Designing for Social Good
Screen based technology is a major hindrance in creating physical and wholesome interactions. A slight vibration and instantly your mind is distracted. When faced with the challenge of designing a piece of technology, either current or future imagined that fosters human-to-human interaction, I developed a new appreciation for technological design that brings people together. How would our society benefit if our humanity was at the focus of all technological designs?
Once my partner and I received the prompt, we both immediately agreed that a game app would be a perfect solution. We had a week to finish the project, and five days later we met in person to begin talking about the logistics. Soon after discussing we realized our concept- an improv game- was not going to work. We sat and bounced off ideas for two hours, coming up with solutions that didn’t stand a chance against our own criticism and doubt. We went outside of the studio and walked around the block. We started noticing the actions and interactions of the people around us, this was when we finally were able to begin truly thinking about what human-to-human interactions require to be substantial. Ten minutes later, we had a concept, one we were really excited about.
Our concept is designed around the idea that everyone knows something that the other does not. If one really thinks about this idea, they realize that there is an infinite amount of knowledge waiting to be tapped into. Teachers and students are the primary symbols of knowledge exchange, though that is only appropriate in the walls of school. These walls, my partner and I agreed, are ready to be taken down. To teach and to learn is a foundational aspect of human communication, fostering key communication skills and establishing vital shared experiences. If everyone has a skill, a piece of knowledge that the other does not, why wouldn’t we all act as teachers at one point or another? Where is our symbiosis?
Our design turned into an app. It is a social network that matches people with skills they are proficient in and people who want to learn those skills, and than vice versa. Going off of the idea that everyone knows something that the other does not, maybe two people are proficient in the skill that the other wants to know. The app matches users with their proficient skills and desired skills with a person who knows their desired skill but wants to learn their proficient skill. Essentially, it is to “swap skills”. Instead of money, the users spend their time and teach the other person the skill they want to know.
The idea started with language, and it seems to serve as the best example to portray the idea. Let’s say there is an Italian foreign exchange student studying in Boulder, CO. In Boulder, there is an American student leaving to study abroad in Italy the next semester. By simple life experience, they each have a vital skill that the other should know if they are to study well, or even find their way around in their new cities. By teaching each other, they can both gain the skill they want to know. No tutors, no school- just life experience and a map to this resource of knowledge.
As we kept conceptualizing, there was a beautiful symbiosis happening in the imagined interactions. Of course there are refinements needed and faults that need to be addressed. But in this short week long project, we came up with something that seemed to solve a real, present problem, all by using each other. There was something there. Something that technology, a screen based app, was cultivating. Technology doesn’t have to take away from our humanity. It doesn’t have to take us away from our current interaction. It can actually bring us together. In really cool, beneficial, and poetic ways.
