The Limitless Hug
In one short film titled Motorcycle, 3-D images of a street in Brooklyn play onscreen, the roar of the engine fills the ears, chemical scents sting the nose, and the body shakes as the seat below vibrates, while artificial wind grazes the cheeks. With cinematographer Morton Heilig’s “Sensorama”, the 1962 movie transforms into an immersive experience that engages all the senses, according to online technology blog network, Engadget. As much as the experience looks, sounds, and feels like cruising down the road on a tricked-out bike, one really sits on a bucket chair mounted in front of a refrigerator-sized metal box, perhaps thousands of miles away. Fifty years ago, Heilig’s “Sensorama” was one of the world’s first efforts at “recreating” reality by taking it out of its space, and transplanting it where it was wanted. In this case, a “motorcycle ride” through Brooklyn was possible anywhere, be it in St. Louis or San Francisco. Since the early 1960s, many inventors have followed in Heilig’s footsteps, each seeking to augment reality by liberating the sensations that accompany an experience from location.
As futuristic as this quest seemed half a century ago, Melissa Kit Chow, an artist and designer, who works in the field of immersive technologies that re-imagine sensory perceptions, recently designed “Like-a-Hug”, a wearable vest-like device designed to give a virtual “hug” to the wearer when he or she receives a “like” on Facebook. Consequentially, it would make location less important in physical interaction. Chow conceptualized and designed Like-a-Hug while studying at MIT, along with two of her classmates, Andy Payne and Phil Seaton as a way to preserve the physical connection to other people that is so often lost in social media.
In 2012, while taking a course called “Tangible Media” with Professor Hiroshi Ishii, the mastermind behind the famous touchscreen in Minority Report, she and her lab partners were challenged to create a machine that functioned using shape display, a technology that uses changing form to communicate information. Basically, shape display joins the physical world with the digital world.
The “eureka moment” that led to the idea for Like-a-Hug, however, did not emerge until the conversation between Chow and her lab partners drifted to the subject of long distance relationships. It happened that one of her lab partners had a long-distance girlfriend at the time, and he found that video chat programs, like FaceTime or Skype, were missing something, namely the physicality of in-person relationships.
“So,” Chow explained, “we were just kind of joking at the fact that what if you could hug somebody virtually?”
And from that joke, the idea for Like-a-Hug was born.
From an early age, Chow was a creative spirit, spending her time inventing her own games, playing piano, and attending a weekly art class in her hometown of Houston, Texas.
“Anything I did involved some kind of creative process,” Chow said when asked about her artistic nature, “It was just naturally what I tended towards.”
Chow didn’t delve into science and inventing, or what she calls “the technical aspects of creativity,” until more recently.
“I wanted to be an artist,” she said, “From a very young age, I’d imagine myself as an adult wearing a beret and a striped shirt like a French artist.”
The 31-year-old works for a design agency called MKG in New York, which specializes in, according to its website, experimental marketing, event planning, and digital integration. But on the side, she works as an artist and runs an artistic design company, MK+H, with architect Helena Slosar, a friend from graduate school. Together, they design and create public installation art for both public and private projects.
“Right now, we’re still at the stage where we’re trying to win projects,” Chow explained, “Within the field that we work… there’s not very much funding, and it’s very competitive. So right now, as young artists, really it’s our goal to just get our work out there.”
Much of Chow’s work for MK+H toys with the science of perception.
“I realized that a lot of my work was about perception, in how we perceive things,” she said, “and for me, that’s what I feel an artist’s job is to do, is to change the way that other people perceive and see things…”
One of her projects that aim to change the way people perceive and interact with their environment, called “Remembered Presence”, remains unfinished. But conceptually, it’s a “light-scape” with several layers that people can interact with. The first layer would consist of a pliant translucent material that has memory, or remembers your touch, like Memory Foam. The second layer would be embedded with pressure sensors that would emit different colored light depending on the amount of pressure applied, and for how long that pressure lasts.
“Your whole body would apply pressure onto it, and in that way, kind of record presence through light and form,” she explained.
Once the project is finished, she envisions it in a place where many people could interact with it, such as in a museum or art gallery.
For Chow, finding new ways to record information, different ways of interacting with environments, and toying with the science of perception, as in “Remembered Presence,” proved to be crucial elements in the development and designing of Like-a-Hug.
Chow and her lab partners discussed the concept of a virtual hug in context of social media, namely in reference to the “poke” button on Facebook. Chow noted that, among her friends, the usefulness of the feature was difficult to pin down, and didn’t seem to be very popular when compared to the network’s “like” button, although the “poke” feature is still in use. It was in this reflection that the notion of a virtual hug found its niche.
“This hugging motion was supposed to take the place of any kind of ‘poking,’” she said.
The idea of replacing of Facebook’s “poke” button was instrumental in choosing the network as the interface to support Like-a-Hug. Chow explained that few other sources would encourage such a reaction. And without an interface, the vest had no outside stimulation to respond to.
When asked about the practicality of such a project, Chow smiled and said it was tongue in cheek, “We really only pursued it because we thought that it would be more fun than our other ideas.”
Despite the vest’s lack of practicality, she went ahead with building a prototype. Chow designed and built the vest, Payne did the programming, and Seaton organized the storyboarding and filming of the group’s promo video.
“I don’t really sew,” she admitted, “I’d done it before, but this was my first stab at really making a solid piece of clothing. Really, I just started with a pattern, and then changed the pattern a bit. I definitely think that working in a three-dimensional way consistently, made it easier for me.”
The vest, made of an impermeable material, was hollow, which allowed it to be filled with air and lightly squeeze the wearer to simulate a hugging sensation. A small fan attached to the back of the vest, taken from an old sumo wrestler costume, inflated it by wireless activation from an infrared remote.
Chow clarified that Like-a-Hug was never actually connected to Facebook. The idea being that when someone received a “like” on the social networking site, Like-a-Hug would receive the data wirelessly and activate the fan to inflate the vest, which would simulate a hugging sensation. In turn, by squeezing the inflated vest, the receiver could give the sender a hug in return if they had a Like-a-Hug, and were wearing it at the time. This scenario only presented a problem if one of the two people was not wearing their Like-a-Hug when a hug was sent to them. In which case, the backlog of hugs would be given once the user turned on their vest again.
However, that entire aspect of the project remained conceptual. The process to do so would have required many more steps, including patenting the vest, and huge investments of time and money. The project was entirely funded by Chow and her lab partners. Although building the prototype cost them only about $150, no one was really willing to make the financial commitment to push the vest beyond a prototype. The group made a “promotional” video, which was posted on the Internet, but the vest itself was never marketed.
“We thought about patenting it, but really the only patent we could get would be a design patent, “ Chow said.
According to the United States Patent and Trademark office, a design patent protects only the physical look of an invention. Because Like-a-Hug was not functional, it did not qualify for a utility patent, which protects how an invention physically works.
The vest design would’ve also required major improvements, such as installing a pneumatic system, which would use pressurized air to inflate the vest at a controlled rate, and apply more pressure to the user to better simulate a hug, and obviously connecting it wirelessly to Facebook or a similar interface for external stimulation. So as of now, Chow and her partners have put the Like-a-Hug idea on hold.
However, the fact that Like-a-Hug was mainly conceptual didn’t keep it from being innovative or going viral. Stories about it ran in The Guardian, The Huffington Post, The Telegraph, and Forbes in October 2012.
“That was a really interesting experience,” Chow reflected, “There were a ton of articles, and it happened like overnight. I just woke up one morning, and I think I first found out through a friend of mine, who told me that she … saw that [Like-a-Hug] had appeared in an article.”
More surprising to Chow than the sudden interest in Like-a-Hug, were the negative reactions it first received from the press. Journalists and the public questioned the authenticity of a device that could give a “virtual hug,” insistent that it could never be a substitute for the real thing, despite the fact that Chow and her partners never intended it to be that way.
“I don’t think that it is designed to be a substitute,” she said, “I think that it was meant to be an enhancement of, say like, a video chat.”
Whether or not news consumers and journalists fully recognized Like-a-Hug’s intended purpose, its existence proved to be a popular launching point into discussions concerning both the futures of wearable technology, mixed reality, and social media.
“I do think the reason that this was picked up so much in the press was because it is something we are already moving towards with technology,” Chow explained, “We use haptic [interactive] technology like everyday in our lives already. And it’s only a stone’s throw away to apply it into what you wear everyday.”
Chow also attributed the hype to the current trendiness of wearable technologies, and the fact that it had been close to the ten-year anniversary of Facebook. Perhaps some saw devices like Like-a-Hug marking the next chapter of social media infiltration into our everyday lives.
Jeff Ramos, a social media and digital strategist who met Chow through her employer MKG, could also see the connection between the strong interest in Like-a-Hug and the uncertain future of social media infiltration into our lives, especially with its goal to add physicality to something as intangible as a “like” or a “poke.”
“I think the vest adds a deeper layer to what it means to like something,” Ramos said, “Especially if the person on the other end knew that their “like” would have a physical effect.”
It seems that merging wearable technology, shape display, which is a technology that uses physical form to communicate digital information, and social media, make social networking feel less impersonal, for which it is sometimes criticized. Yet, both Chow and Ramos were lukewarm to the idea of more personal and interactive social media.
“I have mixed feelings about it… I don’t actually use social media all that much,” Chow said, “I am much more of a face-to-face type of person. But I think it’s great for certain things. I have friends abroad all over the country, and it’s nice to have Facebook to see photos of their kids, or talk to them every once and a while via message. I use it as an enhancement to my social life, not as a substitute”
Ramos agreed, “For someone who uses and studies social media for a living, I use it very infrequently in my personal life. I don’t judge my life based on what others show and I don’t use social media to fill in the gaps in my attention like when I’m waiting for an elevator.”
Chow and Ramos agree that “mixed reality” devices will likely appear on the market in the coming years, that is, devices that create a semi-artificial environment or sensations, in Like-a-Hug’s case, the artificial sensation being a virtual hug. However, they disagree on their potential impact.
Author and futurist Alex Soojung-Kim Pang offered clearer insight into the world of “mixed” reality, and Like-a-Hug’s place within it.
According to Pang, mixed reality involves “giving tangible physical form to digital signals that are communicated remotely.” And in the case of Chow’s Like-a-Hug, giving physicality to Facebook “likes.”
He works at a Silicon Valley think tank called Strategic Business Insights, where he is a futurist who predicts the technological future. He makes predictions by interviewing engineers and entrepreneurs about their inventions, and observing different demographic groups, such as young people, who would likely take up new technology. From there, he is able to make educated guesses as to what new technology will appear on the market in the near future. His predictions are mainly used by business executives, product developers, and the government.
However, Pang emphasized the difference between mixed reality, and virtual reality.
It goes beyond traditional virtual reality, which has mainly been optical,” he said, “A lot of virtual reality has sought to create substitutes for the world around us; a virtual world in which we can interact, and which we experience as every bit as rich or compelling as the real world. Mixed reality does not try to substitute, but rather tries to bring into our everyday, what we used to think of as ‘offline’ experiences, signals from the digital world, or signals from social media.”
For example, exercising outdoors is usually considered a time to detox and unplug. However, fitness apps for the iPhone, such as MapMyWalk, can now keep track of your distance, your pace, and the amount of calories you burn, among other things, and using a voice built into the app, announce that data to you. Through that voice, digital data about your fitness habits mixes into your walking experience in a way that it could not before.
One of the few places the average person encounters virtual reality is in video games. In video games, the reality of the game replaces the reality of the gamer, to an extent.
“Mixed reality is much newer,” Pang said, “You can argue that things like the buzzers on cell phones, or on smart watches, are a very, very early form of mixed reality. They’re not particularly smart. There’s not an awful lot of mixing that goes on because the signal is very, very simple, but they are an effort to give a physical alert to a digital notification.”
So, when it comes to mixed reality, Pang believes we are still at the grunting stage.
However, it has come a long way in the last fifty years. According to The Next Web, an online tech blog, the term “mixed” or “augmented” reality was first coined in 1990 by Professor Thomas P. Cauwell, a researcher at Boeing. However, reality manipulation and augmentation experiments had been going on since the early 1960s, Morton Heilig’s bulky “Sensorama” device being one of the first real examples.
Since then, mixed reality has migrated into many facets of technology, like the previously mentioned fitness app, MapMyWalk, that vocally reports data to the user, and even real-time GPS trackers like Google Maps that actively direct users to a destination based on their real-world movements. In other words, if you own a smartphone, it is likely you have access to some form of mixed reality technology.
According to the Pew Research Center, 58% of adult Americans own a smartphone. That means that everyday, about 183 million people in the United States could potentially use mixed reality in the form of an app alone, and Pang believes this is only the beginning.
“The challenge,” he explained, “is to figure out what in that works, and what new opportunities we have to build on.”
One such place he sees new opportunity is in the field of wearable technologies. For example, Fitbit, a bracelet that keeps track of one’s fitness goals and data, is a device that Pang considers an early indicator that mixed reality, especially wearables, can be integrated into our everyday lives.
“I tend to think that mixed reality, by definition, involves wearable objects,” he explained.
He cited clothing, similar to the Polo Tech Shirt created by Ralph Lauren and Canadian tech firm Omsignal, designed for athletes that incorporate heart and muscle monitors, as mixed reality in the form of a wearable. Those monitors can alert the user of balance issues, asymmetrical muscle use, and heart rate.
He also mentioned smart watches and smart jewelry as examples of mixed reality embedded in a wearable, such as the Samsung Galaxy Watch, that incorporates a cellphone into a device you wear around your wrist.
So where does Chow’s Like-a-Hug fit into the mixed reality equation? Pang was certain that Like-a-Hug technically qualifies as mixed reality in the form of a wearable, given that one could wear the vest and theoretically receive physical feedback to social notifications. While Pang found the idea innovative and interesting, he had doubts about its practicality.
“I think that as a product, a vest that does nothing but hug, is not very likely to take off,” he said, “but as a demo project or prototype that might eventually find its way as a specific device that you would add to your existing clothing, it might hold some promise.”
Ramos agreed.
“It’s hard for me to imagine a world where [singular] use technology will fall outside the buying habits of enthusiasts or niche consumers,” he said.
However, Chow sees a lot of potential in Like-a-Hug as a sellable product once the design is further developed.
“For now, I think the tech crowd has the most interest in wearable technologies,” she explained, “but I also see this infiltrating into high fashion. I think those most interested in up and coming trends are most likely to have an interest and use the vest.”
Pang also clarified that if it were to be marketed worldwide, Like-a-Hug would have to be tailored specifically to different cultures.
“There are some cultures that are just really ‘huggy’ and others that are not,” he said, “So, a wearable device that seems cold and remote in one part of the world, will seem extravagantly intrusive in another part.”
Tuning into cultural differences is just one obstacle that Like-a-Hug, or any other type of device that mimics what is usually considered personal physical contact, would have to overcome.
“One of the biggest balances that designers have to work out is how much signaling is too much,” Pang explained, “It’s not really clear if people need that kind of sensory feedback from Facebook.”
Instead of an entire vest inflating to give users physical feedback to a Facebook “like”, something more discreet, like a cuff or a piece of jewelry, would be more appealing.
“It’s usually not the case that looking more like a technology is considered appealing by people,” he said.
A device like Like-a-Hug could be useful in the realm of therapy to offer stimulation and comfort to people with sensory issues, or for use in games such as laser tag, where the inflation of the vest could give the user a more forceful physical feedback to getting hit, which could make the game more compelling.
But in the future, according to Pang, the world will likely see a move away from devices that use external stimulation, like inflation in Like-a-Hug’s case. What we will see more of are devices that use electrical signals to recreate certain physical sensations, such as a handshake or a pat on the back. Pang believes such stimulation will be presented in smaller packages, therefore making them less socially awkward to use, and easier to hide.
It’s perfectly okay for a laptop to look like a technology,” he explained, “but things that you wear, things you put on your face, things that get in the way of people’s ability to read your emotions… have to be designed with far greater care. And generally, that involves designing them in a way that will be as unintrusive as possible.”
If devices that create a mixed reality, wearable or not, become less intrusive and easier to to integrate into our everyday lives, the question becomes how will these devices change the way in which we socialize?
According to Pang, the laws of socialization themselves will not change. In other words, these devices will not change what humans need in terms of social interaction, they will only change how we get it.
“These technologies have some really interesting effects on our ability to socialize with people at a very great distance,” Pang said, “But they generally have really had an effect on our ability to socialize with people at very close distances.”
Essentially, mixed reality devices, especially in the form of wearables that transform digital notifications into physical sensations like Like-a-Hug would, are great for communicating with a friend in another state, but not across a table.
“What technology changes the most is the way we interact with technology,” Pang explained.
And as technology evolves, especially in the field of mixed reality and wearables, our interactions with that technology will change as well. Our desire for socialization, and, according to Pang, our love for the relative simplicity of managing our online lives will remain the same.
What is important now is progress.
“I think that all tools have to be used thoughtfully,” Pang said, “Now that I think we’re past the point of these tools being cool because they’re new, is how to make them cool because they’re useful.”
Although Chow pursued the Like-a-Hug project despite the idea being somewhat impractical, as the fields of mixed reality and wearables continue to develop, devices that merge the physical and digital worlds will only grow in practicality.
When asked if we have entered the age of trial and error in our mission to figure out what works in terms of these new mixed reality technologies, Pang was quick to respond.
“It’s certainly the age of error, and a little bit of trial,” he said, “but these things are not going to go away.”
