A day at MIT with NFC

NFC technology in everyday life

Scenarios & Future casting, Mobile experience, Ubiquitous computing
Boston (US) / MIT, April - May 2008

Near-Field Communication (NFC) is a wireless communication technology which allows devices to exchange data over distances of approximately ten centimeters. Currently used in contexts such as mobile payment or convenient public transportation ticketing, the true potential of the technology has until now remained unexplored. For this project, a number of future usage scenarios for NFC technology were imagined according to the everyday life of college students in MIT campus.

Brief / Concept

Near-Field Communication (NFC), allows devices to seamlessly and intuitively communicate with one another, enabling a pleasant and convenient user experience. To explore the potential of this technology, the MIT Mobile Experience Lab - in collaboration with Nokia - researched ongoing NFC initiatives and envisioned how to incorporate NFC technologies into the future everyday life of an average user.

Design Process

After the research of ongoing NFC initiatives was accomplished, the process focused on the definition of valuable opportunities and innovations for future NFC applications. Several concepts emerged and were later on clustered according to their inner value: ubiquitous information, health/safety, networking, e-money, entertainment, smart objects and mobility. Finally, a script was written following the perspective of two fictional MIT students as they go through their common day in the future. In order to support the user experience perspective, mobile UIs were designed and a body-storming session was organized to increase the effectiveness of NFC physical interactions in the video-shooting.

A number of concepts that emerged during the design process but were not included in the final scenarios were collected into a Design Opportunities Document.