É. Urcades

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Flowers

On November 16th, Cal and Osebo and I visited Omar and Andre of Folk. It was a great get-together and the first time I’ve witnessed a Dynamicland-like system in person. It was awe-inspiring, to say the least. I’m hoping more opportunities to visit the system (or similar systems) will arise in the future.

Some topics we covered in no particular order:

  1. papercraft i/o
  2. mindstorms robotics kit paper pad
  3. AprilTags and what comes after
  4. mise en place
  5. pilgrimage
  6. CNC alignment
  7. environmental website building
  8. computer vision
  9. folklore form factors
  10. animism

It had been several years since I last visited this particular warehouse Folk was located in. Back then, Cal and I worked out of a single studio bay and it was here we came up with some pretty novel ideas about personal/general/environmental computing that remain extremely relevant to some recent developments in general computing.

I was inspired to dig up some old sketches we’d worked on together or adjacent to one another approximately around this time.

One of these days I’ll take the time to explain in detail some of what we’d been thinking about, and why it remains relevant.

An illustration of a vibrant halo. A diagram explaining the structure of Learning Gardens, an organization for non-institutional learning. An illustrated card for seeking out mods for Learning Gardens A design of an interface for the so-called Pebble project. A Pebble was an object which sampled its immediate environment and built a digital structure that was derived from the sample(s). A design of an interface for the so-called Pebble project. A Pebble was an object which sampled its immediate environment and built a digital structure that was derived from the sample(s). A design of an interface for the so-called Pebble project. A Pebble was an object which sampled its immediate environment and built a digital structure that was derived from the sample(s). A design of an interface for the so-called Pebble project. A Pebble was an object which sampled its immediate environment and built a digital structure that was derived from the sample(s). A design of an interface for the so-called Pebble project. A Pebble was an object which sampled its immediate environment and built a digital structure that was derived from the sample(s). A design of an interface for the so-called Pebble project. A Pebble was an object which sampled its immediate environment and built a digital structure that was derived from the sample(s). A design of an interface for the so-called Pebble project. A Pebble was an object which sampled its immediate environment and built a digital structure that was derived from the sample(s). A pre-LLM interface for constructing text alongside an artificial presence. An unsolicited sketch of an are.na interface for allowing text within text blocks to link to channels. This existed before backlinking was popularized/productized by Roam Research and clones. An unsolicited sketch of an are.na interface that made use of a note/text editor as a means to populate channels. Early representations of New Computer Working Group Early representations of New Computer Working Group. The journey from screens to cairns. A sketch of a projector interface. A sketch of a lifestyle product called New Effects, which was a collaboration between Cal and Toby and I. We were wondering what it'd look like to turn filters into a lifestyle brand. Deconstructing web forum interfaces to find common pattern. A few cards designed for a workshop to facilitate participants imagining themselves as infrastructure. An interface for a so-called 'Oral History Computer', for Laiyi Olson. A sketch of a captive portal for Soft Surplus, as a part of the Soft OS project. A sketch of a captive portal for Soft Surplus, as a part of the Soft OS project. A sketch-explainer of a captive portal for Soft Surplus, as a part of the Soft OS project. An out-take of the annotation computer project. A sketch of Soft OS, in which we wondered how to make use of e-ink tags. A sketch of Soft OS, a page for an object in the environment. A sketch of Soft OS, a page for an object in the environment. A sketch of Soft OS, a page for an object in the environment. A presentation of some of the major themes we were investigating as a part of the Soft OS project.

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