Calm tech

January 13th, 2024
Bellevue, WA

Photo by Levi XU on Unsplash

Calm down and learn about ambient technology

There was a recent article I was reading which in the comments someone had brought up a comparison to the tenents of "Calm Tech". I found it an interesting collection of thoughts, and wanted to take some short notes on these observations.

Calm Technology™/Calm Computing is a term coined by PARC Researchers Mark Weiser and John Seely Brown as they noticed that technology was getting more complex and harder to use.

“simplify complexities, not introduce new ones.”

― Mark Weiser and John Seely Brown (1995)

Please check out Calm Tech main web page to get a full explaination of what Calm Tech is all about. Here is a quick summary of what I've learnt.

8 Principles of Calm Technology

Number Principle Definition
1 Technology should require the smallest possible amount of attention Ambient or background technology that doesn't pull you away from what you are primarily focused on.
2 Technology should inform and create calm Limiting technology exposure as a means to human needs rather than for the sake of technology.
3 Technology should make use of the periphery Periphery meaning outside the locus of our attention. Something that doesn't require our full attention/focus.
4 Technology should amplify the best of technology and the best of humanity Kinda a rehash of above where there is a clear divide between human action and machine actions. Each has it's own role.
5 Technology can communicate, but doesn't need to speak How does technology call for our attention? Does it shout? Or is it a calm whisper? The right amount of "volume" for the right messaging maybe?
6 Technology should work even when it fails Technology failures require an awful amount of attention and focus to diagnose and fix. How to "fail gracefully"?
7 The right amount of technology is the minimum needed to solve the problem Here is another minimalist approach to technology, and that technology should get out of the way when not needed or only do what is required.
8 Technology should respect social norms Technology does over time "train"/educate the users. Just as we have adapted to how mobile interfaces and touch screens, whatever new technology that we come up with next should be aware of how much human behavior we are "overwriting".

Flex your Calm

My favorite part of the website are a set of thinking exercises to explore ideas in Calm Tech. The topics explored are based on everyday modren technologies such as fridges and alarm clocks, but ask the question "Can this be imporved?". Can we think of ways that these machines communicate more discreetly without adding to the noise of all our daily notifications and alerts?

  • What could be an alarm clock that wakes you up in the calmest way possible?
  • What could a battery that would let you know when it was wearing out be like?
  • What types of notifications could we create that would blend into our home environments?
  • Etc etc ..

Some of the key questions they wanted you to focus on while exploring..

  • How does the device catch your attention?
  • How does the device interact with the you?
  • What kind of information does the object provide?
  • Etc etc ..

Conclusion

I really liked the focus on the user as a person with a life outside of the confines of technology. Calm tech is a reminder for us to think about who the user is outside of the user technology experience. What were they doing before using the tech? What will they do afterwards? What other thoughts and goals they might have while using the software? These are questions that I feel can be added to a further exploration when building / working with technology. My personal takeaway here is I need to be more considerate on users rather than assuming they are forced to use the software that I've designing. There could be a hundred things everyday fighting for their attention, a bit of calm tech thinking can go a long way in happier people working with technology.

References