OneZero: Parsons DT Thesis Symposium

The Design and Technology department at Parsons (of which I am an alum) is holding their second annual thesis symposium this weekend, titled OneZero. I had the privilege of seeing a few of the talks and checked the gallery out this Saturday. The show is described by the students as a “way of sharing research and work as designers, programmers, developers, gamers, storytellers, animators and social entrepreneurs. [Their] work is wide ranging but grouped within a variety of themes.”

A really solid and impressive showing this year. Specifically:

Not for Bots, by Kunal D Patel.

Not for Bots is “ a collection of online software that playfully demonstrate how the Internet is shaping human behavior.” As of this writing, there are two Twitter services in the collection: Transito.us and Penultim.it. Check out those links for more info, they essentially both subvert the user’s expectations of URL shortening services.

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Pennant by Stephen Varga

Pennant is “an interactive exploration of baseball data that allows users to quickly and accurately recreate and investigate the history of the annual race to be the best team in Major League Baseball.” Really cool iPad app, with awesome data visualization (notice the Tufte inspired Sparklines). Check out the video here for a demo. Should be available in the App Store soon.

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Data by Zach Gage

Data is a series of projects that “explore a number of discrepancies surrounding our use of data, and how that use is, or could be, shaping our lives for the better or worse.” They are all worth checking out in detail. My favorite is Lose/Lose, an Asteroids-style shooter game that links enemy ships to files on your computer. Thus, killing enemies slowly destroys the user’s hard drive.