TvH parRECeet
. par[REC]eet .
‘This little birdie wants to hear every ones secrets!’
The par[REC]eet is a stuffed bird with a build in recording device, which is controlled with hidden soft buttons. The buttons are located in the wings, tail, beak and belly for easy grabability so your child can record any conversation while playing.
This project was inspired by my research about the ethics of technology. I wanted to make something for children, because this is a vulnerable target group of which people are convinced they should be protected, but not always realise some toys with integrated technology are doing the opposite.
I observed one of my cousins with their tablet, while playing a game they would download every other game that would pop up in the advertisements. All these games ask for permission to use certain features of a device, like the agenda, contacts or even the use of the webcam and microphone. But my 6 year old cousin just kept pressing ok without reading anything. Personally I find it creepy how much data could be collected by those who mean harm, through the trust of parents, who thing their child is playing a fun game.
Also what I wanted to visualise is the difference between not knowing what technology is integrated in the product versus knowing what is in the product and how it is presented.
-
The Par[REC]eet has a crochet body made of cotton and acrylic threads. The wings and tail are made with navy wool felt and needle felted neon pink highlights. The body, wings and tail are equipped with the soft buttons made with felt and conductive fabric. The headphones are made of round plastic containers, covered in bright pink fabric with a spiral of silver thread which is the speaker.
A Sparkfun ISD1950 voice recorder with the microphone is placed in the forehead of the bird. The buttons in the wings and tail are connected to the message 1,2 and 3 on the board. The button in the beak is pressed in combination with one of the wings or tail a message is recorded. When the button of the belly is pressed in combination with one of the wings or tail the message is played back via the speakers in the headphones. These embroidered speakers aren’t very loud, you need to be very close to hear the message, which is a feature I really like, this gives it more the feeling of secrecy.
-
Par[REC]eet is not alone! Meet his friends OwlTenna, Sati Peng and Flying R.E.D. a group of fearless spies from BirdEye-5. Follow their adventures in the animated YouTube series, with a new release every week. Where the bird will take to the sky and fight Evil-I.
Other products will be diaries with build in voice recorders, pens with motion sensors. The game app will of course ask for access to all data on the device.
-
This is the first time I made a project with a silly tone. I’m used to these ideas being shot down immediately, I never consider them as a potential project. And I’m obviously going for the awful pun award!
