In an attempt to keep track of the ever-growing number of ubiquitous devices and pervasive systems, I wrote up a brief taxonomy of “networked objects” for a class last year. I’m reposting an excerpt now as a blog entry because, well, a couple of people said they found the original paper useful. Most of the projects I see these days fit into a few rough categories: surrogate objects, network displays, remote controls, and community devices. The categories are not mutually exclusive; rather, they describe a range of functions shared by many devices hooked into networks.
Paired objects function as surrogates. They are the physical equivalent of software avatars in that they “act for” a remote user. Paired objects enable reciprocal communication between two (or sometimes more) people in different locations. As such, they are tied to one location (typically, the office) or are location independent. What’s important is the one-to-one connection between the objects. Cf: “Feather, Scent, Shaker,” “One2One,” “LumiTouch,” etc.
Network displays, like the AmbientRoom and Natalie Jeremijienko’s LiveWire, are location-independent. Unlike paired objects, their main function is not two-way communication. Instead, network displays represent the status of a larger system. They pull data from the system but cannot affect it.
Remote controls use physical proximity to deliver location-specific information and services. They are usually mobile. Using a mobile phone to turn on a computer speaker or find out what song is currently playing over loudspeakers are both good examples. Whatever protocols they use to connect to their “parent” devices, remote controls facilitate seemingly one-way communication. They make the world “clickable,” as Howard Rheingold would have it. The point of remote controls, of course, is that the users always initiate action. You click on the world; it doesn’t click on you.
Community devices is the most poorly populated category. They manage relationships within groups of people, usually based on location - as in Gerd Korteum's task-negotiating agents or the LoveGety. Like paired objects, community devices express information about their owners. Unlike paired objects, they act as semi-independent agents, not surrogates.
