Technology is evolving us, says Amber Case, as we become a screen-staring, button-clicking new version of homo sapiens. We now rely on "external brains" (cell phones and computers) to communicate, remember, even live out secondary lives. But will these machines ultimately connect or conquer us? Case offers surprising insight into our cyborg selves.

The idea behind Calm Technology is to have smarter people, not things. 

Technology shouldn’t require all of our attention, just some of it, and only when necessary.

The age of AI has arrived, yet instead of clarity, we're overwhelmed with an incessant stream of information about its future. The general reactions include uncertainty, fear, and a sense of being overwhelmed. Many companies feel they are forced into a relentless race to catch up. This fear-driven approach, however, generates a murky path of disruptive forces.

In this era defined by swift technological innovation, Amber Case expands the concept of Calm Technology, a concept first coined in 1995 by PARC Researchers Mark Weiser and John Seely Brown. Calm Technology aims to allow people to invent and design tools that engage attention appropriately, allowing technology to amplify humanness instead of taking it away. 

This speech will revisit concepts from the AI pioneers of the 80s and 90s, the thinkers behind Calm Technology and ubiquitous computing. Instead of relentlessly pursuing the 'next big thing', we can redirect our focus towards understanding and predicting consumer needs through the implementation of "calm technology" and universal human factors. We'll delve into the art of formulating strategies that align with market realities and consumer needs - strategies that are agile and robust, prepared to adapt with the shifting landscape.

The workshop will cover how to use principles of Calm Technology to design the next generation of consumer experiences. By learning from examples like teapots and inner office windows that provide information without demanding constant attention, we can create technology that works harmoniously with the human lifestyle and environment.

The difference between an annoying technology and one that is helpful is how it engages our attention. Calm Technology is a framework for designing ubiquitous devices that engage our attention in an appropriate manner. The aim of Calm Technology is to provide principles that follow the human lifestyle and environment in mind, allowing technology to amplify humanness instead of taking it away.

The terms calm computing and calm technology were coined in 1995 by PARC Researchers Mark Weiser and John Seely Brown in reaction to the increasing complexities that information technologies were creating. Calm technology describes a state of technological maturity where a user’s primary task is not computing, but being human. The idea behind Calm Technology is to have smarter people, not things. Technology shouldn’t require all of our attention, just some of it, and only when necessary.

This talk will cover how to use principles of Calm Technology to design the next generation of advanced tools. We’ll look at notification styles, compressing information into other senses, and designing for the least amount of cognitive overhead.

In an era where artificial intelligence is rapidly evolving and integrating into every aspect of our lives, we find ourselves at a crucial juncture. How do we ensure AI enhances rather than diminishes our human experience? How can we design AI systems that amplify our strengths while respecting our cognitive limits?

Join a session with Amber Case to:

• Gain a deeper understanding of the historical context that shapes our current technological landscape and the opportunities it presents for future innovation.
• Learn strategies for identifying opportunities where AI can most effectively support and amplify human potential.
• Find out how to apply concepts like cognitive security, computer aided metacognition, cybernetics and metastable systems, to your own challenges both inside and out of the workplace.

Our internal states—emotions, thoughts, and feelings—remain largely invisible to us until we develop methods to observe them. This talk explores how self-tracking technologies and systematized data collection can make these invisible states visible, helping us better understand ourselves and enhance our well-being.

I'll share examples of projects that transform internal experiences into observable data: tracking happiness levels throughout the day, mapping locations through GPS to understand environmental impacts on mood, and monitoring brain activity to recognize patterns in our cognitive processes.

By creating awareness of these internal states through data, we can identify factors that diminish our well-being—information overload, digital fragmentation, and attention dispersion. This awareness becomes the foundation for intentional change.

The evolution of this field now includes AI tools that can help develop metacognition—thinking about our thinking—and prompt better questions about our motivations and behaviors. Rather than pursuing "perfect happiness," we can use these tools to create more meaningful engagements with technology that support our human needs.

This systematized, data-informed approach doesn't just track our lives but helps us design them with greater intention, creating environments and habits that align with our deeper values and needs.

Every few years, we get word that a large company will release a heads-up display that will “change everything”, potentially ushering in a new era of augmented reality and wearable computing. What does this mean for the future of design and development? How do we build for the next generation of computers? Who pioneered this field, and how can we learn from them?

The field of wearable computing has focused on augmenting human ability to compute freely. As MIT’s wearable computing pioneer Steve Mann and calm technology pioneer Mark Weiser envisioned, the goal was "to free the human to not act as a machine." Mann rejected the idea of crouching over a desktop computer. He believed the computer should naturally contort to the human, which launched his wearable computing mission.

The best way to understand the future is by examining the past. This talk explores trends in wearable computing from the 1970s to the 2020s. We’ll cover various HUDs (heads-up displays), various invasive and non-invasive technologies, and how mobile interfaces can leverage location, proximity, and haptics to improve our lives rather than interfere with them.