Ultratool – Why Calling it Phone?

Ultratool - Why calling it phone?

A collaborative studio project of MoA Design Research Studio with students from the Dyson School of Design Engineering, Imperial College London, and weissensee school of art and design berlin

The Brief

Calling into question our daily use of handheld devices, we realize that it has become a multifunctional tool for all kinds of communication, information, data sourcing and entertainment. The phone call has taken a back seat as an interaction and is replaced by the multitude of applications such as navigation, healthcare, Internet of Things or social media. Various filters and filtering technologies interact simultaneously to shape our access and exchange with our environment.

The technical basis for the rapid integration into private and public life is always the same components of computer processor, interface and battery pack - in a handy shape. Despite the multitude of iterations and updates of technical features, operating systems and applications, the cuboid shape always remains related to the human hand and changes only insignificantly.

The Objective

The studio project Ultratool addressed this development and investigates conditioning cultural and social behaviors within the technology ecosystem we live in: which standards, which metaphors or narratives are the basis of this »ultratool«? Where are the blind spots in the design process that need to betackleed to enable more meaningful interactions?

How can »ultratool« look like in the near future if it serves to address societal challenges? What infrastructures can be created by connecting technical components and data exchange in bigger networks? The aim of the project was to develop new product ideas and concepts, based on various analyses and design methods on technical and cultural aspects. The design focus lied on speculative, neo-analog concepts that are developed and tested in prototypes.

The Process

Still facing Covid19 pandemic in Spring 2021, the daily study experience for design students was limited to digital formats. However, this limitation also offered the potential to test new forms of international collaboration online. For the studio project, online students from the Dyson School of Design Engineering at Imperial College London and the Royal College of Art London teamed up with product design students from weissensee kunsthochschule berlin. The diversity of cultural, social and geographical backgrounds resulted in multiple viewpoints on the smartphone as a globally produced and globally used product.

These perspectives were supported by the interdisciplinary workshops in the beginning: starting with workshops on »Design Ideation« and »Physical Computing«, design and technical potentials were explored and tested. Social, historical and cultural contextualization was added to the first drafts in the workshop »Archeologies of the Future«, and then deepened and outlined in scenarios in a »Design Research« workshop. Mixed teams of 3-4 students further developed the project ideas, explored possible interactions through prototyping in experiments and developed the final concepts, which was presented online on June 23rd, 2021.

Team

The project has being developed and realised by Prof. Thomas Ness (MoA Design Research Studio, kh berlin) und Dr. Elena Dieckmann (Imperial College London), supported by Hanna Wiesener (MoA Design Research Studio, kh berlin) and Laurenz Reichl (Imperial College London)

Workshops

»Archeologies of the Future« Alwin Cubasch, Cluster of Excellence »Matters of Activity«, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
»Design Research« Rike Glaser, CIRG, Design Research/Interaction Design
»Successful communication is beep, beep« Sara Reichert, CityLab Berlin
»Node.red@IBM Cloud« Rapael Tholl, Jan Ekstrøm (IBM) & Hacking IoT with Jeff Crume (IBM)
»Light dependent relationship« Prof. Mika Satomi (kh berlin)
»Prototyping with Figma/blockdots« Markus Paeschke (blokdots), Carolina Sprick (kh berlin)

Assessments Panels

Dr. Stephen Green, Imperial College London
Dr. Leila Sheldrick, Imperial College London
Dr. Shayan Sharifi, Imperial College London

The final presentation will be held on Wednesday, June 23rd, 2021 at 10.00 am–12.30 pm (CET).

For Zoom link please contact: wiesener [​at​] kh-berlin.de.