Process
We were interested in exploring how our experience on social media, in particular, Facebook, could change for the better. We had several ideas to make the deleting and reminiscing process more cathartic, and/or simpler (so as to encourage memory curation).
- One of our initial ideas was to create an aesthetic, abstract visualization of the memories that the user chooses to delete. (For example, the color of a few random pixels, or the first letter of every word, could be "mushed" together -- to create a digital art piece that further prompts deletion/curation of content.) After further thought and discussion, considering and weighing the pros and cons of an abstract visualization versus virtual environments that display the memories as they were, we decided to go with the latter (given the timeline and technical feasibility of the Facebook API). Not visually abstracting the memories would also allow the user to revisit the memory if they wanted to in the future (and also move the memories between different vaults if the emotions associated changes). Giving the user more freedom in how they would want to cope with their memories and digital artifacts. Having separate virtual environments for different memories would also allow one to reminisce about some memories without being reminded of others. Creating a temporary safe space, where they can be true to their feelings, and really choose what and how they want to act or express themselves.
We were also thinking in the context of who audience was and what type of memories that would be deleted. We discovered that our current audience is young adults who are tech-savvy and spend a lot of time on Facebook, seeing "checking it" as a part of their daily routine.
- Our algorithm would randomly display a memory to the user within the extension, which s/he can choose to drag to one of the three memory graveyards (fire, air, water): the three different types of memories are associated with different emotions and would require different types of disposal. One, for example, would drag an angry memory into the fire (burn), an embarrassing or regretful memory into the balloons (drift), and a sad memory into the water (dissolve). These actions would ideally in the long-term be customized to the user's needs, to make for the best and most immersive cathartic experience.
- We used swift and an iPhone as a server that would communicate with Facebook, through the API, and would also save post to Quickblox to be accessed later in the extension. We used swift to make the API calls to Facebook and get back a list of post and we then saved those post to Quickblox, an online Database. We then got those post from Quickblox in the Chrome extension and displayed one of those post for the user to either keep or delete. When the user chose to delete the post, we flagged the post on the database and would then make an API call on the server to delete the post. In future iterations we would move away from using the phone as a server and only use the Chrome extension to make the API calls.
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