I wanted to use this post to digest my meetings with Andrew and Tom this week.

From Andrew’s meeting, I was left thinking about what the creeping feeling is around my topic. I’ve read a lot of articles about the security of smart home networks and I think there is the gimmick of attackers being able to hack your smart lock. I am more interested in the concept of people willing to give up their personal privacy, willing to give up the feeling of safety at home, consenting to being watched and always feeling like you are posturing, in exchange for lower insurance rates or the convenience of being able to turn on a coffee maker. It’s incredibly depressing to me as a concept, like the next step toward EM Forster’s humans in the machine stops. After feedback collective today, our guest Attilio pointed out that we are all trying to get some sense of physicality back. The creeping feeling is that eventually we will never be alone with ourselves, which is a very confrontational experience that induces doubt but one which I have also found to be incredibly beneficial. Imagining the revelation of space, I am imagining a moment of nothing in contrast to an over-saturation of connectivity and stimulus. I read Amy Herzog’s Belleville yesterday and was inspired with its ability to make me completely understand the progression of events while at the same time asking “How the fuck did we get here!?!” at its climax. I think this relates to my experience with interconnected devices and the slippery slope of convenience. There is an appealing progression of comfort seeking with these devices.

Tom gave me some good advice on the technical aspects and some examples I can draw from as I am making. The biggest takeaway from our conversation is that I should only be building something when I truly need it. Zigbee may not be exactly what I need in the long run, but I can always get back to it later. I think that I need to carve out a plan for how I am going to create this performance and only dive into the technical aspects when I truly need them. For my research, I want to dive further into this sense of people being alone with themselves, the psychological influences of having so many connected devices, and the trade-offs we are making when we welcome devices into our homes.