Open, Seamful and Slow: A More-Than-Human Internet of Things

Abstract

Departing from the concept of an Internet of Things (IoT) as a means to give voice to non-human ‘things’, the project Wildthings.io seeks to develop experimental prototypes for grassroots, community-run digital networks, and DIY electronic devices as artistic interventions. This paper discusses the iterative design processes that concluded in the IoT artwork Papawai Transmissions, which imagines novel ways of understanding and (re-)connecting with disconnected streams, their communities and their ecosystems in urban Aotearoa/New Zealand, through methods of openness, seamfulness and slowness.