Bridging the Digital and Physical in Future Cities - Exploring the Alimentary Dimension

8/13/2019 Bridging the Digital and Physical in Future Cities - Exploring the Alimentary Dimension

1/8

Bridging the Physical and Digital in Future Cities

Exploring the Alimentary Dimension

Karan Dudeja

PGDPD 2012 4thSem.

New Media Design

Guide : Mr. Saurabh Srivastava

Coordinator : Dr. Jignesh Khakhar

17th

February 2014


2/8

ABSTRACT

In the future ahead, cities before other heavenly bodies will continue to be the destinations to attract a majority

of us. Rapid urbanization is inevitable and aspirations of social and financial gains will be responsible for such

trends. In terms of technology there will be unprecedented changes which will allow connecting the digital and

physical seamlessly. The physical information will have digital alternatives allowing us to transfer more into our

knowledge databases. The cities will behave like connected systems enabling meaningful engagements to take

place between the city and its citizens. And, how will these advancements occur in the dimension of food, what

will be causative of them and their effects in turn? Mans interaction with food will evolve, around the hunter-

gatherer phenomena that is hard wired in our systems through evolution. In these future cities also, the find for

food articles as an everyday need will continue. Sometimes to take back and cook, other times to just eat out.

The objective of this paper is to enquire into how design and technology is going to take cognizance, leverage

our need to find these essential bodily supplements and help us in achieving the same in the evolved cities we

will inhabit.

KEYWORDS

Future, City, People, Food, Technology, Design, Human-Computer-Interaction, Human-Food-Interaction


3/8

INTRODUCTION

The future of humanity is a very broad subject that interests all of us as practitioners and learners of design. With

respect to the environments these people will inhabit and atmospheres that will be created is something that is

deeply engaging. What will it all be like ?, is very captivating and fills one with curiosity.

Technology, since the industrial revolution took place has influenced how our societies have shaped up. It has

affected the development and growth of sectors like social, infrastructural, economical, food and beverages,

educational, employment, industrial, travel and tourism, etc. and many sub sectors within these larger sectors. It

has also had strong effects on the identity of individuals and this impact has in turn affected our cultural values

and belief systems.

Food is the most essential need as without it there wouldnt be any possibility of survival. Technology has

helped us and continues to help in developing food to an extent where it becomes easier and faster to produce,

store, distribute and consume, all at our convenience.

Some questions that can take us into the future with food and technological possibilities around it are:What lies ahead in the dimension of food and technology ? How can technology help us find our preference of

food in the city we live in ? Can it help us in expressing our individuality ? Will the food ever be categorized to

suit our personalities ? Can food tell someone if they need the nutrition it carries at any given point of time ? Is it

possible to let food govern the kind of social exchanges we can have ? Will food be able to change our moods

and the affective value our surroundings and circumstances have on us ? Will food always be physical or will it

also have a digital cousin someday ? Will technology be able to augment the experience of eating a certain kind

of food ? Many such enquiries can be formed when dealing with the thought of what lies ahead.


4/8

FUTURE

The future is here, and its happening as we speak. It is at the core of every what if? that we ask. We must

understand that it is the inevitable and even though the word Future has its downsides with strong emotions like

anxiety, uncertainty etc., on the contrary it also has its own share of excitement, intensity and anticipatory

feelings associated with it. As described, it is the phenomena all of us are constantly living in except a few who

know how to enjoy the now of the moment. The word makes us curious and challenges us to want to know

more, to some it can be an intimidating force as it doesnt reveal what its true nature will be like until it happens.

It is what most of us plan for and it allows us to know and be aware of our present.

TECHNOLOGY

If we do not consider the negative aspects for only sometime, the future as predicted by many of us will ride on

technology. The era that we live in, is by some called the period of transition of civilization. It has helped us

grow and be more connected with other parts of world where many like us grow and propagate in ways similar

or somewhat dissimilar than ours. Our generation is by far the most connected race of all the humanity that has

ever walked on this planet.

But, there is no running away from it, as the evangelists of technology happily advocate in favor of it. On the

contrary, there are those(forming a relative minority) who dont accept technology for they believe of it as being

the only root cause of evil and harm to our planet. It is partly true as the many environment specialists see only a

grave future for all of us ahead. But, it has percolated so deeply in most of our lives that we take it completely

for granted and would find it very difficult to do without it. Its development over the thousands of years has

helped mankind evolve into what we are today. It is deeply embedded into our lives, which is needless to say as

everything artificially constructed around us wouldnt have been there, had it not been for a brain and thetechnology to create or use it. Technology, a tool for us came into existence, when man first thought of using a

stone to cut and break things for himself to eat or use.

As students of New Media Design, we are expected to critically see the effect of technology in peoples lives and

understand how it affects our behavior, culture and belief system. Also, we need to be aware of how evolution

affects the alterations brought about in the creation of new technology and systems.

Technology has come not so far in time, since the industrial revolution happened but the interest of those it was

able to tap into has caused it to grow exponentially. The trend shows that technology changes as rapidly as

becoming almost new in every eighteen months. The hardware and material costs are falling, and the capacities

of storage and processing devices is growing at mind blowing rates. Now, machines can do almost all the tasks

humans were to do and that to more efficiently and accurately. This has caused many companies to lay off their

employees which is the under belly of employing technology into systems, but on the flipside computers(the

most pervasive product of technology) have made our lives more simpler, and the internet has provided us a vast

ever expanding ocean of information that can be accessed from anywhere in the world. Convergence of

technology has allowed a mobile phone, nowadays becoming the proverbial smartphones, to be able to do the

job of a camera, voice recorder, music player, notepad, game machine, mailbox, video conferencing tools etc.,

besides being a telephone that once allowed two individuals to connect over voice, in a very portable, ergonomic

and friendly form factor. It isnt too far to imagine that it might allow one to even taste what their friends in

another continent are eating in a few years to come.


5/8

Technology is growing at manic rates in all the sectors that were mentioned above and these directly affect the

first hand consumer. The rise of the industries has also led to the culture of mass consumerism, advertising

oriented commercialization and commodification of all the entities around us. It has changed the lifestyles of

people and has made them all the more, hungry for novelty, passively consume, easily reject, conveniently

reproduce, simply fake identities, effortlessly know about things, share things, thoughts, etc. The mediums of

communications have also evolved from the telegraph, the telephone, radio, photography, moving picture,

television to now people using devices that allow for virtual reality, augmented reality etc. Real time syncing of

data and sharing on the cloud also lets people feel free to access their data with different devices or platforms of

interest. With the incoming phenomenon of ubiquitous computing, the objects around us, the places we live and

those we occupy and use will all be connected to the internet allowing them to connect to our digital entities and

our gadgets which will let them inform us about what their status is, and in turn would adapt to our emotional

state. This would also let us receive context relevant information that would allow the information overload to be

taken care of. Technology is moving towards affective and multi-modal computing, with design becoming more

persuasive. The tech, short for technology is also getting embedded into our apparel, accessories, eyewear etc.

allowing for the self to be analysed quantitatively and qualitatively, and the next step ahead seems to be that of

singularity when we would have the tech inside us, augmenting our senses and making us into cyborgs who can

process, remember, feel, perform more. The technology will influence our future but it will become more human

centric and more aware of our needs and wants, rather than it being the other way around. Information existing

and that generated will create large databases that would be accessible for solving a lot of problems that we

encounter.

CITY

Rapid urbanization and the shift towards cities in the coming times will not cease as real people with realaspirations would want to move to such avenues that promise professional and personal gains to almost all socio-

economic classes. There are many evils associated with the growth in the number of people moving into these

spaces but with technological advancements and design the issues of housing, water, sanitation, mobility,

education, pollution, energy, poverty, employment, governance, security etc. can be regulated efficiently.

The city will be more sustainable, cleaner and connected with the citizens courtesy the pervasive connectivity.

Some projects have taken place in the domain of the networked cities of the future. These are (a) TheAmerican

On Line [AOL] Digital City, these are on-line guides of the major American cities where, besides comprehensive

information on information and tourist activities(restaurants, attractions, cinemas, etc.), the user has the

possibility to purchase services and products on-line. (b) TheAmsterdam Digital City, a more complex model

than the American version which appears like a hardware/software platform allowing citizens to interact with the

public administration in order to obtain services or information, using PC at home, or from the other locations un

public areas(libraries, bus stops, etc.) (c) TheHelsinki Arena Projectis even more diverse. It creates a virtual

city using a 3D model and allows for the interaction of citizens through live video. (d) Finally, TheKyoto Digital

Cityis a complex architecture on three layers which is capable of creating synergies and providing citizens and

tourists with a lot of information and services obtained from the GIS such as, for example real time data

collected by detection centres scattered throughout the city(traffic, parking capacity, weather, pollution, etc.).

The idea of the networked city is what will gain the maximum momentum due to the rise in the IT infrastructure

with the internet being everywhere around us. It does not have any address of its own and works on the model of

access rather than address. These cities will provide wireless internet facility to its citizens with monitored levels


6/8

of bandwidth that will allow them to have controlled access. Through this backbone of the IT, the city will itself

be able to have a digital identity of its own which will allow it to have information that the citizens can access of

its database at their convenience and on the other hand the city would be able to know what kind of people are

browsing what kind of data. This system will allow the citizen to be more informed and be in receipt of

contextual and real time relevant data. Access to the information that the city can deliver could possibly be done

via devices people would carry in their palms, clothes or those that lie at home and would now do more than just

be an artifact for aesthetic appeal.

HOW ALL OF IT MIXES TOGETHER

The inhabitants of these future cities will continue have needs as we know from the Maslows pyramid of needs.

One of the basic needs will be that of finding apt food. It could be related to accumulating raw materials

necessary for cooking at home or that of finding food when wanting to dine out. Both of these conditions have

their own set of challenges, variables, practices and interactions associated with them.

Let us first consider the case of dining out. The reasons why people wish to go out for food vary from wanting to

explore new cuisines, having gotten bored of the staple diet, not feeling like putting the effort to prepare their

own meals followed by having to do the dishes, satiating the hunger pang with a quick bite when already

outside, meeting friends or colleagues outside of their residences, when travelling as a tourist, etc. All these

cases have their own set of constraints like financial, travel related(amount one needs to travel), preference

based(veg/non-veg/vegan), hygiene based, time of the day, the kind of company at that moment, mood based,

catering to choices of others, venue constraints(ambience, availability of seating, limitations of options when

visiting a place not with the purpose of eating), availability of offers/special deals, only knowing limited places

due to word of mouth transmission and then relying on the same etc. It is therefore due to these several reasonsthat they go out and the many deciding parameters that let people choose what and where they want to eat. Since,

it was mentioned before and is for a fact that technology and the city will evolve in the future, so will peoples

behaviors and possibly their patterns of eating out, or the factors that let them decide where and what kind of

food would they like to enjoy. The choice of place will allow them to experience, share and connect over the

meal and this will in turn affect the human-food-interaction. The city will know the citizens through the metadata

that people will provide to databases which may be linked to their own individual profiles on social networks

and which would be connected to a central database of eateries of the city that can assist people effectively and

efficiently. The collaboration with other social media networks will provide recommendation based on what the

friends of these citizens have reported to be worthy of a visit. Assistance can then be offered in terms of helping

them plan their dine out experience depending on what they would like that day, who they are with, where the

might be, the time of the day, their mood at that point of time etc. It could also plot results based on past

experiences and therefore complex algorithms can perform pattern searches and thus provide results that would

closely match with the person who may be interested in wanting to eat out. If then the city system knows where

you plan to dine, it can help you in knowing the best time to visit, or help in reserving a table, share the cost of

the meal, and maybe even provide one with the best route or conveyance to reach their dining destination.

In the first case, where we were looking at eating at home. We can think of systems that are an auxiliary to the

smart kitchens of the future where, based on parameters such as your mood, number of mouths to be fed, the age

group of people about to eat, the time available to cook, the ingredients available to cook etc., the system can

easily guide one with interesting recipes based on seasonal availability of ingredients and preparation methods.


7/8

While in the process of sourcing materials, this system can know what one intends to cook and can either place

an order online to let the ingredients be delivered at their address conveniently or help them in reaching the right

markets for what they are probably looking for.

Both these food systems can be linked to devices their owners carry or wear on them and thus also be aware of

the physiological conditions of the people using these services and hence be in a condition to also suggest proper

diets for nourishments.

OPPORTUNITIES AHEAD

1. The food can be used as a motivator to let people explore the city and help them learn more about the place

where they reside. There can be many interesting sights and sounds on the way to an eating place that could

make the experience of arriving there worthwhile.

2. The experience of finding a food place could also be gamified, as this would make the finding food a treasure

hunting exercise. The motivation to reach the food place can make people interested in overcoming some

obstacles in between them and their food. These obstacles could be contextually related to the kind of place they

chosen to dine at.

3. Food, in most cases seen as a good medium to bond over with someone. So, can this medium be explored in

ways that would allow more social exchanges to take place ?

4. Is it possible to make the eating experience as collaborative and performance oriented form of art ?

5. Sharing food with friends is common. Can sharing of food be digitized and thus physically translated over a

distance i.e. can two people be sharing food together when being physically apart ?

6. Is it possible to use metaphors of online behavior like tagging, liking, sharing, retweeting, etc. into

physical practices when dealing with food ?7. It is an interesting development to see how people have linked the idea of having WiFi and coffee together.

Initially, cafes were about conversations and gathering information from people who visited the caf in person,

but now you can also enjoy the similar information gathering via digital mediums where you can either use the

social network media to connect with people not present there, or get to know about their experiences using the

blogs etc.

8. Design and technology besides making people more aware of what they are consuming, can make them have

new experiences related to their foods through narratives, about how their food arrived there, how it was found,

why is it prepared like that, what are its effects on the body, the best ways of serving and presentation, how it

can be remixed, how do different cultures use the same ingredients, or how its called in different languages, the

kind of ambience/light/colors/music/smells/furniture/weather it can be best enjoyed in, etc.

CONCLUSION

The objective of this paper is to not throw light on any particular solution, but to investigate and explore the

possibilities of the directions we might possibly be taking. The solutions or products offered to people in times

ahead will be more networked, where in the individual will be able to interact with one node of the system at a

point of time. This node will be linked to other nodes in a way that the information flow in the system will be

able to know and understand the people better and thus personalize the solutions for them in a more suitablemanner. Lastly, the next step in the future of cities in relation to food and HCI will be to intervene with

innovative technology and design opportunities to improve the human-food-interaction.


8/8

CITATION

Paolo Fusero,E-CITY Digital Networks and Cities of the Future , Part 3. e-City, 7.1 Digital Cities

BIBLIOGRAPHY1. Altoon, R. A., Auld, J. C. and Egan, N. 2011. Urban transformation. Mulgrave, Vic.: Images Publishing

Group.

2. Bullivant, L. 2006.Responsive environments. London: V & A Publications.

3. Carmona, M. 2010.Public places, urban spaces. Oxford, UK: Architectural Press.

4. Comber, R., Ganglbauer, E., Choi, J. H., Hoonhout, J., Rogers, Y., O'hara, K. and Maitl. 2012. Food and

interaction design: designing for food in everyday life. pp. 2767--2770.

5. Fusero, P. 2009.E-city. Barcelona: LIST Laboratorio.

6. Mitchell, W. J. 1995. City of bits. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This was a challenging subject for me coming from a background of engineering. However, it wouldnt have

been possible without the kind support of many individuals and the resources available at National Institute of

Design.

I am highly indebted to Mr. Saurabh Srivastava for his constant guidance and supervision through the

development of this paper.

I would also like to express my gratitude towards Dr. Jignesh Khakhar for his cooperation and encouragement

that helped in completion of this paper.

My thanks are also extended to my colleagues, Nikhil Tailang and Asmita Misra for being there for discussions

and helping me to the best of their abilities.

Documents

Bridging the Digital and Physical in Future Cities - Exploring the Alimentary Dimension