While some other institutions are installing digital-alert systems on their campuses, the Rhode Island School of Design has just installed seven large-screen digital bulletin boards that will cycle through announcements, calendar items, and “musings, artwork, photographs, and messages posted by anyone on campus.”
A news release says the system is the brainchild of the college’s new president, John Maeda, who envisioned “an open communications tool that would provide the RISD community with a highly visual and spontaneous method of connecting with one another.” Mr. Maeda, who is also a member of Samsung’s North America advisory board, persuaded the electronics company to donate the seven 52-inch screens, together worth $25,000. The interface for the system was designed by former students of Mr. Maeda’s at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Media Lab who now work for a New York tech-design company called Potion.
Anyone with a RISD network account can contribute content, the news release says. “At regular intervals, the community-generated content appears to fall onto the screen in a jumble, rearranges itself, sends specific items to the foreground and remains in constant motion until it’s recycled back into the mix of new information at the next periodic update.” —Lawrence Biemiller
