pythia

A fully functioning prototype, a machine offering a multisensorial speculative design experience, using play pretend methods in combination with interaction design and product design to sell an illusion. This machine aims to get people thinking about and face the presence of metadata and the unseizable amount the- reof.„Pythia offers the unique possibility to get in touch with the metadata spirits. Seize the moment and receive your personal prophecy from the oracle. The newly develo- ped machine facilitates spiritual encounters with the omniscient metadata spirits. By Omphalos transmission, your somatic energies are connected to the vast universe of metadata via your smartphone.“

We are a group of three collaborators from different backgrounds who found each other through a shared interest for speculative design - bold design proposals meant to trigger the debate about future challenges. Our goal is to create design proposals that focus on identifying and discussing critical issues rather than being driven by commercial motives. Our design practice is concerned with future consequences and implications of the relationship between science, technology, and (more than) humans. We join forces, combine our different skill sets and approaches to create tangible experiences - interactive machines working with play pretend to address issues and raise questions through playful and joyful experienes. Within our collaborative work we explore tools and aesthetics of consumer realism, trying to sneak in new narratives, wrapped in well known visual concepts and product interactions. We aim to take the discussion on technology beyond the experts to a broad population of the audience.