arXiv subjects

Albrecht Kurze

Publications and source records attributed to Albrecht Kurze.

16 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

The Oracle of Chemnitz: An interactive art installation to reanimate old things in a garage featuring a rotary phone

Garages have a long tradition of tinkering, creativity and innovative change. School of Garage, a participatory artistic summer school project in Chemnitz, the European Capital of Culture 2025, took up this tradition and turned old Eastern Bloc garages into temporary ateliers for collaborative making and discussion. In our HackLab garage we conceptualized and created the Oracle of Chemnitz within one week. It gives a place filled with history back its stories. It is an interactive installation of artifacts from the past typically found in garages: an old typewriter, radio, desk, tires, mixer and a rotary-dial telephone. Each got a name, personality and story to tell. The phone rings when a visitor approaches. Once answered, it asks for name and month of birth before a story about a device is told, along with hints to other places in the city. Around 2,700 visitors interacted with the system over three months.

cs.HC↗

arXiv2026

Resize, Remix, Regen: Frankensteining IoT Design Methods

There are numerous IoT design methods. Previous research shows that all of them have their strengths, but also their limitations. None of them is a universal, all-purpose method. However, experts often view these methods as more versatile than their creators intended. Therefore, analyzing existing methods and tools, as well as rearranging and combining their approaches and components - just as Frankenstein did with his creature - offers the possibility of new creations that may be better than any single method previously. We present the idea and concept of "Frankensteining", which is based on the repeated application of IoT design methods in various contexts. We present a practical Frankensteining creation that was used in a workshop, our own methods, and a serial Frankensteining approach that was tested in an educational context. We conclude with a discussion on Frankensteining and invite other experts and practitioners to share their perspectives and experiences.

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arXiv2026

Cross Sensory Co-Design Tools and Interaction Qualities

What is the temperature of a loud cry? What is the color of a hand-clap? Cross-sensory and multi-modal interactions offer interesting possibilities in terms of inputs and outputs that might be leveraged for affective and emotional purposes. However, it is hard to design such interactions without the right co-design tools. We developed such tools in the last 10 years: the Loaded Dice and the Wheel of Plush. Both devices incorporate a multitude of sensors and actuators to demonstrate interactions and aid in co-design workshops. The tools incorporate the principle of technical synesthesia: the ability to map any of the included sensors to any of the included actuators. With intuitive simple interaction schemes it is possible to easily and effortlessly create new combinations. We discuss the core principles of the tools and how we realized a meaningful mapping between sensors and actuators. We further discuss how we use the tools for exploration, sensory sketching or scenario driven ideation, and where we see additional potential.

cs.HC↗

arXiv2025

Ein Typenrad auf der \"Uberholspur: Die Kult-Schreibmaschine "Erika" trifft KI

In the 15th century, printing revolutionized the dissemination of information. Innovations such as typewriters and computers have increased the speed and volume of information flows over time. More recent developments in large language models such as ChatGPT enable text to be generated in a matter of seconds. However, many people do not understand how this works and what the long-term implications are. That is why we have "hacked" an old typewriter so that users can interact with an LLM chatbot, which over 1,200 participants have now been able to experience. It helps to understand the possibilities and limitations of AI. It gives us researchers insights into participants' concepts of AI as well as their expectations and concerns. It raises questions about these technological developments and stimulates discussions about the social impact of the intensification and acceleration of information and communication flows.

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arXiv2025

Machines, AI and the past//future of things

This essay explores a techno-artistic experiment that reanimates a 1980s East German typewriter using a contemporary AI language model. Situated at the intersection of media archaeology and speculative design, the project questions dominant narratives of progress by embedding generative AI in an obsolete, tactile interface. Through public exhibitions and aesthetic intervention, we demonstrate how slowness, friction, and material render artificial intelligence not only visible but open to critical inquiry. Drawing on concepts such as zombie media, technostalgia, and speculative design, we argue that reappropriating outdated technologies enables new forms of critical engagement. Erika - the AI-enabled typewriter - functions as both interface and interruption, making space for reflection, irony, and cultural memory. In a moment of accelerated digital abstraction, projects like this foreground the value of deliberate slowness, experiential materiality, and historical depth. We conclude by advocating for a historicist design sensibility that challenges presentism and reorients human-machine interaction toward alternative, perceived futures.

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arXiv2025

Management von Sensordaten im Smarthome: Besonderheiten und Ans\"atze

A wide variety of simple sensors, e.g. for temperature, light, or humidity, is finding its way into smart homes. There are special features to consider with regard to the data collected by these sensors: a) the nature of the measured data as "thin but big data" that needs to be contextualized and interpreted, b) which both algorithms and humans are capable of doing (resulting in comprehensive information in the context of the home, including the recognition of activities, behavior, and health of the residents), and c) uses that lead to interesting positive applications, but also to misuse and implications for privacy. When managing such data, it is necessary to take these special features into account, for which the principles of user experience, human-data interaction, and data protection should be considered together. We present our research tool "Sensorkit" and the participatory research approach used with it to collect sensor data in real homes. In our findings, we present identified challenges and explain how we address them through a) meaningful default settings, b) opportunities for users to interact and intervene, and c) life-cycle management of the data. Important aspects include phases before, during, and after the collection, processing, and use of the sensor data, as well as the provision of user-friendly tools and user involvement. Our findings inform beyond the scope of a research project also the development and use of commercial smart home devices and services.

cs.HC↗

arXiv2025

Smart, simple, sincere - Why and how we should rethink connected things in our smart homes

More and more smart connected things and services turn our homes into smart environments. They promise comfort, efficiency and security. These devices often integrate simple sensors, e.g. for temperature, light or humidity, etc. However, these smart but yet simple sensors can pose a sincere privacy risk. The sensor data enables sense-making of home attendance, domestic activities and even health conditions, often a fact that neither users nor developers are aware of or do not know how to address. Nevertheless, not all is lost or evil. This article makes a plea for how we, the ThingsCon community, might rethink smart connected things and services in our homes. We show this in our approaches and research projects that we initiated.

cs.HC↗

arXiv2025

HugSense: Exploring the Sensing Capabilities of Inflatables

What information can we get using inflatables as sensors? While using inflatables as actuators for various interactions has been widely adopted in the HCI community, using the sensing capabilities of inflatables is much less common. Almost all inflatable setups include air pressure sensors as part of the automation when pressurizing or deflating, but the full potential of those sensors is rarely explored. This paper shows how to turn a complete pillow into a force sensor using an inflatable and a simple pneumatics setup including an air pressure sensor. We will show that this setup yields accurate and interesting data that warrants further exploration and elaborate on the potential for practical applications.

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arXiv2024

Simplications: Why and how we should rethink data of/by/for the people in smart homes and its privacy implications

More and more smart devices enter our homes. Often these devices come with a variety of sensors, mostly simple sensors, e.g., for light, temperature, humidity or motion. And they all collect data. While it is data of the home environment it is also data of domestic life in the home. Thus it is data of the people and by the people in the home capturing their presence, arrival and departure, typical domestic activities, bad habits, health status etc. Based on previous as well as ongoing research we know that people are actually able to make sense of simple sensor data and that they will make use of it for their own purposes. Simple sensors, when critically reflected, are often only "simple" in a technical sense. The unreflected design and use of these sensors can easily lead to unintended implications, i.e. for privacy. However, it may not even need a Big Brother or data experts or AI to make the data of these sensors sensitive, e.g., if used for lateral surveillance within families. Often unintended but wicked implications emerge despite good intentions, such as improving efficiency or energy saving through collecting sensor data. Thus sensor data from the home is actually data of/by/for the people in the home. First, we explain how this might have relevance across scales of community of people - not only for the domain of the home but also in broader meaning. Second, we relate our previous as well as ongoing research in the domain of smart homes to this topic.

cs.HC↗

arXiv2024

From Simple Sensors to Complex Context: Insights for HabiTech

We relate our previous as well as ongoing research in the domain of smart homes to the concept of HabiTech. HabiTech can benefit from existing approaches and findings in a broader context of whole buildings or communities within. Along with data comes context of data capture and data interpretation in different dimensions (spatial, temporal, social). For defining what is 'community' proximity plays a crucial role in context, both spatially as well as socially. A participatory approach for research in living in sensing environments is promising to address complexity as well as interests of different stakeholders. Often it is the complex context that makes even simple sensor data sensitive, i.e. in terms of privacy. When it comes to handle shared data then concepts from the physical world for shared spaces might be related back to the data domain.

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arXiv2023

Emotional Interaction Qualities: Vocabulary, Modalities, Actions, And Mapping

Have you ever typed particularly powerful on your keyboard, maybe even harsh, to write and send a message with some emphasis of your emotional state or message? Did it work? Probably not. It didn't affect how you typed or interacted with your mouse. But what if you had other, connected devices, with other modalities for inputs and outputs? Which would you have chosen, and how would you characterize your interactions with them? We researched with our multisensory and multimodal tool, the Loaded Dice, in co-design workshops the design space of IoT usage scenarios: what interaction qualities users want, characterized using an interaction vocabulary, and how they might map them to a selection of sensors and actuators. We discuss based on our experience some thoughts of such a mapping.

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arXiv2023

Synesthetic Dice: Sensors, Actuators, And Mappings

How bright can you cry? How loud does the sun shine? We developed a multisensory and multimodal tool, the Loaded Dice, for use in co-design workshops to research the design space of IoT usage scenarios. The Loaded Dice incorporate the principle of a technical synesthesia, being able to map any of the included sensors to any of the included actuators. With just a turn of one of the cubical devices it is possible to create a new combination. We discuss the core principles of the Loaded Dice, what sensors and actuators are included, how they relate to human senses, and how we realized a meaningful mapping between sensors and actuators. We further discuss where we see additional potential in the Loaded Dice to support synesthetic exploration - as Synesthetic Dice - so that you can eventually find out who cries brighter.

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arXiv2022

Wicked Implications for Human Interaction with IoT Sensor Data

Human data interaction with sensor data from smart homes can cause some implications when it comes to human sensemaking of this data. With our data-driven method Guess the Data for individual and collective data work we revealed in previous work a number of potential pitfalls when interacting with this type of data. We introduce some of the identified, often wicked implications for further discussion.

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arXiv2022

Scented Dice: New interaction qualities for ideating connected devices

Much research has been done around creating multisensory ideation and prototyping tools. We relate our own multisensory tool, the Loaded Dice, to this domain. We briefly explain what sensing and actuating possibilities the Loaded Dice already have (including thermal sensations), and how they are methodically embedded in workshops using an extended interaction vocabulary to characterize and ideate multisensory experiences. We briefly ponder simple technical ways to add smell as an output modality, and discuss why and how smell capabilities will enrich ideation workshops in co-design.

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arXiv2022

Playing The Ethics Card: Ethical Aspects In Design Tools For Inspiration And Education

This paper relates findings of own research in the domain of co-design tools in terms of ethical aspects and their opportunities for inspiration and in HCI education. We overview a number of selected general-purpose HCI/design tools as well as domain specific tools for the Internet of Things. These tools are often card-based, not only suitable for workshops with co-designers but also for internal workshops with students to include these aspects in the built-up of their expertise, sometimes even in a playful way.

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arXiv2019

From Ideation to Implications: Directions for the Internet of Things in the Home

In this paper we give a brief overview of our approaches and ongoing work for future directions of the Internet of Things (IoT) with a focus on the IoT in the home. We highlight some of our activities including tools and methods for an ideation-driven approach as well as for an implications-driven approach. We point to some findings of workshops and empirical field-studies. We show examples for new classes of idiosyncratic IoT devices, how implications emerge by (mis)using sensor data and how users interacted with IoT systems in shared spaces.

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