Comments on: thingM’s Technology Sketches http://www.adaptivepath.com/blog/2007/01/15/thingms-technology-sketches/ Adaptive Path Blog Thu, 20 Nov 2008 17:47:57 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6.3 By: Ara Pehlivanian http://www.adaptivepath.com/blog/2007/01/15/thingms-technology-sketches/#comment-37495 Ara Pehlivanian Wed, 17 Jan 2007 22:14:45 +0000 http://www.adaptivepath.com/blog/2007/01/15/thingms-technology-sketches/#comment-37495 Very nice. It always amazes me how new technologies can be used in different ways. Very nice. It always amazes me how new technologies can be used in different ways.

]]> By: Mike http://www.adaptivepath.com/blog/2007/01/15/thingms-technology-sketches/#comment-37337 Mike Wed, 17 Jan 2007 03:49:06 +0000 http://www.adaptivepath.com/blog/2007/01/15/thingms-technology-sketches/#comment-37337 Thanks for the note. The evolution of the wine rack was as follows: first, we were working on an RFID bookshelf and realizing that there were a lot of location and display challenges and that we'd like to first work in a more limited environment; my friend Eric then suggested wine, which made a lot of sense because of the physical properties of bottles (which, incidentally, are many of the same properties that made wine.com the first sizable ecommerce site). Wine racks came as a natural extension, since bottle tracking is interesting from a logistics standpoint, but the organization and management of wine is more relevant to people's everyday experiences. Shaping Things may have been a subconscious reference--I respect Sterling's book, but wasn't actively thinking about it--but the relationship to facet browsing was intentional. Wine is a faceted information system projected onto a standardized container (and, well, some liquid ;-) ). Other things share many these qualities--Persian Rugs for example--but wine has an additional quality that makes it interesting: it gets drunk. The regular turnover makes for a good dynamic design exercise. Thanks for the note. The evolution of the wine rack was as follows: first, we were working on an RFID bookshelf and realizing that there were a lot of location and display challenges and that we’d like to first work in a more limited environment; my friend Eric then suggested wine, which made a lot of sense because of the physical properties of bottles (which, incidentally, are many of the same properties that made wine.com the first sizable ecommerce site). Wine racks came as a natural extension, since bottle tracking is interesting from a logistics standpoint, but the organization and management of wine is more relevant to people’s everyday experiences. Shaping Things may have been a subconscious reference–I respect Sterling’s book, but wasn’t actively thinking about it–but the relationship to facet browsing was intentional. Wine is a faceted information system projected onto a standardized container (and, well, some liquid ;-) ). Other things share many these qualities–Persian Rugs for example–but wine has an additional quality that makes it interesting: it gets drunk. The regular turnover makes for a good dynamic design exercise.

]]> By: peterme http://www.adaptivepath.com/blog/2007/01/15/thingms-technology-sketches/#comment-36990 peterme Tue, 16 Jan 2007 04:05:47 +0000 http://www.adaptivepath.com/blog/2007/01/15/thingms-technology-sketches/#comment-36990 Interesting. I'm also intrigued by the choice of the wine rack. On that page, they list many reasons for wine rack, but neither of them are the two that I immediately thought of: 1) the wine bottle was essentially the mascot of Bruce Sterling's <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Shaping-Things-Mediaworks-Pamphlets-Sterling/dp/0262693267/adaptivepat07-20/ref=nosim/" rel="nofollow">_Shaping Things_</a>, the book that explicated the concept of spime, and was much about the ubicomp movement that ThingM is deeply part of 2) wine is the canonical subject to explain <a href="http://facetmap.com/browse/" rel="nofollow">faceted classification systems</a>, and I found it interesting that the problem they sketch here is largely one of (the much maligned) information architecture. Interesting. I’m also intrigued by the choice of the wine rack. On that page, they list many reasons for wine rack, but neither of them are the two that I immediately thought of:

1) the wine bottle was essentially the mascot of Bruce Sterling’s _Shaping Things_, the book that explicated the concept of spime, and was much about the ubicomp movement that ThingM is deeply part of

2) wine is the canonical subject to explain faceted classification systems, and I found it interesting that the problem they sketch here is largely one of (the much maligned) information architecture.

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