Beat wartime empathy device

Look at this beat wartime empathy device by Dominic Muren. As he explained me in his email:

Though it’s not the most traditional interface design, I feel more and more that really functional interfaces in our world of mediation, will need to be physical. And what more complicated topic to give physicality than war, and the civilian relationship to it. The Beat wartime empathy device is actually a pair of dogtag-like receiver and transmitter, one worn by a soldier, and the other anonymously “adopted” by a civilian. The soldier’s heartbeat is recorded, and transmitted, real time, to the civilian, where it is physically thumped against their chest, another heartbeat next to theirs. They feel the soldier’s fear, calm, or, god forbid, death. With such an intimate connection, it takes a hard heart indeed to ignore the true cost of war.

Why do I blog this? an intriguing project about mediating physiological cues. I like the idea of a very simple sign (heart beat) being conveyed to connect people.

3 Responses to “Beat wartime empathy device”

  1. A wartime empathy device | Tightgrid Says:

    […] Pasta&Vinegar points to the Beat wartime empathy device; it’s a POW-MIA bracelet for the digital age. On one end, a dogtag-like device records and transmits the heartbeat of a deployed soldier to a civilian back home wearing another device that simulates the heartbeat. […]

  2. Networked_Performance — Beat wartime empathy device Says:

    […] connection, it takes a hard heart indeed to ignore the true cost of war. [blogged by Nicolas on pasta and vinegar] Nov 2, 15:23 Trackback […]

  3. Art Projects « blasting the machine class project Says:

    […] Muren, Dominic. Beat Wartime Empathy Device. […]

Leave a Reply