research design laboratory

Memory Conference

I'm headed to Seattle (ICA preconf) to present a paper on Memory apps. We use memory theory to explore interface design. From the paper:

With an estimated 70 000 thoughts a day, the human brain can hardly contain the ideas and concepts it generates and processes. The brain is not a hard drive, unlike machines activity patterns of different neural networks and what it brings to mind. The instinct or inherent capacity to remember is less about the mechanical, the organizational, or the digital, but rather, as we argue through the case of hyperthymesics and amnesiacs alike, it is at once, emotional, visual and experiential. Instead of opting for an interface design that documents memories as an itinerary of experience and to recognise them in space and time, we opt for functionalities that are considerate of the complexities of human emotions as tied to experience, and also, as always already networked and collective.
 
As a preliminary finding, the foundation of a reimagined memory tool (and possibly the archive), must be based on flexible organic design that ‘feels’ more than it prescribes; it must engage us in the formation and recreation of memories rather than impose the past onto us.
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