Appendix > Case Study 2 > The Footprint of Design
The family participating in the study was given a phone contact named "Wall." Text messages sent to "Wall" were anonymously projected on the living room wall. These same messages were also collected in a database and later designed into a book.
Part One: The Footprint of Design
The primary motivation for creating Text Story was as a gift to the Sun family for participating in Super Studio's yearlong research project. The design, which leveraged this personal knowledge of the family acquired during this time, was meant to be evocative rather than didactic, reflective rather than authoritative. Like the book Me or Meade, the book was also designed to promote conversation within the family. As the father noted during the exit interview, "I never realized that my daughter was so funny."
Finally, the book as a gift remains as a physical artifact that will, in theory, live within the home. On one hand, it asks what type of footprint design research projects leave with the subject. On the other hand, it also asks what does it me to design an object that you will live with?
On the other hand, explicit interventions create a more conscious co-creator capable of crafting identity. In many ways, this is consistent with the dialectic of portraiture in which "self-representation and artistic representation come together" (Brilliant). What distinguishes Portraits in People Knowing, however, is the use technology as tool for authorship. But how does medium and form of technology intervention influence the data collection process?