums and comment threads. We wanted to bring back the ear and the act of hearing to interactions. We used four of the six weeks we had to complete this project to rapidly build prototypes and test ideas before finding a winner and focusing the last two weeks to develop and iterate it. We learned the powerful lesson of failing fast and moving on.
Technology
We used Raspberry Pi to connect wirelessly with Twilio to create an interactive physical experience with a cloud-based phone database. We coded in php and Python to make this possible.
Prototype
The hardware was creating using plywood, vending coin dispenser and arcade buttons.
For more information, see presentation link here.
Role Concept Development, Design, Fabrication, Physical Computing, Project Management
Team Angela Bond,Hanna Kang-Brown, Doug Kanter, Silva Shih
Expert Engineering: Sean McIntyre
Technology Python, Raspberry Pi, Twilio
Class Designing for Conversational Spaces
Instructor Clay Shirky