Negative space of things: a practice-based research approach to understand the role of objects in the Internet of Things

This is a practice-based research thesis situated in the research context of the ‘Internet of Things’, and critiques contemporary theoretical discourse related to the 21st century turn of connecting everyday objects to the World Wide Web. In the last decade we have seen the ‘Internet of Things’ articulated predominately through three commercial design fictions, each a response to the shift towards pervasive”, “ubiquitous” (Weiser 1991), or “context-ware” (Schilit, 1994) computing; where we inhabit spaces with objects capable of sensing, recording and relaying data about themselves and their environments. Through reflecting upon these existing design fictions, through a new combination of theories and practice-based research that embodies them, this thesis proposes a recovery to understanding the role of objects in the ‘Internet of Things’, which this author believes has been lost since its conception in the mid 2000s. In 2000, HP Labs presented Cooltown, which addressed what HP identified as the ‘convergence of Web technology, wireless networks, and portable client devices provides’. Cooltown’s primary discourse was to provide ‘new design opportunities for computer/communications systems, through an infrastructure to support "web presence" for people, places and things.’ (Anders 1998; Barton & Kindberg 2002). IBM’s Smarter Planet followed this in 2008 and shifted importance from the act of connecting objects to understanding the value of data as it flows between these objects in a network (Castells 1996; Sterling 2005; Latour 2005). Finally, Cisco presented The Internet of Everything in 2012 and moved the argument on one stage further, identifying that the importance of connected objects lies in the sum of their communication across silos of networks, where data can provide potential insight from which you can improve services (Bleecker 2006). Despite these design and theoretical fictions, the affordances of the Internet of Things first proposed in the mid 2000s has regressed from data to product, driven largely by unchanged discourse argued by those designers at its conception and also the enticement of being the next Google acquisition; instead of pigeons reporting on the environmental conditions of a city (Da Costa 2006), we have thermostats controllable from your smartphone (www.scottishpower.co.uk/connect). Therefore the aim of this thesis is to re-examine the initial potential of the Internet of Things, which is tested through a series of design interventions as research for art and design, (produced as part of my EPSRC funded doctoral studies on the Tales of Things and Electronic Memory research project and also whilst employed as a research assistant on two EPSRC funded research programmes of work Sixth Sense Transport, and The Connected High Street), to understand how we use data to allow an alternative discourse to emerge in order to recover the role of a networked object, rather than producing prototypical systems

Developing a smartphone app to enhance Oxfam's supply chain visibility

This paper reports on the development of a smartphone app designed to give drivers and managers in a charity organisation greater visibility of transport, donation bank and shop stock in time and space. Trials of the app with samples of drivers and shop managers across three counties in the UK showed that users’ understanding of vehicle activity and how time was utilised in the business was enhanced. The app also informed their decision making, aided some collaboration and helped in their understanding of donation bank and shop performance, with one region altering their collection schedules. The quality of 3G signal was an issue in certain areas which impeded performance and the rules by which the messaging platform should be used in such a tool need careful consideratio

Fundamental challenges in designing a collaborative travel app

The growing capabilities of smartphones have opened up new opportunities for travel coordination and transport is a fertile area for app development. One stream of development is apps that enable collaborative travel, either in the form of lift sharing or collaborative shopping, but despite growing interest from governmental agencies, there is little evidence of the efficacy of such apps. Based on trials of purpose built travel collaboration apps, deployed in tourism, urban and rural residential communities, and logistics, this paper analyses the fundamental challenges facing users adopting such travel apps. The findings suggest that transport practitioners, policy makers and app developers need to better understand the challenges associated with attracting users, the use of incentives and the types of communities most appropriate to implement collaborative travel concepts using such approaches. Also, how the users’ sense of time pressure and the issues around reciprocal exchange can impact on their long-term success and wider adoption

Hmgcr in the Corpus Allatum Controls Sexual Dimorphism of Locomotor Activity and Body Size via the Insulin Pathway in Drosophila

The insulin signaling pathway has been implicated in several physiological and developmental processes. In mammals, it controls expression of 3-Hydroxy-3-Methylglutaryl CoA Reductase (HMGCR), a key enzyme in cholesterol biosynthesis. In insects, which can not synthesize cholesterol de novo, the HMGCR is implicated in the biosynthesis of juvenile hormone (JH). However, the link between the insulin pathway and JH has not been established. In Drosophila, mutations in the insulin receptor (InR) decrease the rate of JH synthesis. It is also known that both the insulin pathway and JH play a role in the control of sexual dimorphism in locomotor activity. In studies here, to demonstrate that the insulin pathway and HMGCR are functionally linked in Drosophila, we first show that hmgcr mutation also disrupts the sexual dimorphism. Similarly to the InR, HMGCR is expressed in the corpus allatum (ca), which is the gland where JH biosynthesis occurs. Two p[hmgcr-GAL4] lines were therefore generated where RNAi was targeted specifically against the HMGCR or the InR in the ca. We found that RNAi-HMGCR blocked HMGCR expression, while the RNAi-InR blocked both InR and HMGCR expression. Each RNAi caused disruption of sexual dimorphism and produced dwarf flies at specific rearing temperatures. These results provide evidence: (i) that HMGCR expression is controlled by the InR and (ii) that InR and HMGCR specifically in the ca, are involved in the control of body size and sexual dimorphism of locomotor activity

Tagging is connecting:shared object memories as channels for sociocultural cohesion

In Small Pieces Loosely Joined, David Weinberger identifies some of the obvious changes which the Web has brought to human relations. Social connections, he argues, used to be exclusively defined and constrained by the physics and physicality of the “real” world, or by geographical and material facts: "it’s … true that we generally have to travel longer to get to places that are farther away; that to be heard at the back of the theater, you have to speak louder; that when a couple moves apart, their relationship changes; that if I give you something, I no longer have it. " (xi) The Web, however, is a place (or many places) where the boundaries of space, time, and presence are being reworked. Further, since we built this virtual world ourselves and are constantly involved in its evolution, the Web can tell us much about who we are and how we relate to others. In Weinberger’s view, it demonstrates that “we are creatures who care about ourselves and the world we share with others”, and that “we live within a context of meaning” beyond what we had previously cared to imagine (xi-xii). Before the establishment of computer-mediated communication (CMC), we already had multiple means of connecting people commonly separated by space (Gitelman and Pingree). Yet the Web has allowed us to see each other whilst separated by great distances, to share stories, images and other media online, to co-construct or “produse” (Bruns) content and, importantly, to do so within groups, rather than merely between individuals (Weinberger 108)

Improving collection efficiency through remote monitoring of charity assets

Collection costs associated with servicing a major UK charity’s donation banks and collecting unsold goods from their retail shops can account for up to 20% of the overall income gained. Bank and shop collections are commingled and are typically made on fixed days of the week irrespective of the amounts of materials waiting to be collected. Using collection records from a major UK charity, this paper considers what vehicle routing and scheduling benefits could accrue if bank and shop servicing requirements were monitored, the former using remote sensing technology to allow more proactive collection scheduling. A vehicle routing and scheduling algorithm employing tabu search methods was developed, and suggested time and distance savings of up to 30% over the current fixed schedules when a minimum bank and shop fill level of between 50% and 60% was used as a collection trigger. For the case study investigated, this led to a potential revenue gain of 5% for the charity and estimated CO2 savings of around 0.5 tonnes per week across the fleet of six heterogeneous vehicles