Transfer scenarios is a method developed to support the
design of innovative interactive technology. Such a method
should help the designer to come up with inventive ideas,
and at the same time provide grounding in real human
needs. In transfer scenarios, we use marginal practices to
encourage a changed mindset throughout the design
process. A marginal practice consists of individuals who
share an activity that they find meaningful. We regard these
individuals not as end-users, but as valuable input in the
design process. We applied this method when designing
novel applications for autonomous embodied agents, e.g.
robots. Owners of unusual pets, such as snakes and spiders,
were interviewed - not with the intention to design robot
pets, but to determine underlying needs and interests of
their practice. The results were then used to design a set of
applications for more general users, including a dynamic
living-room wall and a set of communicating hobby robots