Isadora Dantas

The Wii on The streets was an intervention chosen through a Poll that I created last semester. The problem is that I couldn’t figure out a way to put in on practice by that time. I tried to settled it at school but didn’t work, even though I had bought that right cable. Last week, however, Cynthia gave me a really good idea: Why don’t you go to one of this electronics stores that have TV in front of the window?

So, I was walking my way home when, suddenly, like a dream, I saw a store that has just opened, with two big TVs in front of it. I had to enter and talk to the owner. He was very suspicious at first, and I said that I could bring my card and show him my website. But since it is an electronic store, I showed my website right there and he said it would be O.K. if I came there the next day. This was the first person who I managed to do something nice. After leaving the store, I called Ann Marie, who said that it would be fine for her to do the intervention on Thursday and then we met at school.

Setting the wii there was harder them I imagined, but Joseph, the owner, helped us and as we first started dancing, some people stopped. A guy started to dance with me and he looked really excited. After the song was finished he even asked to look himself on the videotape.

I had some troubles in figuring out how to deal with the sound. The TV was inside the store, so I had a mobile radio and I downloaded the musics to my Iphone and was playing there. But it was really hard to sync. The people from the store even offered to play my musics on their big stereo sound, but then it would be even harder to synchronize, but I was happy that they were being so supportive.

After that, two older ladies decided to show me their moves. But once they saw that they were being recorded, they kind of changed their minds. I said that I didn’t need to record, I just wanted them to have fun. And they were impressed that I was doing that just for the sake of being nice.

Sometimes, I feel that the feedback that I get from people while I’m doing these interventions, is much better than the experience itself. After that, I kept dancing for a while, but people stopped to watch but without playing. Since my goal is to have at least one interaction, I was already feeling successful with my intervention, and the guys from the store told me that I could go back any time I wanted. So, mission of the day was completed!

So, to push the thesis further, I decided to create a marathon of interventions. I’ll be doing five per week, during the next two weeks. Since my goal now is to track people’s emotion, Cynthia suggested that I had to have at least ten, and that’s what I’m going to make, besides those that are already made.

To achieve that, I created an event on Facebook asking for people’s help and right now, I have around 35 people to assist me. I asked them which day and hour would be better and now I’m arranging them according to the interventions.

Another aspect to add to the formula, is that I decide to focus on “problems” or negative experiences that we have to deal daily. One of the problems pointed out on my survey, is that people can be extremely mean. That being said and added the fact that Valentine’s Day was yesterday and many people could be depressed, I decided to create the Free Compliments Day.

I recruited two girls that were available on Wednesday to help me: Seul Lee and Estefanie Duque. We went to Union Square and set a table there. There were three signs: “Is the world letting you down?”,  “Free Compliments!” and “Enhance your Self-Esteem”. I took my balloons with me too, because now they’re going to be part of all the experiments.

I guess I was very lucky, first because as soon as I set my table, three girls from Green Peace approached me, and I complimented them about the initiative of fighting for a good cause. These girls seamed very interesting, and for the first 10 minutes they kept bringing more people, and I started to compliment about something they were wearing or their style.

When there was a group, another woman came and looked very shy, but then I said that she was beautiful and she opened a big smile. Didn’t say anything but thanks, and then left.

Three older men approached me also, one was a photographer, another just received a compliment about his scarf (was actually very beautiful) and another was Italian, and we discussed about the food in Italy.

The funniest part of this experiment, is that I was there to give compliments, but I was the one who were the most complimented. People were extremely kind to me, or appreciating the initiative or myself, but in a very kind way. First, I felt confused about it, but then I realized that this is what my project is about: bringing positive experiences to people’s life and inspiring them in doing things that they wouldn’t normally do. They were being very nice.

One aspect that I added to this intervention, was the cards. For each person I talked to, I gave them a card written nothing more than a compliment, like: “You’re awesome”, “You shine”, “You don’t know how loved you are” and “You’re beautiful to me”. And on the back, there was my website. People seamed to love the cards, specially the Green Peace group, they kept comparing theirs and were very proud of what they received.

Even after the intervention was completed, I could extract a smile from people at school each time I handed them a card. So simple, but yet so effective.

I’ll edit the movies later, but these are some pictures of the event:

I really need to define what I’m doing this week, so I can have time to work on everything the way I want. So I came with this presentation to show tomorrow in class:

What I’m thinking about doing.

This week we had to do a map including thesis, reasons, evidence and objections.

I found specially hard to defend my thesis, and as a feedback I got that I should make more constraints about my thesis. There are people that just don’t want to be helped, limit the audience and balance the desire to improve the world without being naive.

As a bike user, I’m usually alarmed when biking in NY. Although we have all those bike lanes, people  usually don’t respect and we have to look for ourselves and others. This time I decided to call attention to me, but, as always, in a good way. I attached a bubble machine to my bike and also I found a way to attach my I-Phone to a battery stereo sound and put it inside my basket, so it was hidden. For the soundtrack, I choose some lullabies written by Chopin, just using Piano.

My ride was around Chelsea and Meatpacking, around 1pm:

The response was much better than I expected. The whole ride took around 20min and during this time, I had at least 6 people interacting with me, or talking, or asking or laughing, not counting those who were smiling and commenting about it to others. Only one of them was not a very good response. This guy was in another bike and stopped next to me and said: – This can’t be fun! and when I asked why, he was answering while running away, but I imagine he said something like: it is supposed to be on the back, or something like this.

But besides him, some people were exclaiming: – Bubbles! , others were laughing and a woman asked me where did I buy that.

And for my goal, I had never had such a calmer ride. The lullabies were also relaxing, but I didn’t have to fight for a place on the lane.

If I were going to take it further, I would like to find a machine that could make bigger and more bubbles, find a way to create a louder sound and find someone that could record it for me, instead of leaving my camera on my neck.

Overall, I found it was pretty nice. Here’s a link to people’s expressions:

In class we came with a If/Then statement to define our Thesis. Mine was:
“If I can intervene in commuters everyday lives in a positive way, then they will feel and act happier”.

But one point that was raised in class, was: why does it matter?
And this is my response to this question:

To sum up, I believe that happier people can make this world a better place, just because of their inner motivation.

Cynthia suggested me to analyze the method behind my prototypes so I could arrive to a formula of project. I created sections to organize them, as well as the new ideas that I’m having.

What I could notice, is that they are divided into performances and leaving objects on spaces. Some of them are also created to cheer people, while others are more focused on creating a kind chain.

Finally, I gave a personal grade on a scale of 1/10 to measure how I found them effective, considering how was the effect on people and how could I track it.

According to this graphs, apparently I should pursue interactions on commutes and urban spaces based on performance and developed to cheer people in general.

FEEDBACK:

After my presentation, I realized that one aspect that was really weak, was that I didn’t relate my prototypes, and didn’t specify what were the questions behind them and their results. Most part of the feedback I received was related to that, so that’s why I created a different section to discuss it.

Mike Edwards:

* Audience is too large, almost half of the world
* Take a look at the precedents and analyze their audience
* bookmark organizations that do the same
* Precedents: Where is George
* Happiness can be less abstract and more measurable. Research about it
* While I go through the prototypes, explain what is working or not

Mike:

* Earlier prototypes were kind of weak and maybe not “thesis worthy”
* However, with prototype 6 I could defend more the “happy factor” due to the performance
* Try to keep with the performance. Use the principle of taking uncomfortable situations and make it something nicer. Look into journals and newspapers
* Position myself as a scientist

Chris:

* Present prototypes from a why/ result perspective
* Standardize a way to present the prototypes
* Open my design questions/ how do I relate them to my process? Not yes or no.
* I need your help. It worked because of the captive audience/ personal interaction/ humor/ most people like chocolate
* Research The Gift Economy

Classmates:

* Narrow the audience. Not everybody respond to the theme the same way. Maybe use age range?
* Try in small spaces that are not so personal (ex: friend’s building)
* Look at TED’s talk about “What Makes us Happy” (I had already done it! : ))
* Specify more the kind of “happiness” so it can be more innovative. For example, for kids, at work, public spaces, etc.
* Narrow down the definitions so the audience can be also more specific
* How did the precedents influenced my work?
* Add more specific questions to the central one

About prototypes:

* Add central questions
* How to test their successfulness?
* What aspects of kindness are being addressed in each of them?
* How to access people that are participating?
* how do all prototypes relate?
* Sometimes, the question might not be related to the prototype
* Instead of saying I’m on a diet, I should just offer, so people know that I don’t have any interest on it