Moved by B*Bots: Speculative Toy Fiction and Play with Future IoToys
: Heljakka Katriina I.
: Arai, Kohei
: Future Technologies Conference
Publisher: Springer Science and Business Media Deutschland GmbH
: Cham
: 2023
: Lecture notes in networks and systems
: Proceedings of the Future Technologies Conference (FTC) 2023, Volume 1
: Lecture Notes in Networks and Systems
: Lecture notes in networks and systems
: 318
: 978-3-031-47453-8
: 978-3-031-47454-5
: 2367-3370
: 2367-3389
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-47454-5_12
: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-47454-5_12
This study introduces the idea of speculative storytelling to portray fictitious internet-connected toys, namely B*Bots, as a tool to understand envisioned affordances of future IoToys. The study positions speculative toy fiction as an emergent area of design fiction that allows the inspection of future technologies yet to be realized. The Internet of Toys (IoToys) is a developing area of technologically-enhanced toys with multidimensional affordances that use sensors, light, sound, and movement. Previous research on IoToys demonstrates how currently connected toys offer edutainment through physical, functional, fictional, and affective affordances. One dimension detected as a design feature and affordance for play is the toys’ capacity to generate multidimensional movement while used in play. By analyzing the animated film, Ron’s Gone Wrong (2021), the paper highlights two approaches to movement discovered in association with interaction and engagement with the B*Bots as an illustrative case of speculative toy fiction. The findings demonstrate that the functional affordances of the connected toy robots first urge physical movement in play, and second, invite emotional bonding achieved through affective play. These affordances related to mobilizing tendencies of technologically-enhanced toys provide a pathway to think about and design features for IoToys and connected robots of the future.