Preface

I made this list a long while back and recently I’ve been asked again to share! So have fun! This is a place to type up the structured ideas I have for making “badges” and other electronic bling for conferences around the world.

No AI or LLM was used in the making of this document.

General Bling Ideas

Important Considerations - Inclusion :)

There are important things to consider when designing bling, especially if inclusion of all neural and physical types are to be taken in to consideration

Primary senses to consider:

    Sight (visual spectrum)  
    Sound  
    Touch  
    Tactile  
    Smell  
    Taste  
    E&M/Radiation (invisible spectrum)  
    Empathy  
    Curiosity  
    Mortality  

Sight (visual spectrum)

Sight is a standard sense on all meat-puppets, meaning it is often considered the most important; however be careful. Many meat-puppets are vision impaired and benefit from additional options for interacting with whatever bling you bring

Also remember to include a “LO-BLING” mode so our friends sensitive to flashing lights may participate from the safety of their non-blingy dwellings

Sound

Sound, much like sight, is a standard meat-sense that most will be familiar with. Sound can often be used as an alternative to sight if one is vision impaired, and can create a rich experience if used correctly in conjunction with the other senses.

Touch

Joining the standard ranks along with sight and sound, touch is important to consider when designing something users are going to be touching. It can even be used as a primary sense in rare cases, cases in which it is often beneficial to make inclusion a priority. By bringing touch in to consideration, interaction is encouraged by just holding whatever it is that is being made

Tactile

Tactile could be included with “touch”, but it is really its own sense. This sense allows users who aren’t even looking at, listening to, or consciously interacting with the device to idly play with it while gaining a sense of doing “something”. Tactile really shines in the recent wave of fidget toys all hitting clearance this November in every X-Mas sale near you!!!

Smell

Commonly a non-standard sense due to the signal-to-noise ratio in the con-air (easily remedied by $4 & walk to the corner drug-store), smell is an overlooked sense in the arena of bling design. Who wants to be the smelly kid really? A novel implementation of Smell in a design will definitely yield novel results

Taste

Not often found in bling, taste is a non-standard sense but that does NOT make it a less important sense at ALL. Usually combined with Smell, taste can offer a powerful tool for providing clues, functionality, and even on occasion - group interaction gasp

E&M/Radiation (invisible spectrum)

UV, IR, and the spectrum in-between is included above with Vision, and may be moved down here, for now that’s where they’re documented

E&M/Radiation is almost always an electro-sense, being implemented in the form of sending electronic signals to change the state of integrated devices such as LEDs, screens, microphones, and more. What we mean here is the NON electronic ways to use E&M/Radiation as a unique part of whatever is being created. This passively supplements the meat-senses and allows users a richer experience when iteracting with whatever is being made

Empathy

While not really thought of as a primary sense, Empathy is one of the most important parts of putting together a project that intends to create a community. Building a device that encourages the one rule of “Don’t be a jerk” will help bolster the confidence of users and help them discover what they cannot on their own. Mainly, we want to see different behavior around familiar and unfamiliar groups of badges

Curiosity

As humans and inhuman alike explore the universe around us, there must be a drive to keep us going. Something to surprise us when we are least expecting it, and occasionally in a way that impacts us for life. Curiosity keeps us moving forward, opening new doors, and trying new things. It also will keep watch on Mars for it’s remaining days #roverlove

Mortality

Much like the Event-Horizon, the devices we design need to survive going through hell and back and should also have some way to track the passage of time through a known decay process. Building in a sense of Mortality encourages participation in whatever way is required to maintain the “least viable method” to maintain the status of “alive”