COLTAN SNAPFACTS VIDEO

The group’s video for our installation

Icon Content

In order to complete the construction of Coltan Snapfacts, a list of content (to be placed under each icon) needed to be created. This content needed to be short and succinct, so that our facts could be portrayed as concisely as possible (more impact).

The following shows what facts where hidden in their respective icons:

Warning
<Disclaimer for graphic content>
This device contains graphic, confronting images and impacting content. There is no responsibility taken for any shock or disturbance on the viewer’s behalf. This installation’s content is to be viewed at your discretion.

Information
<An in depth (but not too large) brief on coltan mining and coltan wars>

COLTAN is a special mineral, short for Columbite-tantalite. It is a special mineral because when it is refined it is used to create devices we all use everyday: PHONES, LAPTOPS, DIGITIAL WATCHES, GAME CONSOLES, hell even in CARS.

80% of the world’s Coltan resource comes from the Congo and the Congo is in the midst of a bloody civil war. What is the issue??? Mining for COLTANis a dark business because the mining it is FINANCING the Congo civil war. At the same time coltan mining is run by warlords who force children to mine for coltan. Child laborers die mining the mineral. The sad fact is that 45,000 people [including children] die a month in Congo not only because of the civil war, but also because of them being exploited for illegal mining especially for coltan.

Huge tech companies like Motorola, Dell, HP, IBM, Nokia, Apple, Sony, Microsoft, etc. all buy processed coltan to build computer chips for their electronic devices and they DON’T PAY ATTENTION on where the coltan comes from. In a sense, they can be financing the civil war. BUT hold on there, tech companies are not only to blame! We, ordinary folks, are also to blame! The more we keep throwing away and buying more electronic devices, we can also be financing the civil war in Congo as well. In other words, your luxury may be causing someone else’s misery! This may be confronting, but this is the sad truth about the phone you’re holding in your hand, the laptop you work with, and the other devices you use everyday.

See the To-do list icon to see the advice on how to minimize this issue.

Settings
<Instructions>
1) Raise an icon to discover the hidden fact(s) behind it

2) Ensure you pay sufficient attention to this information

3) Each fact represents an issue involving coltan mining

4) Feeling happy now? Feeling guilty? What do you feel?

5) Sorry there is no parental controls on this device

Gallery
❤ really impacting and/or bloody pictures with small captions.>

Caption: An unfortunate victim of a civil dispute, erupting in the streets of a small Congolian town.

Caption: A UN peacekeeper walks past a body, killed in a dispute in Rutshuru. Death is a common, daily seen consequence of Congo’s bloody coltan war.

Caption: The civil war in the Congo has no mercy. Men, women, children, the elderly; millions of lives are directly affected. What is the main cause of this civil war? The mining of Coltan.

Caption: an example of child exploitation for the mining of Coltan. Your purchase of an electronic device may have originated from these very children.

Maps
<Map of affected area, with highlighted affected areas>

Caption: This is the location of the Democratic republic of Congo. This 3rd world country contains a whopping 80% of the world’s supply of coltan.

Internet Browser
<5 IMPACTING/INFORMATIVE external sources for more information>
If you wish to find more information about the Coltan wars in Congo, here are some good places to start:

Blood coltan: Is your cell phone soaked in Congolese blood?
http://tribune.com.pk/story/67995/blood-coltan-is-your-cell-phone-soaked-in-congolese-blood/

Blood Coltan
http://www.javafilms.fr/spip.php?article8

Coltan Mining in the Congo: We All Have Blood in Our Hands
http://www.cookiesound.com/2011/09/coltan-we-all-have-blood-in-our-hands/

Coltan Minerals 101: Coltan, The Congo Act, and How You Can Help
http://people.howstuffworks.com/conflict-minerals-congo-act7.htm

Congo Coltan War PSA
http://youtu.be/4J1s3NeyVU4

To-do List
<Tell audience what action to take>

• Take your old phones or smart devices to Recycling Stations. These stations reuse the metal in your devices; reducing the need to mine for more – ultimately extinguishing the Congolese civil war.
• Spread the word about this issue, and tell as many people as you can! The more people who know, the more action can be taken for this issue. Bring it out into the public eye!
• Do not keep upgrading your smart devices, just because the latest one came out. The more purchases you make, the more demand for coltan, and the more mining – resulting in more deaths and unrest in Congo.

 

Concept cards for Thesis 3

 

These are the 20 concept cards that responds to the 3rd thesis (Intelligent devices increases the gap between rich & poor and powerful & weak):

1. Traffic Life

2. Water and Life

3. Missile Mission

4. Snapfacts

5. Push the Button

6. Act it out

7. Two – sided cities

8. Dirty Water Stand

9. Sticky Feet

10. Flight Simulator

11. Iphone Coffin

12. The Convertible Car

13. Rich & Poor Water

14. Public Fact Book

15. Public Screamer

16. Building Race

17. The Playground

18. The Medical Booth

19. The Master View

20. Sludge Fountain

Ensuring the Concept Provokes Reflection

An important (and crucial) criteria for our concept is that it must provoke reflection.
It must make people think; either by encouraging them to interact, provoking them to see the world differently, or inviting them to explore, experience or shape the environment they live in.

To ensure our concept provokes reflection, we focussed on informing users with this device, by encouraging them to interact with it. What Sarah, our tutor, told us, was that this concept needed a means of proving we got our point across to users, rather than just hoping we did so. We needed to prove that the users understood what the device was telling them and that they were going to act on it.

What our team chose to do, as a simple solution, was to have a person from our group nearby the installation (undercover, so to speak). When a user is finished interacting with the device, our team member will ask them a few questions regarding what they have learnt, etc.

The questions that our team decided would demonstrate whether our device served its purpose or not, were:
– What did you learn from this device?
– How many smart devices do you own?
– Did you know about Coltan mining and the civil war in Congo before now?
– What actions do you think you could take to help solve this issue?
These questions will ensure to us that our concept demonstrated its point clearly to the viewers.

Building the Concept (Meeting 1)

This meeting was arranged at Henry’s house, and was attended by Tom, Marlunn and Henry. At this meeting, supplies were brought and the concept’s construction was begun. What was mainly done was the painting and constructing of the frame, as Marlunn drew up the icons. After this first stage of construction, icon content was brainstormed (what goes underneath each icon) and where these would be positioned on the installation. This is what was chosen (in order of position *NOTE* there are two icons per row, from top to bottom):
Information – A short brief/definition on coltan wars 
Settings – Instructions on how to use device
Gallery – 3 impacting pictures with short captions
Maps – A map of mainly affected countries
Internet Browser – Links to external information sites
To-do-list – Tell the user what they can do to act on this

The reason this order was chosen, was so that the audience is first given a brief/instruction on how to use the device and what it is about (top row – information and settings). After this, they are shown impacting images through the gallery and more information on the location of the issue areas (middle row – gallery and maps). Finally, they are shown links to go home and look up for more information, and instructions on what they should to to help. This leaves them with a call to action, so that it acts as a last impression (bottom row – internet browser and to-do-list). 

Another meeting was arranged for the upcoming Saturday, to finish off the construction. 

Critiques on Bodystorm

Peer critiques in our zone were done after the Bodystorm due date. The critiques mentioned that our concept fits the brief. They like how we are approaching in a serious way and that it is informative. They also suggested that we should improve the concept by engaging the users more. The photo below this text is a brief summary of the suggestions in the critiques. They mentioned the context of use, engagement of user and other additions to make the concept better.

Research for Context of Use

After running our workshop, we discussed and decided on our favourite/strongest ideas for contexts of use. The two that we were tossing up, were outside a tech store in a shopping mall, or outside a computer lab/tech area at a university. We were ASSUMING that both of these areas had their strongpoints, but we didn’t have research to prove our assumptions. So, we compiled research to prove and establish strongpoints for both contexts of use:

Research for university:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/04/120422231828.htm
Almost all students under 25 years old (97.8 per cent) had a mobile phone, just over three quarters (77.4 per cent) owned a laptop and over a third (38.1 per cent) owned a desktop computer. Over two thirds (70.1 per cent) felt their access to computers was sufficient to meet their computing needs, and the mobile phone was chosen by 83.2 per cent as the device students would miss most if they did not have access to it.
This is a strongpoint for this context of use, as university consists of (a majority) of people under the age of 25. Because of this, many people have access and enjoy using smart devices, and therefore will be more intrigued by this concept and what it is telling them.

http://interactive.alive.com/september-2013/globally-aware-children/#
“It creates a better society that is more respectful of people’s rights, and more compassionate,” says Paula Gallo, senior education manager with UNICEF Canada’s Global Classroom program. “But there are also many ways it’s personally beneficial. It makes you feel better; it improves your brain capacity.” Experts say that children who become involved in their local and global communities have greater self-esteem, enhance their social and psychological development, and make healthier lifestyle choices. They’re also more likely to become engaged citizens as adults.
Although this article is mainly aimed at children, the same can be said about young adults. It is beneficial, and also, highly important, to educate the youth of today about worldwide issues.

Research for Tech Store:
http://www.smarthouse.com.au/comment/J9A3J6A2.aspx
Although this is specifically to do with JB Hifi, and can be assumed that many electrical stores are similar. The main (or only) relevant information in this is where it is stated that “What JB Hi Fi has over retailers like Harvey Norman is a target audience of shoppers who are young, upwardly mobile and have money.” This tells us that a place like this would allow our product to be seen by a tech savvy audience (likely to show more interest).

http://www.mobileyouth.org/post/apple-target-market-demographics/
This basically states that Apple focussed their products around youth, and this paid off. This shows that youth are the generation (mainly) that are attracted to smart devices and are therefore more likely to pay attention/act on our installation’s information.

After discussion, deliberation, and assessment of research, it was decided that the context of use for our device will be at University, outside a tech savvy building or room (such as a computer lab, Ask IT section or Library).