Outdoor Display Utilization Project (ODU) is a system that import users’ information from their phone to a displays in public areas, so they can view their texts, emails, fitness status, and news without taking their phones out.

Introduction

As the idea of ubiquitous computing is spreading out, designers are trying to rethink the role of public place. They tend to believe that public place can do more than it currently does. The Outdoor Display Utilization (ODU) project aims to utilize public displays and the Internet to enhance human communication, providing shared displays to people with the information they need. The purpose of ODU is to go beyond traditional channels of receiving information, and to offer new ways for human communication. ODU is going to let people receive information in more places, more often, and with less distractions.

The problem this project is aiming to solve is the lack of flexibility and efficiency of the public displays. Outdoor displays include billboards on the buildings, screens in the light rail stations and bus stations, and kiosks in supermarkets and pronto stations. Those displays attract people’s attention only in a few occasions; more often they are in a “standing by” mode, waiting for people to notice them instead of interacting with them proactively. The ODU project seeks to integrate users as part of a display (or entire display for a limited time), showing nearby people personalized information with the help of near field communication technology.

A recent design prototype from a research team of University of Washington has revealed the idea of turning the Seattle’s light rail station into a public art exhibition. They plan to develop a mobile application that allows users to interact with the transit area; they can draw on the app, and their artworks will be shown on the tunnel displays. (Tweeddale, 2016) Going off that idea, the ODU plans to expand the functionalities of public displays and turn them into an extent screen for everybody.