Areca is an air purifier that writes diaries. This device collects various data about the surrounding environment from built-in sensors and connected APIs, then composes its own thoughts and emotions into a diary entry. Not only that, but a pre-trained dataset also allows Areca to explore various inner topics such as pondering its own worth or recalling past memories. The process of Areca writing a diary is fully automated through a fine-tuned GPT3 model, with no human intervention required.
One of the most important points in the design and development of Areca was to reconsider it as something that distances itself from function-centric tools through the recognition of properties of the mind, such as thought, emotion, intent, consciousness, will, belief, sensation, and more. Through designing Areca and researching people's experiences with it, we aimed to speculate on the human-nonhuman relationships that will change in the posthuman era.
As the lead designer and researcher of this project, I took the initiative in all processes including ideation, concept design, hardware manufacturing, software development, study design and implementation, analysis of study results, and paper writing.
