The Technology of Good Intentions

Shy Light (2012)

“Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel...” UNTIL NOW!

An electric lamp doesn’t like anyone to see it when it’s turned on.
It hides under a bushel basket and when it’s exposed, it fades out.
When the basket is replaced, it lights back up.

Read a complete description and view the video at my blog.

Media Circus (2011)

You've heard of Marshall McLuhan? Meet General Eccentric!

We're celebrating 100 years since Marshall McLuhan’s birth, and as part of the celebrations, I offer this project as a homage.

Media Circus is a scrolling marquee that displays amusing headline news mashups, such as these from July 2011:

• Warship contract would bring sea constituent file-shredding
• Autopsies reveal little on a crowded planet
• Fatal crash in a life without sunshine
• Economy shrank in urban orchards

Media Circus uses @generalxcentric’s daily tweets, which are actually cutups of contemporary news headlines from CBC and the Toronto Globe and Mail.

Shy Dildo (2011)

Does this remind you of anything?

The concept is simple: “Shy Dildo” is a 'personal massager' object on a box. The vibrator motor works when left alone but stops when it is touched.

Clock with Tics (2010)

This is an Arduino-powered digital clock that very briefly displays expletives at random intervals.

A clock ‘ticks’. A ‘tic’ (note the different spelling) can be a mental disorder and can manifest itself in a number of ways; most seriously, someone suffering from “Tourette’s Syndrome” will blurt out swearwords involuntarily. I had thought of titling this piece “Time for Tourettes”, but the clock itself is tasteless enough.

This artifact is part of my series “The Technology of Good Intentions“ which focuses on ‘failure’ in design. In this case, who has not had an electrical widget that has ‘gone on the fritz’ and suffers from momentary lapses?

A Clock of Your Own

An online version for web browsers—if you're on an iPhone or iPad, a special mobile version is served—is available here or by way of the QR code (above) that is attached to the actual clock.

Northwest Passage (2010)

“Northwest Passage” is an exploration of the difficulties and risks inherent in development and discovery. In the case of this piece, the end result is a water flow display. When there is no water flowing through the copper pipe, the display reads noFlow. When water flows, the display will read Flow. However, as experience has taught us, we can often get bogged down in solving a project's many small technical details and fail to resolve one major one. In this case, while the software and computer hardware have been thoroughly tested, the fatal flaw is in the placement of the sensor: it is positioned out of the way of the water flow.

As a result of this error, the display will always read noFlow. The title of the piece is a reference to the Franklin Expedition of 1845, which was lost in its search for the “northwest passage” from Europe to the Orient. The ships became trapped in ice and all perished.