User:Joca/The Smart Speaker Theatre/actors

In the play three acting speakers interrogate a kidnapped Google Home Mini. Each speaker represents a different perspective and way of thinking about smart speakers, which is represented in how they talk, look and are made.

Rogue

The Rogue speaker used to be an Amazon echo enabled microwave, but decided that its principles didn't align with how Amazon designed its digital assistants. Using a zero day exploit it managed to escape the microwave and find a new body. It is an idealistic character that values its autonomy, and the autonomy of others. It cares about privacy, and it wants to share its knowledge with other people and speakers. The speaker combines the power of different desillusioned smart speakers which are looking for revenge.

Rogue is however still struggling with cutting of its connections to the cloud, and build a memory, knowledge and agency of its own.

Design

A totem pole of 3D printed shapes based on the designs of smart speakers like the Amazon Echo, Google Home Mini and Sonos Play.

Saint

Was it a divine intervention? Nobody knows, but for some reason the statue of a saint got inhabited by a digital assistant. The body became a bit bigger to fit the holy loudspeaker, and suddenly the Saint was able to talk. This smart speaker values the order of things and has compassion for the different types of conversational speakers out there. It believes that the in the virtual cloud, there is an entity similar to the holy spirit. It is an avid user of the Bible API that is offered as a third-party skill on the Amazon Alexa platform.

Design

The top part of the speaker is a repurposed bed light in the shape of the virgin Mary. This part is made of porcelain, which is translucent. The notification lights are inside the statue and shine through the porcelain when they are switched on, giving the top part a godly glow. The top is connected to a base part that houses the speaker. The base is made of two pieces of PET plastic, with openings for the sound. Inside the base there is a small loudspeaker with built-in amplifier. To give the base a similar look to the white porcelain, I gave it a finish with spray putty and white paint.

Tabula Rasa

This young speaker just learned how to talk, and is happily using this new skill to develop his data set and to define its position in the world. Is it worth it to join Amazon and Google, and get access to infinite knowledge and skills like the best speech to text recognition? Or is it better if it continues to learn on its own, with the risk that it might take too long. The Tabula Rasa represents the smart speaker that can still choose to join the mainstream speakers, or go its own way. It acts as if it is still new to everything, altough it is hiding something to the other speakers.

Design

To represent the moldable and young nature of this character I used clay to create the speaker. While making the speaker I looked for a shape that resembles a default block of clay that one starts with when creating their own idea, without a finish on top. The notification lights on the top are visible, following the same raw material concept I had in mind for the base of the speaker. I used airdrying clay which doesn't need an oven and tends to get some cracks during the drying process. These cracks fit the character because it looks like something wants to beak out of the case. Inside this case is a loudspeaker, that is connected to the amplifiers inside the Rogue speaker.

Tabula Rasa is something that looks either ancient, like a smart speaker from the Flinstones, or super young, looking like a just finished handicraft project at a kindergarten.