Office Plant #1: Intimate Space and Contemplative Entertainment

Abstract

Walk into a typical high-tech office environment and among the snaking network wires, glowing monitors, and clicking keyboards, and one is likely to see a plant. Unfortunately, this plant is often dying; it is not well-adapted to the office environment. Here the authors discuss their work <i>Office Plant #1</i>, an exploration of a technological object adapted to the office ecology that fills the same social and emotional niche as a plant. Office Plant #1 monitors both the ambient light level and its owner’s email activity. Its robotic body, reminiscent of a desert plant in form, responds with slow, rhythmic movements and quiet ambient sound. <i>Office Plant #1</i> is a new instantiation of our notion of intimate technology, that is, technologies which address human needs and desires as opposed to technologies which meet exclusively functional task specifications.