Today, The Tech Museum president, Dr. Peter Friess, officialy opened the exhibition “The Tech Challenge Gallrey”. This exhibition shows to new visitors, more than forty totally interactive experiments prepared, narrated and explained by other visitors: boys and girls that have collaborated in this gallery explaining experiments on video.
This exhibition has been and is a learning process for all. On the one hand, kids close to the Tech Museum have learned by getting involved in the exhibition creation process itself. They also have discovered fundamental laws of physics related to light, mechanics, fluids and then have been able to explain them in their own words in a simple, funny and engaging language. They are the protagonists of it all. They appear on a video seen on a flat screen device behind an actual physical experiment that can be use in the gallery.
On the other hand, the Tech Museum professionals have been able to learn more things by sharing with this true protagonists of the museum and they have been able to share this experience with this special visitors. The President of the Tech Museum said that there is no better way to measure the impact of the Museum than to see how this kids are explaining scientific laws and experiments. It is a way of measuring not so much related to quantities of visitor but to the quality of their learning.
Finally, other new visitors will be able to experiment and understand science thanks to the videos recorded by other previous visitors: the girls and boys we have alreadya mentioned. Everyone, eventually could become the start of the “Tech Challenge Gallery”, because this is a process that is alive and well and will be kept going by all people involve, staff and visitors alike.
The Tech Museum will create a new lab, where boys and girls will be able to shoot their own videos explaining what they have learned while performing experiments and other activities in the center.
This exhibition, however, is not only for kids. Adults can also enjoy it. The Expolab Team (Irene Lapuente and Ramon Sangüesa) have been there too and enjoyed playing with wheel gears, peg tops and prisms. We think that this kind of initiatives help not just to bring science close to people but also let the younger ones appropriate by science themselves. Congratuilations to the Tech!
Expolab collaborates with the Tech Virtual Workshops in San Jose, California, awarded with the Linden Prize 2010
The Tech Virtual Museum Workshop has been awarded with the annual international Linden Prize 2010, a virtual space in which Expolab Citilab has made innovative contributions highly valued by both the San Jose museum itself and the organizers of the competition. The award is promoted by Linden Lab, creators of Second Life virtual world. The award was created by Linden Lab, the founders of the virtual world Second Life. The competition was tough, and Tech’s proposal was chosen from over 130 different projects. The award recognizes residents of Second Life or teams with $ 10.000 for innovative projects within Second Life to improve the way they work, learn and communicate in their everyday lives outside of this virtual world.
A more participatory exhibition spaces The project Expolab has collaborated closely with the Tech Virtual Museum by creating a new concept of participatory exhibition where designers around the world have submitted prototypes that will become a corporeal exhibition in Citilab. The best projects were chosen on April the 8th by public voting online and offline (114 votes), both in our country and tin he USA with few hours difference.
These contributions have surprised the jury and have contributed in favor of the Tech proposals. Expolab was the first of its virtual workshops open to the participation of the all the cubes which made up the exhibition (and not just a single module, as before) and, moreover, that the winning projects were chosen by an open poll, instead of being chosen by a selected committee.
At the moment, we have already chosen the contents collectively through workshops and meetings with more than 60 people, co-created modules exhibition in Second Life with contributions from people of all ages and regions of the world, chosen the most popular modules by voting online and offline, worked on the final design,. So now we have to start building and transfering to the physical world, this exhibition that has been created in the virtual world with the participation of people worldwide. It is time to start thinking about how to co-create workshops and tours for visitors who will develope the activities they want and need to enjoy this exhibition.
Institutional recognition
However, this is not the only news related to Expolab. These days we know that this project has been selected for the meet program grants from the Spanish Foundation for Science and Technology (FECYT), among more than 2.000 nominations. Good news, wich certainly will encourage this project and consolidate and develop new ones in the field of science and technology communication.
During the months of April and May, Expolab team has been working hard on getting the final design of the first exhibition “From the contemplation of participation, and beyond.” Our starting point was the modules chosen by the general public: Connections, photography, digital sky, the bank of ideas and what is your opinion about security, and from there, we have worked on the details and the homogeneity of the whole exhibition.
This is an idea of the how the seven modules will look:
From now on we will start the construction work, and finally, we will see how the contribution of many people is embodied in a physical exhibition!
However, do not think that participation has come to an end, there are still many stages where we need ideas, requests, suggestions of all the people who are following this project. We will let you know all the activities we are planning in order to develope activities, courses and events around this exhibition as soon as we know the dates…
The opening day is getting closer and that makes us be very exited… At the moment, we can celebrate that we have a final design!
The second workshop, “2.0Projects and practices in cultural institutions” organized by the Centre for Contemporary Culture (CCCB) and Citilab was held on April 28th in the Sala del Mirador at the CCCB. Again, a large number of participants got together to work and define six projects involving the participation of users.
Here are their proposals:
Archiu-us
An area but also a conceptual map for revising the concept of a library.
The user may access the production of the “official” cultural industry in multiple formats.
Additionally, the user can produce and consume all users’ production.
It is a structure on the net, where everybody can have access to its content
The role of the library is to offer tools and facilitate more active roles.
For example, materials are stored related to personal memory (personal testimonies).
Seeking to construct a community where the library has an active role in improving its materials.
As a physical space it has ana are for cataloguing and accessing content and another one for production of content.
The cataloguing (also participative) would be organized by using an open subject list and keywords.
A model of copyleft licences for users’ works with different options would be used.
I-lab (laboratory of Ideas)
A virtual Project open to institutions and individuals for spreading ideas.
Any institution can take their “needs” to link them and work on them.
A facilitating area based on tagging ideas.
It pursues the goal of “democratizing” culture and to collaborate with its environment.
It would enable ideas and people who are currently disconnected to be grouped together.
Uusers can bring in projects in which they wish to work.
Despite being virtual it could also have a physical space or reference.
It is devised mainly to act only as a connector, with no subsequent follow up of what comes out of it.
“Be the expo”
Project to make scientific learning more participative, where the user feels part of the process.It offers two possibilities for participation:
A dynamic process for choosing collectively the subject-areas for the exhibition.
Concrete Identification of aspects to exhbit in the chosen subject-area.
In both cases we take a look at what is filtered through the criteria of experts.
The users are consulted about how the exhibition should be articulated.
People are invited during the process to learn and be more active in the subject-area under consideration.
One can interact on-line by modyfing from home the objects and elements exhibited.
The exhibition can be modified during the participation process.
Not only do we promote opinion, but we actively modify what happens in terms of personal presence.
The exhibition is strengthened because it has an online discussion and reflection area outside the reach of the museum or institution that hosts the physicial exhibitions.
Dynamic processes are promoted to “protagonize” elements of the exhibition (in virical simulations for example).
Traffic
Project to be located in low transing areas: waiting areas, hubs, the global “non-places”.
It developds in three phases:
Communication with a diverse audience using these “non places”: open questions about what use to give this space are posed there.
Design of a concrete installation in the space that responds to the requests.
Celebration of events, actions, exhibitions, concerts, based on the inputs received from users.
Example: the waiting-hall and passageway in Terminal 1 at Barcelona airport
it is a place where users can decide what is going on in terms of cultural experience.
The area would be filled with content promoted and generated online or in person.
The user can add content and suggestions or be just a mere spectator.
It could, for example, be a platform for emerging creators, who base their ideas around proposals given by users.
A virtual idea board would be set up to participate from distance or in person, in advance or in situ.
At an economic level it could be opened to commercial sponsors, or promoted as an opportunity to give added value to the space for the manager of that transit space.
Open door
Online project facilitating connections between youn creators and promoting them, acting as a launching pad for young creators.
It proposes three lines of action:
Training: access to knowledge for artistic and cultural creation based on transversal dynamics of sharing between users, on the one hand, and, on the other, by experts in specific aspects that act as consultants for creators.
Promoting actively the motivation and facilitation of productions. The platform here serves as a channel for networking and distribution of expert advice.
Publicising the works created via a web presence and networks of contacts that grow around the platform.
There is also a plan for an functional area for those professionals in charge of run galleries as well as experts so that they can detect talent via access to the platform.
it will also work as a motivational element with emphasis on learning, on the one hand, and on the other recognition for contributions.
The first kiss
Project based on the possibilities of participation around personal stories about the first kiss
This is used as an example proposal, but it aims in general to the goal of achieving cultural ressonance from projects built around vital experiencies
It aims to provoke and promote things to happen public areas
In this case, it could start at the well known “Carrer dels Petons” (Street of Kisses) in the gothic quarter of Barcelona
It would use a video-photo-booth where people could explain their first love by telling anecdotes about the experience of their first kiss
People can invited or be invited to enact this first kiss. Also, famous first kisses on history of cinema can be used.
Street sings would be set up to identify and locate the initiative.
A webpage would publish the content, and would also be visible from the place where people sign up.
The project aims to detonate experiences, spark significant action.
It is open to all ages, as well as in its use to connect with personal stories.
Project and platform should be designed so that they can be used for other similar experiences.
If you want to see more photos from this event, you will find them in Flickr!
During the months of April and May, Expolab team is working hard to make the most votes prototypes generated digitally in a virtual world like Second Life. The idea is to create an exhibition that makes a short tour on the science, the technology and the humanity behind the changes that Internet and new technologies has generated in our lives. However, we want to build an exhibition with more than one way of reading it and we will ask visitors to propose their personal route and even to tell us how they would use the space for creating activities and workshops around this contents.
We show you some images of this process and we look forward to hearing from you!
Today we have organized the voting session at Citilab and online to find out which proposal the most popular. The polls are now closed! People could vote either via the blog (in Catalan, Spanish and English) or in situ at Citilab using the platform located to http://expolab.net/local/. After adding up all votes (114 total) the winner is… Maria Bobes, with her design proposal proposed “Connections“!
If you want to feel closer to what happened today, listen to the following audio tracks:
Irene Lapuente explaining what proposal has won and what will happen afterwards with it
Maria Bobes talking about her views before knowing the results (in Spanish).
We leave these tracks for you to listen and we go to celebrate. We have a lot of work to homogenize all proposal because we have to start building the physical exhibition very soon!
In this post you’ll find the link to the platform that lets you vote the exhibit that you like the most. Remember that you can only vote once and for a single exhibit proposal.
With these votes we are looking to find out which is the exhibit prototype that you like the most. Bear in mind that the most voted option will be finally built to the meet and it will be possible to see them if you visit Citialb Cornella. Therefore you have to take into account in your assessment how feasible you think the exhibit proposal is. We also want you to know tell you that the exhibition we are preparing will have as a title: “From contemplation to participation and beyond”. It main goal is to show how new technologies (for example, the Internet) have changed our lives. We want the exhibition to show anedcotes that illustrate the socia effect of the technologies but also, and very importantly, to make very understandable the science and technology that is behind all this changes. This exhibition is part of a project that aims to introduce public participation into the world of sicence and technology exhibitions, so do not forget the value of participative aspect that the an exhibit that you like may have. It is an important factor. You will find more information about the projects in previous posts and at the Tech Virtual Museum web page.
Thank you for your cooperation and we are looking forward for your vote!
Tonight has been very active, almost looked like the Christmas night. We woke up, and there were 5 new proposals that filled the projects folder on the website at theTech Museum. We will briefly describe and explain them to you and we’ll continue working in order to have everything ready to start voting today from 22 pm on, local time in Barcelona.
Memory Launch
Memory Launch is an installation that suggests sending memories in video or photo format from any place in Citilab to the friends of the visitors. These friends are in different places, outside Citilab.
The Internet has changed the way we share memories in that we can almost “transmit” them to people who are far away. Memories are shared by photo and video but also by souvenirs… Send them to your friends (or to home) from this cube! How does this change the notion of memory versus what it is happening now?
These ideas was proposed by Kyle Walker.
Message Modes
This cube explores and tests the experience of three different types of communication. It allows visitors to send messages to someone else on the other side of the cube by using three means: writing, chat, and videoconferencing. Visitors can observe and enjoy their experiences using these types of communication. Which one is faster? Is there any difference in how we communicate using a medium or another?
This proposal was made by Bob Ketner.
Dynamic Docuverse
The “docuverse” is a concept that was coined by Ted Nelson in 1974 when he conceptualized the Internet as a centralised source of information. Now, the Internet allows documents to be changing forever, and many versions of a document may exist across the Internet. Besides that, documents themselves change as we edit them in multi-user platforms. The Internet now allows us to have such documents that are aso dynamic that the concept of what a document is is put into question. This cube discusses how collaborating on a document in real time changes our conception of documents in general.
This proposal was made by Bob Ketner.
The world is flat
On a computer screen, the world is flat. It is in this flat world where people connect and visit various places through videos, images, text, etc… In this module the visitor can use four touchscreens. Each screen offers him or her several options: Google Earth, Google Images, YouTube and a webcam, and visitors are free to travel in two dimensions around this flat world and share it with others.
This proposal belongs to Huodig Nguyen.
Future workspace
This installation represents a preview of a workstation of the future. It shows how different employees will use the same window. Each table will have a set of screens placed in a circle and so people will be able to work in different projects.
This was one of the first proposals, which has finally been documented by Daffodil Yuhara.
Tonight you will be able to vote!
You see, this is a box of surprises! Stay in touch with us and we look forward to receive your votes on-line or accompanying us tomorrow, Thursday April, the 8 starting at 17h, in Citilab. Remember that at 18:30 pm (local time in Barcelona) we will close the votes space, so do not miss it!
There are two days left to vote what is the design you like the most of all the proposals we have received during these weeks. Yesterday we published a post explaining all the projects we received so far … but today we woke up with a new proposal!
Jose Maria Marimon has sent us a proposal of a generic design that includes the aesthetic and conceptual definition of the entire exhibition. He proposes a conceptual and aesthetic thread for all the modules. The current contents of each module are simulated. To obtain this proposal, he studied the basic concepts that lie inside computing and the Internet:
The code: Binari Code
The essence of the Internet is digitization. All information contained on the Internet is made up of zeros and ones. The binary code is code that is written on, manages and stores all information on the Internet. Without the binary scanning process would not exist much of today’s technology, much less Internet.
The channel: The Net
Internet Moreover, the Internet network is built upon a digital communications protocol called TCP-IP. This is based on the packaging and transmission of information through standardized packages. The format of these packets is always the same, and within these packages are the data. To put it more simply, the messages are evenly divided and transmitted one after another. The receiver receives the packets and restores the original message. On the Internet all information is sent through TCP-IP.
The content: The Image.
The third concept which is built on the aesthetics of the proposed exhibition is the pixel. All images are digitized and are made of pixels. Pixels are the smallest unit of which digital images are built. The images are not more than a million stored color rectangular packages. Therefore we can also think that the images are divided and packed package infinity.
From three concepts (binary code, packaging information, and the nature of pixelated digital images) he has come to imagine each of the modules built 2m x 2m, in turn, with 0.5 m square cubes that could be placed and customized according to our convenience.
This same solution could be adopted in all communication materials, including those containing audio-visual exhibition and he made a nice example of it:
Meanwhile, other projects have also appeared in Second Life without any documentation. Unfortunately we can not consider as valid those proposals that do not contain a picture and a description … Therefore, we encourage all those who have participated, but who have reach halfway, to finish entering the necessary data… There is just one day left to do it, so don’t hesitate!!
Easter Holidays ended, and with them, the deadline for submitting designs to the first exhibition organized by the Expolab project. For nearly two months, designers and fans around the world have contributed their ideas and suggestions via the Web and Second Life in the virtual space Citilab has built within the Tech Virtual Museum of California island on Second Life. So far, we have collected ten complete proposals which include the design and full description of the corresponding idea and its realization. We also received six other proposals that are still in the making.
This post wants to share with you all of them as a warming up for the voting day. The vote will take place on April 8th. We’ll wait for your at 5 pm at the Citilab entrance hall. Try not to miss the drinks and the atmosphere we will enjoy in this meeting!. However. if you cannot make it, and as we want to leave no one out, you will always be allowed to vote online! (We’ll tell you soon how you can do that).
Proposals of the participants
Bank of Ideas
Contributed by Bob Ketner. It represents a large bowl full numbered cards, each with its own text and image corresponding to an idea. Visitors take a card from the bowl and suggest a new proposal and they give it the same number of the corresponding image or text. Each new proposal will become part of the bowl. In that way, all the initial ideas of the initial proposals will evolve towards new suggestions. The original numbering of ideas is maintained in order to be able to track the evolution of ideas. This cube is intended to analyze what are links like, that is, how the links on the internet help us make our thinking evolve.
This is the analogic part of the proposal. The digital counterpart will be worked through and through by using Twitter hashtags, i.e, small sets of letters preceded by the symbol “#” that are used to identify tweets related to a specific topic.
What’s your point of view about security?
This cube is made by Marie and Stephen Crandell. It analyzes the visitors’ feelings of security in relation to past and present times. It proposes the creation of two rooms within the cube. In one of them there will be a figure representing the old “serenos” (night watchmen). There will also be a person who would open the door for you. This person is allowed to enter and leave the cube whenver she or he wills. In a second room, a CCTV camera would be installed and show its images in another part of the exhibition.
On the outer part of this cube, a white wall would encourage visitors to use graffittis to explain how they have felt while inside the cube. In particular, they will be invited to commento on which of the two experiences made them feel better (the person sneaking in side every now and then or being watched by a CCTV camera). The remaining outer walls of the cube would be used to explain how CCTV cameras work and what is their history. They also would be used to show the tweets of all those who participate in the exhibition. In that way, the boundaries of the exhibition would be pushed. This cube also propose to use some kind of hashtag (such as #cctv, for example) and to encourage anyone who has seen or come across a CCTV camera in any place to use a tweet with that hashtag to tell the rest of the wolrd where the camera was located and how he or she has felt about it. So, visitors themselves would be watching the cameras around.
Connections
This proposal is designed with the help and support of Maria Bobes. It discusses the connections between people and social networks. These concepts are represented by two walls. On one of them the relationships that the visitors hold with other people would slowly add up by means of threads of different colours and textures tied up by visitors. On the other wall, they would be asked about how many “strong” and “weak” relationships they can maintain.
Pin Analog Scanner
This proposal was contributed by Philip Dolman. It explores the world of work and globalization in the fields of design and construction. It is an interactive illustration of the globalization of design. It proposes to build a cloud of points for each visitor who approaches the cube, digitize it and build a small object from the resulting digitization.
This proposal seems quite interesting … but what challenge to build it! Let’s see how it evolves!
Social Networks
This design was made with support of Lars Stalling. On the inner part of the cube a video is shown in order to observe interactions between people. This video can be made in a participatory fashion. In fact, it would be possible to offer workshops in order to train people to make the recordings and to create videos. In this way, the visitors would end up modeling the scene showed on the cube.
On the outer walls of the cube the science behind networks would be explained: types, structure, evolution … and much more more!
Digital Skies
Charming proposal from Bob Ketner. It analyzes travel through space and time in the Internet era. It creates an insulated cube where visitors are asked to enter data about the place where they would like to travel and also its time zone. A screen would display images of the chosen location and the lighting system would simulate the amount of sunlight or darkness in the chosen area. If at the time of visiting the exhibiton it were night time at the selected city, you could see on the cube’s ceiling all the stars in this region at this time of the year. So, one would recreate a live global travel experience.
Although the visitor actually performing the virtual travel would be isolated from the outer side of the cube, other visitors on the outside of it would be able to see what was happening in the inside by means of, for example, the use of polarized glass
Thanks to this exhibition it would be possible to get Citilab and the Tech Museum more connected.
Sharing memories: photography
This cube was developed by the Expolab team at Citilab. Its origin comes from one of the anecdotes that were told during the Expo-design workshops. It analyzes the evolution from analog to digital cameras and its associated social impact. In the past, we only had a couple of pictures that were highly significant to us, whereas now, we have a thousand pictures of every corner. The photo developing process, based on chemical products, imposed physical constraints that prevented the excessive manipulation of photographs. Now, however, the use of semiconductors and the translation of light into ones and zeros, i.e., into the language of computers, allows us to manipulate that information easily.
Within this cube the basic operation of a camera is also shown. A set of lenses that is used both by analog and digital cameras is also on display and the construction of a stenopeic camera is proposed. We encourage visitors to upload their photos via Flickr to share them with the rest of the public.
A shrinking world, growing connections
This contribution is made by Rob Stephenson. It represents a map of the social network of a person before and after the Internet. It uses a globe to encourage visitors to map their friends and acquaintances around the world. It invites us to reflect about where were the people with whom we were related before Internet.
The Evolution of Social Networks
This proposal has been designed by Jason Spriggs, a contributor under 18, and also a member of the Teed Greed. Jason wants to talk about how social networks started with the neighbors and have become a business.
The Introductory cube
This cube has been codesigned by the Citilab-Expolab and Tech Tech Virtual Museum teams. We are still working to create an introductory cube that will display the whole process by which this exhibition has been made. We also will and where we will invite visitors to recommend visit itineraries to new visitors.
The image we have is still a sketch that must be improved so that visitors can get to know every person that has been involved in the creation of the first Expolab exhibition, which are many! Also we want to share with visitors the images of all the prototypes that were created in the process and all the good ideas that have been generated, since all that material is Creative Commons. Last but not least, we don’t want to create a cube where only the voice of the organizing team is heard, and that’s why the visiting recommendations are left to participation.
These are the proposals that have been more thouroughly developed. However, all along the co-design sessions and meetings in Second Life other prototypes have been created. These ideas and prototypes could be finally completed and en up making their way to the final exhibition if you vote for them. We don’t want to leave any idea out of your scrutiny!
So here you have them too:
Travel in time and space thanks to the Internet
Instantaneousness: travel in time and space
Evolution of Social Networks II
Other proposals
We appreciate your feedback on this blog … We also encourage you to come to Citilab on April 8th , 5 pm, to vote the proposals that you liked the most! Do not miss the opportunity to participate in this first exhibition of Expolab, a new way of understanding the exhibitions that opens them to the public! Come on, join us, tell us your opinion!
Today, The Tech Museum president, Dr. Peter Friess, officialy opened the exhibition “The Tech Challenge Gallrey”. This exhibition shows to new visitors, more than forty totally interactive experiments prepared, narrated and explained by other visitors: boys and girls that have collaborated in this gallery explaining experiments on video.
Finally, other new visitors will be able to experiment and understand science thanks to the videos recorded by other previous visitors: the girls and boys we have alreadya mentioned. Everyone, eventually could become the start of the “Tech Challenge Gallery”, because this is a process that is alive and well and will be kept going by all people involve, staff and visitors alike.
This exhibition, however, is not only for kids. Adults can also enjoy it. The Expolab Team (Irene Lapuente and Ramon Sangüesa) have been there too and enjoyed playing with wheel gears, peg tops and prisms. We think that this kind of initiatives help not just to bring science close to people but also let the younger ones appropriate by science themselves. Congratuilations to the Tech!
Expolab collaborates with the Tech Virtual Workshops in San Jose, California, awarded with the Linden Prize 2010
An area but also a conceptual map for revising the concept of a library.
Project to make scientific learning more participative, where the user feels part of the process. It offers two possibilities for participation:
Project based on the possibilities of participation around personal stories about the first kiss
Memory Launch 
This cube has been codesigned by the Citilab-Expolab and Tech Tech Virtual Museum teams. We are still working to create an introductory cube that will display the whole process by which this exhibition has been made. We also will and where we will invite visitors to recommend visit itineraries to new visitors.
