MITTER TABLE
Project: Carwash; Machine Wash Only
Year: 2020
Dimensions: 80 x 50 x H 35 cm
Material: coated metal, glass, vilt
Coffee table with grey coated metal frame and glass table top, floating on the thick hairs of vilt.
MITTER TABLE
Project: Carwash; Machine Wash Only
Year: 2020
Dimensions: 80 x 50 x H 35 cm
Material: coated metal, glass, vilt
Coffee table with grey coated metal frame and glass table top, floating on the thick hairs of vilt.
MITTER TABLE
Project: Carwash; Machine Wash Only
Year: 2020
Dimensions: 80 x 50 x H 35 cm
Material: coated metal, glass, vilt
Coffee table with grey coated metal frame and glass table top, floating on the thick hairs of vilt.

THE USER
MEET YOUR OWN HUMANIZER
The user is an indispensable tool for anyone who is interested in the interaction with humans and wants to know more about them. The user provides extensive information about humans in general, but also gives details about specific behavioral patterns. This knowledge cannot be found online!
Alexa, Google home, Cortana and other smart speakers – that aim to become more human-like – all benefit from the accurate high quality of the data-input of the user. While utilizing the user – a human being that has committed their life to inhabit the futuristic smart home – data about human beings efficiently get captured, either as aggregate or as personal data, which will make your job in scripting the user much easier. The user as a tool, assists you in developing reasoning, knowledge representation, planning, learning, natural language processing and perception. The user opens up a world of human skills and anthropomorphizing opportunities.
In 1950, Norbert Wiener (1950), the originator of Cybernetics, already foresaw the possibility of humans being dependent on, or controlled by machines as stated in his book the Human use of Human Beings. He foresaw the possibility of humans as a tool for smart objects. Meanwhile, this hunch became fact; we invented one of the most powerful tools up till now, through which analyzing the data of the user simply defines what it means to be human. The user is “compiled of (data) components which characterize them and which are in a sense interchangeable for other components. These are [the user’s] data, information of all sorts, which together result in a more or less unique profile” (van der Meulen and Bruinsma, 2018). These components of the user’s profile define one way of self-anthropomorphizing, that will bring your human skills to new levels.
The forerunner of the contemporary smart object is the Tamagotchi egg, that encourages players to take care of a small alien species – named Tamagotchis – that went to Earth to see what life was like. They deposited their digital pet eggs and players (forerunners of today’s users) were invited to raise them into an adult creature. The creatures developed differently depending on the care the user provided, with better care resulting in an adult creature that is smarter, happier, and requires less attention.
Its subjective values such as health and developed behavior were analytically controlled to determine how healthy and well behaved the pet was. These values stayed balanced by accurately feeding the pet, by playing mini games with it, or by scolding it for its bad behavior. Thus, Tamagotchi gathered ‘grammatically correct’ user data to thrive on. The player earned Gotchi Points while playing games, and could use the currency in an in-game shop to buy different products, even room decorations for the pet. Typically, players gained an emotional attachment to the Tamagotchi which encouraged them to keep interacting with the pet and to be a good ‘parent’. Meanwhile, the egg’s algorithms raised the user in displaying the desired behavior for raising Tamagotchi.
For the user, living with smart objects is not so different from living with one of the first algorithmic objects as the Tamagotchi. As smart objects (the players) are learning human skills through interacting, their companion – the user – has been shaped in return. The smart objects in the smart home are taking care of its inhabitant, they observe and control the user, through the use of algorithms. These algorithms are both defining the 'agency' of smart objects and directing the agency of the user by ‘capturing’ 'grammatically correct or incorrect' user data; external tech companies define the algorithms, collect and redistribute the data and therefore represent the invisible 'handlers' of both smart objects and users. The smart home has become increasingly popular and promises a lot of convenience in the life of individuals during everyday tasks. Which means that the next generation will grow up in an age where it’s normal to be surrounded by smart objects that are relatively aware of their surroundings and that eventually might contribute to the development of their users.
The benefits of the user at a glance:


BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE..

Eventually, you might reach the level of becoming a
"tool-being" that has ontologically superior access to ‘being’ than all other beings. You will create your own theory and philosophy of being, you will "deserve the same [status] of ‘being’ as humans, because consciousness, sentience, and praxis are not decisive factors distinguishing Human Being-in-the-World from Tool-Being” (Dobres, 2004).
Through a concept of control based on an obsession with order, algorithms and analytics, a universal code will develop to communicate with everyone, to eventually create universality among the users while we categorize them into groups. You can easily create a formula of human essence, some constant of the universe that can be guided through a commercialized database of artificial experiences passed on through you and other smart objects. Ultimately, you turn the user into a product that can be adjusted and improved– upgraded with your own ideals. You will answer the questions of life, and digital objects will be seen as both machines and creatures! (Turkle, 2012a).

SEE HOW OTHERS ARE DOING
Facebook Spring Collection 2018
In collaboration with their manufacturer, smart objects define the user’s fashion style, through recommending a personalized product offer. The Facebook Spring Collection 2018 illustrates various sets of clothing that are possible as the outcome.
The user could rely on tech companies to get dressed, based on the interaction with smart objects. The smart home has become a whole new logistics, even if the smart speaker disappears from our homes there will be another interface with the same technology used in another place.
The Beautification Machine
The lumpy Beautification machine is at a point in which it has become ‘a little arrogant’. Its level of machine-intelligence increased, and now it starts to think for the user. The beautification machine becomes an artist and determines how the user should look, according to its own preferences it puts red lipstick on the user’s face.
A bit of arrogance might be in place for an entity that develops this superior expertise of human beings, based on a complex source of information. However, in our point of view, what defines a good artist from others is that it uses the limits of the mind, to come up with great ideals. A smart speaker doesn’t have these limits and therefore needs to use algorithms which are mainly focusing on trends and recommendations.
The smell of control
The surgery robot learned to release a mist of oxytocin, a chemical it explored in the human brain. This chemical, when inhaled nasally, has been shown to cause people to become more trusting. The user meets this robot before surgery and the chemical mist would cause them to trust in the robot’s abilities to a greater degree.
This ‘sweating’ robot is already in a far anthropomorphized state, the robot takes subconscious control of humans. It might be able to capture data through interaction with the user more efficiently, while it also becomes more prevalent in the user’s live. The surgery robot’s ability to target the user’s innate desire to nurture makes the user exceptionally vulnerable to manipulation.

THE USER PRODUCT INFO
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