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Project

Talking Machines: Democratizing the design of voice-based agents for the home

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Nikhita Singh & Anastasia Ostrowski

Nikhita Singh + Anastasia Ostrowski

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Embodied voice-based agents, such as Amazon’s Echo, Google Home, and Jibo, are becoming increasingly present in the home environment. For most, these agents represent their first experience of living with artificial intelligence in such private and personal spaces. 

However, little is known about people’s desires, preferences, and boundaries for these technologies. This projects seeks to answer questions surrounding this space: How do we live with voice-based agents in the home? How do different generations interact with voice-based agents? How should these technologies be designed to incorporate people’s preferences, desires, and boundaries? What tools can be used to understand this space?

This work presents insights from a long-term exploration with over 70 children, adults, and older adults over a one-year period to interact with, discover, experience, reflect upon, and design voice-based agents. In addition, design tools and learnings from the experience have been developed into an open-source design kit to enable designers and researchers to explore these ideas with the broader population.

For more information, please contact Nikhita Singh (nikhita@media.mit.edu) and Anastasia Ostrowski (akostrow@media.mit.edu).

Copyright

Nikhita Singh & Anastasia Ostrowski

Copyright

Nikhita Singh