A loud team of childish Unsworn innovation facilitators host a series of workshops - involving pre-school personnel, collaborative media researchers, interaction designers and music teachers - exploring digital media to create new means of singing and music making for two to five-year-olds.

How do you want to Chronophone today?

Chronophone Switzerland

The Chronophone service allows people to call their future selves. You call now and record a message. In exactly one year your phone will ring. When you answer you will hear your own voice delivering that message from the past.

Cronophone premiered in Finland at Pixelache 2011. Just a few days ago the Swiss branch of the service was launched, in conjunction with the opening of Haus für elektronische Künste Basel.

Mixed feelings

So far people have approached their, real or imagined, Chronophone call with a mix of enthusiasm and caution. The weight of the task haunts some. Others see Chronophone vouchers as a perfect gift - a drop of long now injected into everyday life and chores.

One woman told us she would distribute Chronophone vouchers to her friends: “future moms and dads, grandmas and granddads, and aunts and uncles”. She herself is pregnant and will use the Chronophone to reflect on this time of change: “Everyone with kids tells you that once the baby is there life will change in unexpected ways. I have naturally heard this many times over and have grown to take it as the most likely truth - but that does not mean I have any clue of what really lies ahead.”

Another Chronophonist told us that she didn’t dare to use it: “What if I die and someone else is using my phone and they get a call from me…”

Stories wanted!

Learning about these stories is the greatest reward for us Chronophone providers.

What would you tell yourself in one year? Perhaps you’ve already used the Chronophone? If you like, you can share your stories here or email us: telecom at unsworn.org.

Kiitos, danke, tack!

PS. Check out more Unsworn Telecom projects at www.unsworn.org/telecom.

Telemegaphone Dale had a rough 2010. The windmill was hit by evil lightning and the pole was pushed by heavy snow. Erik and Magnus went back to Dale to oversee the installation of a new power system.

It’s started off great. Dale’s culture chief, Ingeborg, sent a Facebook call for dugnad and a motley group of battery carriers showed up to help us transport two 40 kgs lead batteries, one windmill, a solar panel and all that other stuff you just might need on the mountain. (You don’t want to climb down again to pick up that all-important screwdriver you forgot.)

Svein Ove and Kjetil climbed the pole, mounted the fresh wind generator and a spanking new solar panel - just in case. The amazing Telemegaphone electronics had survived the long winter and booted happily.

Great! Everything is back up and running!

This is when we decided to install that new, mind-numbingly powerful amplifier to get some extra sonic oomph on windy days…

Replacement speakers will be installed as soon as it stops raining in Dale. Stay tuned for a, hopefully, happy ending!

A few more expedition photos can be found here.

Thanks to nkd for letting us stay in their fine basement and use their workshop.

Bike path between Möllevången and Rosengård
Commissioned by the City of Malmö Unsworn Industries is running a project aiming at contributing to the development of Rosengårdsstråket – a bike path that stretches between Möllevången and Rosengård in Malmö. Expected outcome of the project is a number of interaction design concepts which in the next phase can be implemented, and set up along the pathway. The overall project aim is to stimulate movements, and increase the connection between the inner city and the suburbs to create a more sustainable city.

The concepts are developed in a prototype-oriented, interative design process. Besides City of Malmö and Unsworn Industries other partners involved in the project are Urban Art Solutions, Medea, Malmö University, and Do-Fi.

Workshops and prototypes
Up to now two workshops have been organised, and a number of prototypes designed and tested.

Prototyping sessions

Workshop # 1 on April 28, 2011

Workshop # 2 on May 12, 2011

During 2011 we will develop and try out new - pragmatic and extravagant - ways of visualising the history of the 700-year-old Bohus fortress.

IKON?

IKON is an EU-financed project with the aim to strengthen the tourism industry by developing new technologies, tools and solutions that enhance visitors’ experiences of historical sites, and cultural attractions. The project has 47 participating organisations from Norway, Denmark, and Sweden. As a part of IKON National Property Board Sweden (Statens Fastighetsverk) and the City of Kungälv have commissioned Unsworn Industries, in collaboration with Testbedstudioand Terje Östling, to develop and prototype a wide range of visualisation concepts at Bohus fortress in western Sweden.

Bohus fortess

The fortress was built in 1308 by the Norwegian King Håkon V. With its strategic location, next to the river Nordre Älv, and close to the borders of Denmark, Norway and Sweden, it has played an important role in Nordic power struggles. The fortress was besieged fourteen times, but has never been taken. In 1789 it was closed down and left to decay. Today the fortress is the main attraction of the city of Kungälv and open to visitors during the summer.

Prototyping historical visualisations

A range of events, activities, and guided tours are today offered to people visiting the fortress. IKON aim, by means of low and high tech innovations, to enhance the public activities to attract more visitors, both tourists and locals. How can we bring to life the historical treasures hidden behind the walls of the fortress without disturbing a sensitive site?

Our first experiment is a, yet unnamed, Mobile panorama application for smart phones and tablets that visualises, site-specific historical views, and layers. Inspired by the Parascope the app displays multiple panoramic visualisations of how the fortress might have looked like in the past. The users can immediately compare these views with the current millieu.

Another experiment, the Fickla Walk, explores ultra-violet (UV) torches and ink. When walking the walk using the torch to light up the UV markings, hidden messages are discovered, secrets revealed, and stories told. We have developed prototypes of both production methods and storytelling techniques. We are also researching how the UV-materials might affect these fragile historical environments.

On-site prototyping sessions in March and April 2011:

UPDATE: Check out these videos from the user-testing!

In the end of March, the City of Malmö hosted a meeting with delegates from the network Cities for Children. The aim of this European network is to offer cities the possibility to exchange, and develop progressive concepts across national borders on how to promote the well-being of children, young persons and parents in the urban environment.

In connection to the meeting Unsworn Industries organised a panorama workshop with a focus on developing multi-functional outdoor environments for children as well as office workers. The goal of the workshop was not only to discuss design matters, but also to get the chance to try out, and experiment with a new kind of tool for prototype-oriented city development, and citizen-dialogue - that is, the Parascope.

One hour panorama workshop
The set-up of the panorama workshop is based upon experiences made, and learnings gained from previous panorama workshops, e.g. in Gothenburg in collaboration with the Ingrepp research group, in Alnarp at the Movium conference, or in Nydala in collaboration with Medea.

The design brief handed out to the workshop participants was:
Re-design the yard outside the City hall into a multi-functional outdoor space to be used by kindergarten children, civil servants, and the general public.

The actual site they were to re-design was located just outside the window where the workshop took place. One hour was the impossibly short amount of time they had to their disposal to come up with a design proposal. The participants were working in groups of four, and visualised, tested, re-tested their proposals by sketching, drawing collages on panoramic images of the physical site. The panoramas they produced were digitalised, and uploaded on-line, as well as into a Parascope for swift comparison on-site, outdoors on the yard

Despite the tight workshop schedule, time-wise speakting, there were some very interesting ideas, and design-proposals developed. The workshop participants stated that they clearly could see benefits of applying this methodology in urban planning processes. They saw potentials in using the Parascope, and organising panorama workshops both when it comes to collaborative design processes involving urban planners and citizens, as well as when communicating ideas, and forthcoming changes.

Chronophone is a new telephone service that allows people to call themselves - one year from now.

When you call the Chronophone it automatically picks up and records whatever you say or do. Exactly one year later the Chronophone calls you back and replays the recording.

What would you tell your future self?

The Chronophone service is currently tested at the Pixelache festival in Helsinki. Get your Chrono-credits at the Pixelache info-desk! €1 = 1 call = 1 minute.

Chronophone is an Unsworn Telecom initiative.

Unsworn Telecom is kindly supported by Nordic Culture Point.

Unsworn Industries sent a massive delegation to Alnarp the other day. We lectured, workshopped and exhibited at the annual Movium conference, this year themed “Life in the City”. Some 200 people who work with “everything between the buildings” - from landscape architects to cemetary caretakers - attended.

Prototyping the city

Following prominent speaker like Martha Schwartz Erik and Magnus sharpened their powerpoint to the max and delivered a snappy presentation on prototype-oriented city development. The key message: by making potential futures more visible, audible, and tangible they are possible to discuss and evaluate, also for non-professionals. If we are seriously working towards a citizen-dialogue within city-planning we need new “prototyping” formats. The Parascope and its sibling projects is one experiment in searching for such formats.

Post-lunch panoramas

After a hearty lunch all participants were invited by Elisabet, Terje and Magnus to remain seated and get their hands dirty with pens, post-its and panoramas. The brief: turn the space outside the conference venue, “Bobos plats”, into a better meeting place. In one hour. The resulting panoramas were uploaded into a Parascope on-site for swift comparison. Thanks everyone for eagerly joining in!

Stainless steel showcases

Besides two Parascopes, we exhibited a fully functioning Megaphonebooth. Back from duty in Helsinki last summer the Megaphonebooth presents unexpected action spaces and new public communcation modes. It also proved a invaluable tool for the moderator to announce the upcoming lectures to espresso-busy, mingling conference-goers.

Malmö´s Western Harbour area sports a number of state-of-the-art, sustainable solutions for its energy, waste and water systems. These systems are mostly invisible to the untrained eye. Visual storyteller Arlene Birt created a “Behind the scenes” panorama for a Parascope during her residency at Medea.

“Wow, I’ve lived here for three years and I still didn’t have a clue how it all works”, exclaimed one of the locals.

Magnus calibrates the Parascope for perfect alignment with the Turning Torso.

Unsworn Web designed and produced www.mobilsyjunta.se - a crafty website for a series of ambulating SMS-embroidery sewing circles.

Slow embroidery and fast tech

Digital communication meets traditional craftmanship in Threads - a mobile sewing circle, a workshop that tours Swedish rural community centres throughout 2010-2012.

www.mobilsyjunta.se is the online extension of the sewing circles. It documents what is produced in the workshops, offers new trajectories through the material, and invite others to share their SMS-embroideries.

Collaborative development

The site was developed in close collaboration with initiators Åsa Ståhl and Kristina Lindström and producers Swedish Travelling Exhibitions. This allowed us to design a site that tightly integrates with the pyshical exhibition series.

Behind the eternal clotheslines a heavily customised WordPress installation powers the site. We created fresh plugins to allow a new type of “thread-based” navigation as well as custom uploads of SMS-embroideries from the web and mobile phones.