Jing Shen

I am a designer exploring the interaction and communication between human and machine. From the undergraduate stage, I began to use virtual and mixed media to deepen the capable volume of information of interaction between human and object, During my time in RCA, I tried to use different interactive media to narrate and discuss speculative topics, hoping to turn complex and abstract subjects into design work with higher engagement and more interactive interest. For the next step, I hope to continue the investigation of smart home, which is an interesting space with many touchpoints for design.

Education

2020-2022 MA Design Products, Royal College of Art

2015-2020 BA Industrial Design, Wuhan University

Under the context of the big data economy, the network platform built with tech companies centered influence on people profoundly but subconsciously. The following two mini projects respectively discussed two hidden labors based on the internet and machine learning, one is manual labor and the other is machine labor.

In my research, I found that there is a gap between understanding and perceiving. Many interviewees could vaguely describe how the big data and algorithms were nudging our decisions, but few of them keep digging because the knowledge involved was too complicated. Therefore, These mini games aim to transform complex information can be into experiences that can be perceived. They are visualizing virtual things, revealing hidden potential contradictions and increasing opportunities for deeper discussions.

Launch Project

Scene of Level 1 – The first level is intended to tear apart the natural language system and prepare the player to receive information as function-contents (the parameter to be processed). Firstly, the vocabulary is processed as letters. What the player need to do is selecting the letter into the correct zone.

Scene of Level 2 – When receiving a new input message, the player need to touch the right object triggering the response. The moment of touching will trigger the device writing log into the logbook and the glitch effect. The blue color of the ground is the footprint of the player, which is the user behavior record for player to learn about the “user”(which is the NPC of this game).

Scene of Level 3 – Sensor is a very important tool for AI to perceive the real world. Sensors function as one of the inputs will instruct the player to touch corresponding objects. The action sensor will present the persistence of human and the human will flash out as long as he/she passes by. The sleep sensor consists of two parts: heart beat rate and breathing rate, while the temperature sensor reflects the colormap of the temperature on the wall that would change according to time system.

Scene of Level 4 – The visual of the level 4 can be divided into two layers, data loading and object recognition. Only the place close to the field of vision will be loaded, and the object is not with the actual color and texture, but with the color tagged manually.

Game Structure – The process is divided into four levels, each level costs approximately 5 minutes in the demo. In every level, the goal is finishing every task of the daily routine. The difference from level 1 to level 4 is that the input information sources are expended. That’s how it constructed the evolving world. The general interaction throughout the game is that find the object to call the function after getting input from smart speaker, sensors, cameras. After touching the object, the player will get feedback.

Human perceives the world using body senses, while AI understands the world by sensor signals and data which is nothing similar to any sensor that we possess. What will the world be like if we are the AI? World in Eye of AI is a surreal experience trying to present the day-by-day work routine of AI assistant of smart home system in an intelligible form. The shift of viewpoint and identities can be the topic starter inviting audience to rethink about the relationship between human and machine. Every input, every action trace can be converted into behavioral data. And all the information collected can be used to predict users' behaviors and even their preferences. Why does the data value so much? What if from this moment on, data becomes your eyes, your ears, your senses to perceive the world? These are the questions to bring into this game.

Medium:

Digital media

Character & Scene setting

Physical setup

Gameplay

Battle for content game can be defined as the confrontation process between the uploader and the content moderator. Within a short period of time after the user uploaded the specific content with risk, the content will be reviewed and returned, which leads to the uploader modifying the content with flipping, mirroring, or adding other irrelevant contents as the ways to confuse the moderators. There would be several rounds in this game, which will eventually lead to the victory of one side. Content moderators are small but necessary components, and also executors and defenders of this system, even if they are just finding a living. So in this critical game, this invisible and silent labor and political fight that related to almost everyone is something that I want to emphasized and mimic with some gaming strategies to encourage people to experience their work. One player would be the Uploader to create chaos, and one is to be the content moderator trying to find out all the potential risks. The aim for this mini game is to lead the audience to feel the different positions of both sides in the confrontation and start to be critical about the content moderation system on certain topics such as how to judge the attributes and values of the contents, what consequences the moderation system would lead to, and who holds the power to set the rules.

Medium:

Digital media

Surveillance And Privacy Video Games

Jing Shen

Medium:

Medium:

Social

About

Royal College of Art