Visual Mapping of Stylus
Concept Note
The stylus has almost never existed as a device on its own. It has always been a part of a larger system. An attached tool. An extra input device. Our narrative essentially attempts to explore a couple of these larger systems that styluses were a part of, that were vital in its early history. We have attempted to look at how the development of these early devices/systems has had a lot of impact on the technology that is prevalent now. Our narrative is based on the work that has happened in the world of styluses between its genesis and before the 1980s, much before they entered the scene of handheld devices.
We all remember the days our phones/tablets had a small stick-like device that could be pulled out of its slot on the sides and be used to navigate, scribble and draw. There have been times when we have carelessly lost these tiny styluses or completely ignored them. And now we are in that time where these styluses have evolved to become more adaptable to the natural way of our writing or drawing. And they have become expensive too!
The way this little gadget has evolved into various forms with time and technology is what got us interested in getting into its history.
When we started collecting data, we observed that a majority of inventions and projects related to the stylus were based in the U.S., majorly in research laboratories like MIT Lincoln Labs and Bell Labs. And most of these projects were created for use in the US Military, Air force and Navy.
ARPA and DARPA were playing a major role in the research and development of various emerging technologies. At first, it would be hard to guess that something as minute as a stylus was a part of something bigger that was used in the US military forces. Our narrative makes an attempt to show this bigger scheme of things and also to understand how one thing at a certain time in a certain place influenced something else in a different time and place.
The search of our data was based on questions that we asked about the geography of these projects, the utility, the inspirations and the motivations behind them. It was fascinating to see how there is so much investment of time on research and development of various technologies. We looked into this device was used in the various projects, what physical forms it took in each of them. We also understood how the evolution of computers (in terms of form factor and capabilities) and input devices also has had an impact on the stylus. Also how marketing strategies have played a role and impacted the use of stylus.
With all this data, we chose to visually mind-map it, because it is a powerful learning tool which allowed us to understand the information we had in a better way and more quickly capture, organize, analyze, and share the information we had. It also enhanced our abilities to think and make inferences of our own about the device.
We plotted each of these projects we chose to historicize as nodes and put the information related to it in different color-coded branches. With the nodes in place, it became easier for us to make connections between them and to understand how the design and work of one node influenced the other nodes.
The biggest takeaway from our study of the history of the stylus is that there exists profound stories and people behind all the years of research and development work of even the littlest of things. And digging into these often hidden, forgotten stories and going back to the times of genesis of ideas has certainly given a new direction to the way we look at devices that are a part of our daily lives. Looking at innovation through the lens of history is a way to improve our understanding of Design and Technology.
While we were collecting data, we came across a piece of information that caught our attention, on how Steve Jobs felt about the stylus when the iPhone was about to be released into the market in 2007. “Who wants a stylus?” Jobs said while introducing the iPhone. “You have to get ’em, put ’em away, you lose ’em. Yuck! Nobody wants a stylus. So let’s not use a stylus.”
This got us thinking about how significant “icons” of technology can have an influence on how a device or a piece of technology is perceived by the masses across the world. This could possibly be another narrative that one could investigate.
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Submitted by Kshama M and Simran Mehta
