Rolling Rhapsody
AI systems and products are increasingly becoming more ubiquitous, driven by advancements in machine learning and big data. The critical challenge in developing a new AI system for analyzing sounds in a home environment often lies in acquiring the right data. And this was the challenge provided to us by our clients, Bosch and Philips.
Our team, Echoes, adopted a Game With a Purpose (GWAP) approach to tackle this issue by gamifying audio collection. Leveraging the Twitch platform, we curated sounds from various home activities, such as dishwasher operation, coughing, footsteps, and security alarms. At the project's inception, we grappled with a significant design challenge—how to make audio recording enjoyable for users. This uncharted territory, coupled with the constraint of utilizing Twitch as our platform, presented formidable challenges. We successfully navigated this obstacle through extensive communication with fellow designers, playtesters, and our clients. As the producer and a programmer within the team, I played a pivotal role in orchestrating this solution.
In my role as a producer, my responsibilities encompassed ensuring clarity on our objectives, motivating team members, assigning tasks, and managing our schedule. This proved personally challenging as I was new to the role of a producer and found balancing my time between being a producer and a programmer to be demanding. Recognizing the time-consuming nature of the producer role, I opted to reduce my programming tasks. Seeking guidance from experienced producers, I aimed to enhance my skills and effectiveness in my producer role. Despite my decision to take on fewer programming tasks, challenges arose as additional programming responsibilities were added to the backlog. Subsequently, I became involved in developing the mobile application (using Unity) for recording and uploading audio files.
One of the most gratifying moments in this project occurred when we had the opportunity to conduct playtesting with a Twitch streamer, VindRGaming. Receiving valuable feedback from both the streamer and their community provided invaluable insights into potential future enhancements for the project.
The link to the project website is provided below:
A game with a purpose to collect audio data (Academic)
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