I recently found out about Electronic Objects, “a computer made for art”. An Electric Object is effectively a wall-mounted device which comes without a mouse or a keyboard. It promises to bring “art from the Internet into your home”, and I can see that it will do exactly this:

1. Designed for the home (1) – The problem that Electronic Objects are looking to solve is that of small devices not being great for properly experiencing art on the Internet. As Electronic Objects founder and CEO Jake Levine explained to TechCrunch recently: “The devices that we use to access the Internet (our tablets, our laptops, our phones, our computers), they’re designed not for contemplation, not to live in the background, not to be quiet or still, but to demand your attention and absorb you.” Reason why the Electric Object “01” is created in such way that users don’t have to worry about all the – utility and productivity related stuff – happening on their devices.
2. Designed for the home (2) – In a recent Product Hunt podcast, Jake Levine mentioned how digital hasn’t yet made its full foray into people’s living rooms. There are products such as Nest which cater for the whole house or the kitchen, but the “Internet of Things” hasn’t quite made it into the living room yet. Electric Objects aims to provide a product which isn’t about utility but something that can become “a part of our lives fitting seamlessly into our familiar home and work environments” according to Jake Levine.
3. Designed to fade away – On Electric Objects’ Kickstarter page it describes how the “01” has been designed to “fade away”, like a photograph or a painting. I like that the screen of Electric Objects 01 is effectively just a frame that you can stick onto your wall. There’s no keyboard, mouse or alerts, avatars, slideshows, feeds or docks. The frame is connect to your WiFi account, which means that you can directly control the artwork on the frame from your smartphone or any other device.

Main learning point: Electric Objects have created an exciting new product in this computer made for the display of art from the Internet. Their “01” computer is now available for pre-order and it will be interesting to see how many people will buy it to bring digital art into their living rooms. Separately, I’m keen to see how many product people and designers will start to concentrate more on the ‘living room’ as a place to create digital products for. Watch this space!

Fig. 1 – An Electric Object ‘in action’ – Taken from: http://techcrunch.com/2014/04/30/electric-objects-funding/ 

Fig. 2 – Electric Objects Founder and CTO in conversation with TechCrunch’s Anthony Ha – Taken from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hLSPCqUuRM4

Related links for further linking:

1. http://techcrunch.com/2014/04/30/electric-objects-funding/
2. http://techcrunch.com/2014/07/08/electric-objects-launches-kickstarter-campaign-to-build-displays-for-digital-art/
3. http://www.theverge.com/2014/7/8/5880371/electric-objects-digital-picture-frame
4. http://thenextweb.com/creativity/2014/07/09/electronic-objects-eo1-frame-brings-internet-wall-near/
5. https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/electricobjects/electric-objects-a-computer-made-for-art