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Parents can now follow what their offspring are doing
at their day-care centre by means of a picture and video diary
service. The service, which was tested last year and commercialized
this year, has come in for a more enthusiastic reception than
expected.
The picture and video diary service was tested last year
in four day-care centres in the Helsinki Metropolitan Area.
The staff at the centres took pictures of what was happening
during a day using multi-media equipment. The pictures and
videos were transmitted automatically to an Internet service,
from where they could be seen by the children's parents.
"The centres that introduced the service have distributed
dozens of pictures or videos per day. The parents have used
the service enthusiastically. The activities, everyday life
and atmosphere at the day-care centre were transmitted to
the parents in a quite new way," says the coordinator
of the project, Pauliina Smeds, the head of development
at Forum Virium.
Protected by passwords
Picture albums protected by passwords were opened for each
day-care centre on the Internet service, and each parent had
their own user-IDs," says product director Hanno Nevanlinna
from Futurice Oy, which has put the service into effect.
The automatic transmission of the pictures and videos from
the camera phones to the day-care centre's online album was
considered to be important "The threshold for taking
the photos would have been much higher if more time had had
to be taken up in sending the pictures and videos."
Human-responsive solution
The service developed by Forum Virium with its co-partners
will now be taken forward by ConnectedDay Oy, which will develop
and expand the service by increasing the scope for day-care
centres and parents to make their influence felt.
"The service is very human-responsive and makes everyday
living easier. The interests of parents and day-care centres
converge and the service goes beyond cultural boundaries,"
says managing director Timo Airisto.
The service has also aroused a great deal of attention worldwide.
The project will be launched during the spring in the United
States, Great Britain, Australia and Singapore.
Living Lab an export product
Helsinki Living Lab is a test
environment in which companies can carry out
a practical test of services and develop service
concepts. The Living Lab concept will be made
into an international export product.
The project, which is being
funded by Tekes - Finnish Funding Agency for
Technology and Innovation and companies, is
being coordinated by Art and Design City Helsinki
and Forum Virium Helsinki. There are almost
20 players involved: case companies, method
developers and consultants.
The combined expertise of players
together with networks will create a world-class
Living Lab concept that companies will be
able to make good use of either by offering
a service or exploiting it. The concept will
also enable universities and research institutes
to develop their own research methods.
What is Living Lab?
The Living Lab concept was developed
by Professor William Mitchell, according
to whom user-centered research methods make
it possible to identify, assess and ensure
in a genuine home environment multi-dimensional
solutions that will be needed increasingly
in evolutionarily changing living environments.
The Living Lab theme has also
become a strong area of operations in the
EU's Seventh Framework Programme (2007 - 2013).
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