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Future Media Home is a research project of the Media Lab in the University of Art and Design in Helsinki for studying the media environment of the home of the future. It is funded by the Finnish Technology Development Fund TEKES and a group of participating companies.

The project will develop demonstrations and prototypes of phenomena, services and products of a possible future information environment and of the ways how people might use them. Expert interviews and thematic workshops will be carried out to produce material that will be compiled into a knowledgebase, which in turn serves as a foundation for the scenario building process. The knowledgebase will be implemented in interactive audiovisual media.

The ideas for demonstrations are generated and selected according to the understanding the project team develops of the possible interests and problems of the home media technology users of the future. The demonstrations will be implemented in a laboratory environment on a powerful, integrated digital hardware and software platform. The design solutions created in the project will be evaluated according to a three-stage user test model.

The companies participating in the project are Andersen Consulting Oy, Helsingin Puhelin Oy (Helsinki Telephone Company), ICL Data Oy, Sanoma Oy, Telecom Finland Oy and Yleisradio Oy (The Finnish Broadcasting Company).

The project interacts with other Media Lab projects and is connected to the university's Future Home framework, whose original concept was developed and evangelised by the Media Lab during 1995-96.

One goal of the Future Media Home project is to function as a fertile seeding ground for new spin-off research and development projects which can focus on some more specific aspect of the media or information environment of the future home.

Contacts at UIAH / Media Lab:

Kari-Hans Kommonen
project lead
khk@uiah.fi

Philip Dean
Media Lab director
pdean@uiah.fi