The interactive system is designed to be non intrusive while enabling members of the pubic to simply type in their thoughts and interpretation of museum objects and click ‘send’. Their interpretation become part of the objects history and ultimately the display itself via the interactive label system to allow the display of comments and information directly next to the artefacts.

The project is powered by Tales of Things technology which has developed a method for cataloguing physical objects online and capture memories and stories via the Internet of Things. QRator takes the technology a step further bringing the opportunity to move the discussion of objects direct to the museum label and onto a digital collaborative interpretation label, users’ mobile phones, and online allowing the creation of a sustainable, world-leading model for two-way public interaction in museum spaces.


At its heart QRator is an iPad/iPhone and web based system that allows everyone to be a curator and share their views on an exhibition. Visitors can examine an object before leaving their thoughts via an iPad to create a digital, ‘living’ label that subsequent visitors can read and respond to.

By downloading a free application to an iPhone or android phone, visitors are able to see rolling updates to the digital label after they leave the museum, or via twitter. Participants are also able to take part in the conversation online via the QRator site with comments appearing live within the museum.

Content currently covers two museums at UCL; The Grant Museum of Zoology and The Petrie Museum of Egyptology. he Grant Museum of Zoology is one of the oldest natural history collections in England, dating back to 1827. The collection comprises over 68,000 skeletal, taxidermy and wet specimens, covering the whole of the animal kingdom. Many of the species are now endangered or extinct including the Tasmanian tiger or thylacine, the quagga and the dodo. The Grant Museum is the only remaining university zoology museum in London.

The post Introducing QRator – iPad and Web Based Living Labels for Museums appeared first on Digital Urban.

The day was organised in such a way as to allow participants to take part in semi-structured discussions that were interspersed by presentations and demonstrations to further inform debate. Debate was complex and opinions upon the benefits and threats for tagging became more subtle throughout the workshop, with individuals views swinging dramatically from blind enthusiasm to extreme paranoia.

Since then the workshop was documented and written up to create a 66 page book on the outcomes of the workshop.

You can download a PDF copy here first, whilst ECA head off to blurb.com and start printing.

The book is well worth a download, it covers topics ranging from the Internet of Old Things through to RFID and Privacy. For more on tagging and related technologies take a look at http://www.youtotem.org/.

The post Tagging Technologies: Free Book appeared first on Digital Urban.

The day was organised in such a way as to allow participants to take part in semi-structured discussions that were interspersed by presentations and demonstrations to further inform debate. Debate was complex and opinions upon the benefits and threats for tagging became more subtle throughout the workshop, with individuals views swinging dramatically from blind enthusiasm to extreme paranoia.

Since then the workshop was documented and written up to create a 66 page book on the outcomes of the workshop.

You can download a PDF copy here first, whilst ECA head off to blurb.com and start printing.

The book is well worth a download, it covers topics ranging from the Internet of Old Things through to RFID and Privacy. For more on tagging and related technologies take a look at http://www.youtotem.org/.

The post Tagging Technologies: Free Book appeared first on Digital Urban.

Its simple to do, just sign up, upload a image of your building of choice (under 2mb) and add a story. Your building will then go live and your be able to add it to the architecture group. If you want you can also print out a QRCode that you can stick to the building allowing anyone to scan the code and add to the story/history of the building via the free iPhone/Android apps.

Your building will also be able to ‘Tweet’ everytime it is scanned or a new comment/story added, it will also become part of the ‘World of Things’ map – a place to view all the objects added so far to the site.

We are working on ways to make the objects more location aware and aware of near by objects, it could be interesting over the next few months to see how this develops. We look forward to seeing some of your buildings on the site and will sort out some sort of prize for the best stories…

You can start tagging anything and everything via talesofthings.com

The post Tag Architecture – A Call for Images and Stories of Buildings appeared first on Digital Urban.

As Wired states: The project has been tagging architecture for a few months. In one location in Chalk Farm, a wall that used to feature a piece from Banksy that has a tag that lets scanners see what the work looked like. The BBC’s Broadcasting House has also been covered in tags. In one Oxfam shop in Manchester, the project used RFID tags and QR codes to allow objects to be tagged with the memories of those who donated them.

Tales of the City starts off with a pre-placed tag at the historic heart of Shoreditch, St Leonard’s Church. From there you will be able to spot tags (QR codes) on Shoreditch High Street which you can add your own stories to, contributing to the growing network of tagged architecture.

This will enable people to form a personalised tour of London’s contemporary history through architecture. If you have an iPhone or an Android handset be sure to download our free app – talesofthings to enable you to leave comments on the QR codes, or create your own codes to put on your favourite buildings.

In order to take part simply download our free “talesofthings” app for your iPhone or Android and when you spot a code on a building scan the code to add your own memory such as what the building used to be, why it is important to you or perhaps it is simply a building you hate.

If you don’t have a smartphone you can still take part by visiting our website www.youtotem/talesofthecity where you can clip on the map and add comments to buildings which have been tagged.

Tales of the City is part of ‘TOTeM’ – a collaborative research project run by Edinburgh College of Art, Brunel University, University College London, University of Dundee and University of Salford. This project aims to find a new way of preserving social history – through people’s memories. People will be able to preserve their family/community history by “tagging” (labelling) their personal objects via our website www.talesofthings.com. Users will be able to attach memories to their objects in the form of video, text or audio, this will enable future generations to have a greater understanding of the object’s past. TOTeM will carry out its research initially through case studies with different community groups who are not included in a written history of our time but their experiences and memories are just as valuable.

Its simple to tag architecture and objects with memories – you simply upload a photo, give it a story and print a QRCode:

The project aims to offer a new way for people to place more value on their own objects in an increasingly disposable economy. As more importance is placed on the objects that are already parts of people’s lives it is hoped that family or friends may find new uses for old objects and encourage people to think twice before throwing something away.

If your in Shoreditch be sure to look out for the QRCodes, of course its not limited to Shoreditch, you can tag anything and everything with stories via http://www.talesofthings.com

The post Tales of the City: QRCodes, Architecture and Wired appeared first on Digital Urban.

As Wired states: The project has been tagging architecture for a few months. In one location in Chalk Farm, a wall that used to feature a piece from Banksy that has a tag that lets scanners see what the work looked like. The BBC’s Broadcasting House has also been covered in tags. In one Oxfam shop in Manchester, the project used RFID tags and QR codes to allow objects to be tagged with the memories of those who donated them.

Tales of the City starts off with a pre-placed tag at the historic heart of Shoreditch, St Leonard’s Church. From there you will be able to spot tags (QR codes) on Shoreditch High Street which you can add your own stories to, contributing to the growing network of tagged architecture.

This will enable people to form a personalised tour of London’s contemporary history through architecture. If you have an iPhone or an Android handset be sure to download our free app – talesofthings to enable you to leave comments on the QR codes, or create your own codes to put on your favourite buildings.

In order to take part simply download our free “talesofthings” app for your iPhone or Android and when you spot a code on a building scan the code to add your own memory such as what the building used to be, why it is important to you or perhaps it is simply a building you hate.

If you don’t have a smartphone you can still take part by visiting our website www.youtotem/talesofthecity where you can clip on the map and add comments to buildings which have been tagged.

Tales of the City is part of ‘TOTeM’ – a collaborative research project run by Edinburgh College of Art, Brunel University, University College London, University of Dundee and University of Salford. This project aims to find a new way of preserving social history – through people’s memories. People will be able to preserve their family/community history by “tagging” (labelling) their personal objects via our website www.talesofthings.com. Users will be able to attach memories to their objects in the form of video, text or audio, this will enable future generations to have a greater understanding of the object’s past. TOTeM will carry out its research initially through case studies with different community groups who are not included in a written history of our time but their experiences and memories are just as valuable.

Its simple to tag architecture and objects with memories – you simply upload a photo, give it a story and print a QRCode:

The project aims to offer a new way for people to place more value on their own objects in an increasingly disposable economy. As more importance is placed on the objects that are already parts of people’s lives it is hoped that family or friends may find new uses for old objects and encourage people to think twice before throwing something away.

If your in Shoreditch be sure to look out for the QRCodes, of course its not limited to Shoreditch, you can tag anything and everything with stories via http://www.talesofthings.com

The post Tales of the City: QRCodes, Architecture and Wired appeared first on Digital Urban.

Its a concept that takes a bit of time to take in, for example a wall in Camden Town, London, tweeted me last week when someone replayed its memories of having a Banksy painted on it. That wall is part of the Internet of Things via the project TalesofThings.

The best part is, its incredibly easy to add objects. You simply sign up at talesofthings.com and then take click on ‘add a thing’. This takes you to a form where you give your object a name, for a example ‘Andy’s Mug’ or ‘BBC Broadcasting House’ are some of things we have added so far. You then type in a short story, or tale, linked to that object and upload a photograph to the site.

Everything has a location so we are creating a ‘Geography of Everything’, a brave claim perhaps but one that develops a new a new kind of geography, the geography of things. Simply click on the map to set a location, your object will now become part of the ‘World of Things‘ map.

Thats it, your object will now become part of the Internet of Things and will be able to tweet, have new stories/tales added as its passed on, sold or interacted with. It is all part of a Social Web of Things or SWOT as its known.

Each thing created gets assigned a unique ‘qrcode’ which can be attached to your object. For example, we have attached a qrcode to our office here in CASA which visitors scan using our free iPhone app. This ‘virtual guest book’ allows our office to recall the story of CASA and the people that pass through our doors. You can print out your codes via the site and attach them to anything.

Any media can be added to you object, the clip below provides a glimpse of the system running via our recent link up with Oxfam via Future Everything, complete with the iPhone RFID reader:

Anything, anywhere can be tagged with any media, do take a look at the beta version of TalesofThings, we are very proud of the work and as the Ericsson Labs blog noted, this is really part of the social web of things, it will be trillions of tags around in a couple of years…

The post How to Add Anything to the Internet of Things: Creating the Geography of Everything appeared first on Digital Urban.

Its a concept that takes a bit of time to take in, for example a wall in Camden Town, London, tweeted me last week when someone replayed its memories of having a Banksy painted on it. That wall is part of the Internet of Things via the project TalesofThings.

The best part is, its incredibly easy to add objects. You simply sign up at talesofthings.com and then take click on ‘add a thing’. This takes you to a form where you give your object a name, for a example ‘Andy’s Mug’ or ‘BBC Broadcasting House’ are some of things we have added so far. You then type in a short story, or tale, linked to that object and upload a photograph to the site.

Everything has a location so we are creating a ‘Geography of Everything’, a brave claim perhaps but one that develops a new a new kind of geography, the geography of things. Simply click on the map to set a location, your object will now become part of the ‘World of Things‘ map.

Thats it, your object will now become part of the Internet of Things and will be able to tweet, have new stories/tales added as its passed on, sold or interacted with. It is all part of a Social Web of Things or SWOT as its known.

Each thing created gets assigned a unique ‘qrcode’ which can be attached to your object. For example, we have attached a qrcode to our office here in CASA which visitors scan using our free iPhone app. This ‘virtual guest book’ allows our office to recall the story of CASA and the people that pass through our doors. You can print out your codes via the site and attach them to anything.

Any media can be added to you object, the clip below provides a glimpse of the system running via our recent link up with Oxfam via Future Everything, complete with the iPhone RFID reader:

Anything, anywhere can be tagged with any media, do take a look at the beta version of TalesofThings, we are very proud of the work and as the Ericsson Labs blog noted, this is really part of the social web of things, it will be trillions of tags around in a couple of years…

The post How to Add Anything to the Internet of Things: Creating the Geography of Everything appeared first on Digital Urban.

Using scanners, delegates of Future Everything and the general public will be able to listen to memories and buy objects that come tagged with their very own story.

TOTeM has created a new iPhone RFID reader especially for this piece Using a jailbroken phone and off the shelf circuits, the reader can replay memories by simply ‘swiping’ near the object. The team plan to release a ‘how to make your own’ breakdown of the device in the near future via the talesofthings.com site. The Oxfam store is also home to a Bluetooth ‘wand’ which works with Android phones. These devices bring the Internet of Things to life allowing all the objects catalogued with talesofthings.com to connect to any online media. The Oxfam Shop has been taking donations of all shapes and sizes that have been tagged with memories as part of the in-store exhibition.

The movie below shows some of our ‘internet of things’ tech running and the memories of past objects:

Thanks go to the whole TOTeM team with notable thanks to Benjamin Blundell, Duncan Shingleton and Martin de Jode for developing the technology and getting everything working.

You can of course tag anything and indeed everything yourself via http://www.talesofthings.com

The post iPhone RFID and Bluetooth AudioBoos in Oxfam Clip appeared first on Digital Urban.

Using scanners, delegates of Future Everything and the general public will be able to listen to memories and buy objects that come tagged with their very own story.

TOTeM has created a new iPhone RFID reader especially for this piece Using a jailbroken phone and off the shelf circuits, the reader can replay memories by simply ‘swiping’ near the object. The team plan to release a ‘how to make your own’ breakdown of the device in the near future via the talesofthings.com site. The Oxfam store is also home to a Bluetooth ‘wand’ which works with Android phones. These devices bring the Internet of Things to life allowing all the objects catalogued with talesofthings.com to connect to any online media. The Oxfam Shop has been taking donations of all shapes and sizes that have been tagged with memories as part of the in-store exhibition.

The movie below shows some of our ‘internet of things’ tech running and the memories of past objects:

Thanks go to the whole TOTeM team with notable thanks to Benjamin Blundell, Duncan Shingleton and Martin de Jode for developing the technology and getting everything working.

You can of course tag anything and indeed everything yourself via http://www.talesofthings.com

The post iPhone RFID and Bluetooth AudioBoos in Oxfam Clip appeared first on Digital Urban.