Research Synthesis
This week, our group carried on analyzing our field research "share your culture", we mapped key images on the Miro board and pointed out insights from micro relationships.
Also, we tried to synthesise all research outcomes from the past few weeks, so we sorted all keywords of findings and jotted down the points on each subject like food, street style, music, languages or characters and so on. Basically, Brixton is a melting pot of diverse cultures. When reviewing everything, a few points stood out to us - especially music.
Brainstorming
After the synthesis, we had a brainstorming session of how can we bring multicultural and humanly values together to create a system that can be recorded in the blockchain. Gabrielle had an interesting idea of tapping cards to create a noise as a verification of kindness, while other teammates put their interests in combining local character and enhancing value in blockchain, I was mainly focused on materlize the blockchain by street art but has missed the community identity, seemed that none of our ideas covered all aspects.
Idea sketches by Gabrielle and Svaney
Upgrading ideas
Our group discussed further about how to integrate the theme of cultural hybridity, the concept of blockchain technology and the feature of Brixton community in one idea then to materialise it through music. Thus, we situated the scenario in the music festival - Cross the Tracks held in Brixton every summer, and the concept of the defined design idea is for us to exchange and remix music with others there.
Music Mashup Idea
Our refined idea is about people who will be going to the music festival can create a new music mashup with others, the meaning behind this concept is music enthusiasts can quickly meet new friends and exchange their musical knowledge by "tap your card" action - tool for connecting with people to build mashup is their "ID Card''. This ID card provides the user with a passport to the network, and according to the blockchain's features, the identity should be unique and anonymous. So our solution is to allow the user to record a clip of particular sounds and then they will create a new song that represents their own culture as their identification. After they mixed with other users, the new songs will record on their ID cards as well as a shared playlist so that participants can recall all cultural mashup music.
Idea explanation, made by team
Pre-testing
As we were generating this concept we immediately tried testing and getting the opinions of our colleagues. They point out several critical questions: 1. Why is remixing the songs counted as cultural hybridity? 2. What is this idea special about Brixton? 3. What is the value of having the shared remix list for the participants?
Pre-test idea with colleagues, Ines, Manali and Svaney
For moving further, we were thinking we could turn a bit of our focus from culture hybridity of different countries, to the hybridity of cultures in Brixton, so that locals have a better sense of Brixton.
Presentation and Feedback
Mid-point Presentation, by Ines
In this week's presentation, we mainly summarised the research done previously and how we developed the music concept. People appreciated our efforts and also gave us suggestions for progressing:
What is exchanging? music? culture? knowledge?
Where is blockchain, how to make it in an apparent way?
Why do people want to know about (validate) the transaction?
What are the final outcomes of the transactions? How is it visible?
So far, we have developed a relatively solid idea, and even though there are many issues with it, this is also a motivation for us to continue working on it. In the next few weeks, we will need to think more about the rationality of blockchain technology in the concept and the local nature of Brixton.