BrightIdea

Slides

Problem Description
Ideas can come at any moment, and when working in groups sometimes those ideas occur when not in physical proximity. How can individuals effectively record ideas that occur to them during the day, and how can teams work together and evaluate ideas effectively, when not all together?

Proposed solution
The BrightIdea is a system to help users record ideas that occur to them at the spur of a moment and share with teammates. Each system consists of a base, that contains several idea “bulbs”, each bulb consists of multiple LEDs of varying color that identify which user made a given contribution. When a user has an idea they record it on the bulb. When they are ready to share their idea they recorded, they replace it in the base of the unit. Depending how good of an idea the creator thinks he or she has come up with, the creator make push the bulb deeper or shallower into the base to adjust the actual brightness of the bulb. Other users that see a lit bulb, may then place lit bulbs in the ‘play’ socket of the base, which replays the idea. Afterwards other users replace the bulb into the socket as well and similarly can indicate how good of an idea they think it is by how deeply they replace the bulb into the base.

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About samvaran

Samvaran Sharmahttp://web.mit.edu/samvaran/www
MIT CSAIL, Robot Locomotion Group / MS1

Experience
If I had to describe my skill set in one sentence, it would be "an engineering and computer science foundation with a keen eye towards aesthetic appeal, neuroscience, and HCI". My education at MIT and my activities beyond have been a true reflection of this statement - I majored in Computer Science and Electrical Engineering at MIT as an undergrad, and minored in Visual Arts (the ACT program - I tried to double major, but it was not offered as a major at the time of my graduation). I have plenty of experience in both the technical side of things (having been programming and making devices since I was a kid), and the aesthetic portion (I spend a good amount of my time doing freelance graphic design work as well), which makes me well-suited for this class. Yet perhaps the most relevant qualification I have is that I'm very interested in this topic. I've long been imagining ways for humans to interact with digital world and robots in more tangible ways (for instance, in 6.115, I created an interface that could control a remote control helicopter with accelerometer-based hand motions), and I would view this class as an amazing opportunity to explore more work in this field.

Why
Even as technology becomes an ever-increasing influence in all our lives, most of us are simply stuck, staring in at a beautiful digital world on the other side of a piece of transparent plastic or glass, with minimal interactions with a universe in which anything is possible. It's like someone gave you a big box of Legos and then only allowed you to build your creations with chopsticks. We've reached an age where our interactions with the digital world should be more seamless and tangible, rather than stuck to the paradigms of the 1970s. This class is a beautiful blend of art, science, and engineering that seeks to work on this exciting new problem space, and I would very much like to be a part of it.

Art
Architecture
Craft/Fabrication
Design
DIY Electronics
Electrical Eng.
Mech. Eng.
Programming/CS

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