Raising Curiosity about Open Data via the ‘Physiradio’ <i>Musicalization</i> IoT Device

Abstract

Open data is a technical concept and a political movement since datasets (e.g., on environment and business) can be used to verify/falsify (ex ante and ex post) governmental policies. But data analysis is not for the masses and non-experts may not even know the existence of open data. Here the challenge is to raise interest, curiosity and the need for knowledge in the average person. Data physicalization may be of some help: by creating a familiar device (e.g., a radio) that ‘physicalizes’ some publicly available data, the authors are trying to raise curiosity about the source and availability of open data and the techniques underlying data access, extraction and analysis.

This paper presents the prototype of a desktop ‘Physiradio’ that plays internet streams according to a mapping between weather conditions and musical genre, i.e., a musicalization process. The association (weather → musical genre) is subjective but understandable by most people: this device internal workings can be almost fully grasped by the non-experts, thus it can be used as a conversation starter.

Physiradio was field-tested among coworkers, students and other people through a quanti-qualitative information gathering process. The field test data presented here can be useful to measure the efficacy in:

• raising curiosity about internals and open data techniques
• conveying information (i.e., verifying the mapping)