Careables Online Exhibition - See you in Singapore!

rc3 preroll music

Herald: Welcome back to our studio in
Halle. And today, the the next

presentation will be about the Careables
a moving exhibition. The speaker Saad

Chinoy, is managing his local makerspace
called Salvage Garden in Singapore. He

considers himself a geek and maker, and
we'll talk about the moving exhibition

today.

Saad: Thanks again, and sorry about all of
this. It's become the necessary dance that

we have to do with all the remote
connections and multiple streams and so

on. But thank you again for the intro and
I'm really happy to be with you guys in

spite of all of the distances and not
really happening in the physical space,

which is kind of what I'd like to talk
about with you a little bit. And before I

get into it, let me do a little bit of an
intro. My name is Saad and I'm based in

Singapore. Normally, I'd set up a little
maker spaces and I'm all about trying to

apply tech for good. And I have
volunteered with Engineering Good, which

is a nonprofit charity based in Singapore,
and we work with persons with

disabilities. I'm here today to try and
talk to you and to share with you a little

bit about what we've been doing in
combination with partners from around the

world through a program called Careables.
And if you've read the little description

of the talk, you'll probably be wondering
why all of the people mentioned there

aren't here. And it's kind of what this is
all about. They weren't able to join me in

conversation for various COVID related,
safe distancing travel related issues.

Ricardo is in-between places. Geraldine is
also in between places. And so as far as

you are, and I'm actually quite fortunate
to be able to jump in and share with you

what we have. So I'm going to keep it nice
and informal and brief. But for my co-

presenters, I hope that continued health
and that they have safe travels and I hope

to see them again soon. All right. So if
I'm able to if you're able to see my

screen, I'd like to show you around a
little virtual space that we've created. I

mean, careables.org is the project and
you'll find more about careables on the

website and so on. But because of the
restrictions that we're all under around

the world, having a physical interaction
is like CCC to be next to impossible right

now, and it makes perfect sense. And we
need to put health and safety first. So

the virtual exhibition that I'm about to
show you is created in a two dimensional

world on a platform called Cabbagetown,
which is not unlike the 2D world that RC3

also has. It's actually inspired by last
year CCC, if you see and the sort of

interactions that we saw while people were
able to sort of run into each other and

have a spontaneous conversation just by
the fact that they were in back for the

virtual space and a moment in time. So the
idea of having that virtual space seems a

little bit strange because, you know, it's
all on the screen. So why bother? But I

think the more you try this out, the more
you move around in this, in this two

dimensional environment, you realize that
even though there's a slight difference

between having a little character running
around. It really makes a huge impact. So

that's kind of what we were inspired by.
And we create a little two dimensional

space here, and we call this the
Terrible's International Park. And it has

various instances or little jump off
points for different cables, moving

exhibitions. And I'll show you one of
them, in particular the one that I've been

facilitating in Singapore last year. And
you'll see that in a second. But if you're

going to show you a little video to sort
of situate you as to where what these

careables are moving and conditions that
are a bit like. And the video might be a

little bit choppy because of their screen
share, but that's OK. There is no text,

really. There's just a bit of music.
video plays So that's what the sort of

intro video and you see this ad right in
the middle of this crossroads. So when you

join the virtual space later on, I'll
share with you the link. You'll be able to

sort of orient itself by looking at the
video, and I'm hoping that what you what

you saw in that video, a little snippet of
the various exhibitions that have taken

place around the world. I was the one sort
of facilitating curating the exhibition in

Singapore and gave us an opportunity to
take this EU Horizon 2020 funded project,

which is careables and invite other local
partners within Singapore to come forward

with similar ideas. And just to give you a
little briefing there. It's about

assistive technology, so things that are
either 3D printable or modified or custom

made that cater to persons with
disabilities or try to address a need that

has to do with persons with disabilities.
So those are the sorts of examples of

objects, physical or otherwise that we put
together at these exhibitions. So let's

take a quick look at Singapore. All you
have to do is sort of walk around to this

portal, and once you get there, you got a
little instruction that says, you know,

the key to continue and it will transport
you to another virtual space, which is

also built on the town. So I'm going to
switch off this little video here and we

can just use the moving around virtual
space, so all of these spaces were created

by volunteers and super enthusiastic
interns, so they are a work in progress.

But you can get a sense of what they're
all about. So here we are at in little

tiny little shop house. If you're familiar
with Singapore, you'll know what shop

houses are. It's basically a shop in the
downstairs area and a house upstairs

traditionally. This has been converted
into an office, and it's a rather narrow.

So the 2D space is created sort of to
resemble what it would feel like if you

were in the physical space in and around
Singapore. So I'm just going to walk you

through the space and show you all of the
things that we have on display here. The

exhibition was late last year, and with
some really nice fun people, some of these

are local partners. And so that's the
little poster at the entrance. This is our

little lobby area. It's a courtyard and
it's open to the air. But we sit outside

and talk about things and smoke cigarets
and things like that. Want to get in? It's

a tiny little space where you'll see a
whole bunch of laptops arranged along the

side, and there's a lot more in actual in
the actual space. And to tell you a little

more about why we've got so many laptops,
here's a little intro video to give you an

overview of what engineering is and why we
do what we do. So I hope this comes across

OK? If not, you know, there will be help
outpaced the link in the chat or something

similar.
Video is played When we started the CAC

Initiative Competition Against Corporate
Initiative, we actually initially thought

we would just refurbish 24 laptops and
pass it on to the beneficiaries and then,

you know, watch Netflix and play
PlayStation for another two months. So

far, we've been able to give out five and
a half thousand laptops. We work with more

than 200 social service organizations or
charities. And true then we've given out

all of these five and a half thousand
laptops.

Joanne: I am Joanne. I am the director for
engineering good. We are a Singaporean

charity who started out in 2014 working
with persons with disabilities to enable

their inclusivity in daily life. We grew
in 2020 where as a cause of the pandemic,

we started a new initiative to refurbish
and donate laptops to people who need

them. And now we are working on new
initiatives that have come my way because

of our work in assistive technology and
our work in digital inclusion. So, for

example, our next big initiative is
troubleshooting community framework, where

we will train volunteers to help
troubleshoot the laptops, the digital

devices of people in need. Together with
our group and digital inclusion, we also

have grown our initial work, which was
working with persons with disabilities.

Our tech for good, for example, grew from
80 participants to 150 participants this

year. We've grown from only working with
the six special schools to the 200

charities in Singapore that work for and
with persons with disabilities. So because

of the impact that we continue to make and
the impact that we are requested to make

by our various social service
organizations, we have an internal

conscience that makes us want to do more
and help more. And because of that

engineering good. It is growing in leaps
and bounds. We got our first office in

India in September 2020 and being a small
team of three four people. We thought this

was all all. We need it right and a nice
little schoolhouse next to the mighty so

that the volunteers can come in. However,
because of the growth in the initiatives

that we want to do, we are hiring more and
more people. We now stand it full timers

and we are hiring another five more. That
together with the rolling bunch of interns

and the part timers and all the volunteers
that we have, it's making this space a bit

congested too. We actually are moving to a
bigger space and industrial estate where

we have about 2700 square feet and we can
then run small workshops and more programs

and also trained digital inclusion efforts
that we will be doing. We would like to

ask for your support in providing us with
more devices to refurbish, to pass on to

the people who need them. We ask for your
support to come in and help volunteer as

engineering, but we do not only need
engineering volunteers, we need volunteers

of all types, we need people to work comes
comms, meaning people to help us with our

website design our accounting just like
any other organization. So please, if you

have the time and want to give more of
yourself, come and join engineering good.

So we hope you can support engineering
good by donating to our cause and helping

us grow so we can help more and more
people.

Saad: OK, so it's a bit of a background of
the organization, but I have been

volunteering with, as you heard from
Joanne is our executive director and he

put in a lot of his heart into the work
that we do, and it's all about reaching

out to those who are in need. And in the
last two years during the pandemic, we

found ourselves responding to the call for
addressing the digital divide through

refurbishing laptops. Although that is not
exactly what engineering good use to do,

it is all about assistive tech. And so now
that we've handled that campaign, it's

because of the volunteers and the sort of
devices that we've had. We were able to

continue this campaign way beyond we
initially thought we're coming on to now.

I think close to 6000 laptops in the last
two years that have gone to families that

don't have access or are unable to work
from home and study from home at the same

time. So in sort of combination with this,
laptop computers against COVID, as we like

to call it, campaign, we've also now being
able to re energize our assistive tech

work. And those are the exhibits that we
have on display here as part of the

cababilies exhibition. So we do have a few
more videos, but I'm not going to bore you

with those. I think as you explored the
space by yourself, you'll be able to view

those without any lag and delay. So let me
just walk you through the upstairs area.

So here we've come up to the top floor of
the space, and at the back you'll see

there's a little corner that's been
designated the salvage garden, and it's a

sort of reference to Savage Garden. We do
have sort of a vague. I mean, there's a

broad range of volunteers that would that
that spend time with engineering good. But

with the reference to Savage Garden, I
think you understand what demographic

we're working with, and that's kind of how
the the the name came about. But the idea

was that we would salvage as many of these
devices that were not working into working

devices and then send them out to the
families that need them most. And this is

work that. So this is the corner that is a
little makerspace. And you know, like most

maker spaces, it tends to be appropriately
messy. You could probably also see in the

in the corner there we have our supervisor
stick stuck to the window. She's our most

furry volunteer, and she just wandered in
while we were refurbishing laptops and she

wasn't being cared for because everybody
was on lockdown and she didn't have the

usual source of food, which was leftovers
from cafes and restaurants. Wandered in

from the street. And she's been with us
ever since, sort of keeping an eye on

things when nobody is there. Gordon is a
space with a cat. She does also keep an

eye on activities, and I'd like to show
you that, but before I show you some of

the current projects, let's have a look at
what's on display here for each of these

tables has sort of like a representation
of what was displayed in the actual

physical exhibition. So if you walk up to
it and hit X, you'll be able to see a

photograph or a video or a series of
photographs and videos that show you the

object of this event as a good example of
one of the careables. It was designed by

an Italian consortium member, and they
went on to have a successful Kickstarter

program around commercialization of this
idea. But the open source files and the

models do exist, so you're able to just
download and 3D print and edge a

noncommercial version of this to try out
for yourself. And of course, you know,

being 3D printable, it allows for
customization and personalization. And

this particular object is designed for
children with fine motor control

difficulties that are instead of being
able to hold a pencil with their index

finger in their thumb. You have sort of a
wearable ring that goes on to multiple

fingers, and they're able to hold their
pens and pencils and draw on on paper. If

you look at the little poster at the end,
I think that'll give us a little bit more

of a detailed view of what this is all
about. And, you know, just like an

exhibition, you have links to where it's
available and how you can get involved if

you choose to do so. So that, Cliffo, so
let's have a look at the next stage, this

particular one is a personal favorite of
mine. I mean, this is engineering goods

careables if you like, and it is in doing.
Ever since we started as. When I make

these assistive switches, which are 3D
printable and are incredibly easy to

lightweight and easy to adapt to specific
circumstances. So if you have a mobility

issue, say you are wheelchair bound and
you have to install switches or access

control mechanisms around your wheelchair.
Then having it be as lightweight and

modular as possible is a good idea. So
these switches really help, and we've been

using them in various ways. In particular,
we've been plugging them into toys. And as

part of our hackertoy workshop, where we
teach caregivers and cognitive behavioral

therapists how to make the switches
themselves. So the idea behind what

engineering good does is not just create
the devices, but to engage the primary

caregivers as well as the end users as
much as humanly possible, and share the

skills behind making the idea of thinking
out of the box and looking at what your

specific needs are and repurposing things
that you have around you in order to

create something new. This is another
example of a very interesting invention.

This was contributed by S.G. Enable, which
is a local Singapore based organization

that has a physical library for assistive
tech from commercial examples, engineering

good tends to focus on sort of like a low
cost alternative to what's available in

the marketplace. But if you are in
Singapore and you want to have access to

assistive tech devices just to get a feel
for what they look like, S.G. and A they

will make you try these things out. So
they contributed this, which is a very

interesting little jacket, and it looks
like a hoodie like any other. But if you

look closely, the pockets in the lining of
this jacket actually have little air

pockets inside and they can inflate and
sort of give you a feeling of a hug. And

it's used for kids who are have NZD
disorders, and it's found to be quite

useful and helpful in situations like
that. And of course, there are other

scenarios where this could be useful as
well. That's the T-jacket. Let's look at

what else we have here. This is a good
little 3-D printable that was again a

collaboration between two maker spaces.
And it offers up for attachment that is

incredibly lightweight because a 3D
printable and incredibly modular because

you can attach different little pieces to
it. And as the arm grows or as the user's

needs change, it's easier to make
something that is 3D printable on the

spot, and it's easier to modify it so that
it doesn't rub against the skin, or it's

know a little bit bigger on one side or a
little bit more bent this way. So we find

that the possibilities around these kinds
of objects are far more conducive towards

the user rather than what's available in
the marketplace, and they tend to be

heavier and mass and incredibly expensive.
So we feel that salvage garden, that we

don't just play the role of making these
things in 3-D printing. We have the

responsibility to also make the
modifications and the changes necessary in

order to facilitate its use. I mean, it's
all very well to have as much, you know,

brilliant AI enabled fancy tech in the
world. But if it's not going to be usable,

then what's the point of the fancy tech?
So we want to try and bring to you

printable objects and 3-D printing closer
to the end users as much as possible. And

we're not alone in this. There are other
spaces that are doing it. And I think

Campbell's is a good example of who those
people are. One last little exhibit that

I'd like to point out here is something
that is available in the marketplace, but

incredibly useful. It's called the roll
around. And it is the commercial product,

it is not particularly cheap, but it is
incredibly useful in making spaces

accessible. It rolls up into a sort of
like a yoga mat kind of format. And since

it's metal, it is quite heavy. But once it
rolls out, you can bridge over the little

tiny little steps like this and allow
access for wheelchairs and so on. And

let's just have a quick look at the poster
on the wall. Books are on the wall is not

OK. It seems to be connected to Syria. The
whole can still coming through. I'm going

to quickly reload this. But in the
meanwhile, at the end of my little talk

here, I'll share the link to the main
space and to a like a little QR code as

well with the tiny URL that will point you
to the virtual space, and I highly

encourage you to come and visit and
explore on your own time. It looks like

we're OK here. All right. One last thing I
want to show you at Makerspace is what I'm

currently working on and. You'll notice on
this table we've got a bunch of pie. And

that was the closest analog I could find
in this virtual 2D space for the Raspberry

Pi, which is the sort of programable
pocket sized credit card size computer

that I feel has tremendous potential. And
the little slice of pie on the table. And

I'd like to show you that as an example
here. Hopefully, this will work. Yeah.

Here we go. And let's get rid of these
here. It's very quick. It's a little, a

few slides, and I'm sure you've had a lot
of you are familiar with this wearable

device, which is the Google Glass, and
it's quite pricey. It didn't make it into

the mass market, but it still is around
and is being used in enterprise

environments and is quite expensive. But
that was an interesting article, which the

link to a use case where children with
disabilities or in this case autism could

use this device as a variable in order to
assist with the activities of daily

living. And it's still being explored.
There are sort of very small little use

case and trials where this is being tried
out, but I personally, I feel this is an

excellent use case for something that
didn't quite make it into the mass market.

However, the technology behind it is
inaccessible financially, because for 999

US dollars, it might be OK for an
enterprise to use it, but for an

individual that is still quite hard to
reach. And there's little caption at the

bottom red state surprisingly simple. But
if you take apart one of these devices,

you very quickly realize that it's far
from simple and there's a phenomenal

amount of tech that an engineering that
goes into making a device like this

possible. Just the idea of having the
screen in front of your eyes so close kind

of defies the laws of physics. And to be
able to overlay a little bit of text or a

little bit of information wire will to see
through it. The key thing, but it took a

whack at it and in our low cost sort of
DIY maker kind of way, we said, Look,

let's find a low cost alternative to this
and see if we can make it work. And what

we have here is a device that basically
auto translates. It has a little

microphone that picks up what is being
said, and I'm sure everybody is familiar

with this by now on YouTube or other video
things. You can have little auto generated

captions that text that speech to text
technology and having that be visible to a

person who has difficulty with hearing is
a good idea, and it assists with

scenarios, where otherwise you would be
required to lip read. And now everybody's

wearing masks. And if you have more than
one person in the room, it's a bit tricky

to be able to manage it all. So the use
case, that we were looking at is a low

cost alternative to something like the
Google Glass, something that can be worn,

but it's also lightweight and incredibly
affordable. So we did manage to put

something like that together. And again,
you know, in true maker Open-Source

fashion, all of our volunteers very
happily made everything open and

parametric. So this these are preliminary
designs. It's a work very much still in

progress. But the intention here is again
to keep it as open and accessible and

modular as possible. So where we are now
is we have successfully made a functional

prototype of just this idea, and you can
see the screen kind of sticks out very

noticeably, but it does deliver the end
functionality that is required, so it's

not meant to be worn all the time. But,
you know, like a fancy pair of glasses,

you put it on for special occasions and
you know where it can figure out. So we've

made five of these in as many different
colors as two different hooks handle, and

we have five hearing aid users who signed
up to trial this out and give us feedback

on what works, what doesn't work, what
needs to be removed, or whether or not

it's a stupid idea and things like that,
but the initial feedback has been quite

positive. I think that it opens up a world
of possibilities here for involving users

of these devices in its shape and
capabilities. So here's where we are now.

We have this trial. It is ongoing early
mid chan. We should have the outcome of

the user feedback and then we should be
able to take it to the next level. But so

far, we've managed to keep it comfortably
within 99 dollars. And again, I want to

reiterate that affordability is one thing,
and it's only possible because of

volunteers not charging for that time. So
the equipment itself is incredibly low

cost. But if you have a pool of volunteers
and give them access to space technology,

tools and equipment and use it, I think
the product that comes out of it, it makes

good sense on multiple levels. So this is
the Ihea prototype, that's a little bit

about me, my background. You can explore
the space and look at the thing at your

own time. But should you need to contact
me? That's my email address. So with that,

I'm done with this space and I've given
you a little walk around of our little

Singapore exhibition. And before I sort of
end, I'd like to point out the other

things that we have here, a couple of
videos to give you a sense of what spaces

like. There is, here we go. This is our
little website. And we think about the

space and about what we've been doing as
part of the exhibition, will find on a

little blog post. On this level. So I'm
hoping that the physical space is a little

bit more engaging than just reading
another blog post, but you know, it helps

to have it in this format as well. All
right. So that pretty much is this

particular space. I'm going to walk you
out of Singapore and back to the

international park, so to speak. And on
the way, we'll pass by all these hundreds

and thousands of markups. And go back to
the portal that takes us to the main

space. They're not working anymore. So
there we go. I'm really hoping that we

won't have to do these online things
forever. I think it's they're moving

forwards. It's a good idea to have a
hybrid situation. And now that we're all

sort of forced to get comfortable and used
to doing remote sessions, hoping that next

year we're able to do a more physical CCC
again. I really do miss that a lot. All

right. So here we are. You had a look at
Singapore. You sort of have a little

ComingSoon with placeholders for the other
moving exhibitions that were done around

the world in the last year or so. And that
was mentioned in the central video. Before

I end, I would like to just play this
video here, which I think captures the

essence of what all of these spaces and
what engineering good inside Savage Garden

has been trying to do. This one is the
open health academy from Be Able. *video

plays* But she is focusing on that all the
interiors of mantle and mentioned focus on

come on. Oh man, they're part of the
weekend and clan teams have smitten on

life hacks. She does live in Brooklyn for
her mom on the idea that some folks in

the. Sons of much respected fund owned
much by seven plus smart ones were loose

on midday AEDT. Holly, to me, all the
Hollywood sign and then a central tenet

who responded to the English novel. Open
source your. I think in this order,

because I admit you're not ICC cricket.
Adina Chung, fullback make it Mervin

fluent in Spanish. Magdalena Tomasetti is
a highly on India's next Adnan Fab Labs.

He did so early, Tedward SplatS, who also
is innovative on workshops and and when I

did this, put as much potassium and
products and pick in deposition this

opportunity and with my project for the
initial release and sold us Kansai Anklets

on. Just kind of it in traditional
bladders and thicker than advancement.

Couldn't it be open, have I got any test
ratings of also having lousy take blame

the industry? It's would be. That's all
being put up and break down. The question

that you gave me about being accessible to
him, given that he keeps asking you. But.

So with that, I'd like to thank you for
your time. And if there are any questions,

I to take them now, but otherwise I hope
everybody is staying safe, be healthy.

Gekko?
Herald Gekko: Yes. There are question, so.

audio problems by the question.
Saad: Yeah, I mean, it's a very good

question, and yes, that has been the
biggest challenge with trying to make

something new, something innovative,
something that goes beyond what's already

available. It requires hands on
interaction and with most maker spaces.

This continues, to... It wasn't exactly
easy to do this even before we went into a

pandemic situation, inviting people into a
space. We had different barriers to entry.

People were shy, people were not familiar,
they were not comfortable, they were

scared of the noisy machines. And that
still is the case. And not to add to that.

We have, you know, masks and vaccinations
and all of these sorts of things, but

we're still not out of the pandemic yet.
So we are finding ways to. You know,

collaborate while making the hands on
element on our own. The idea of 3-D

printing in the 3-D printable things is no
longer just trapped within a maker space.

People have these things at home. One of
the most sort of heartening things I

noticed. In the early days before the
before the vaccines were an option, there

was this global shortage of PPE, and a lot
of makers stepped forward and said, Look,

I understand how to use a 3-D printer, and
I don't normally think about this. But

what? He is needed and was being polite
until shows intentionally or otherwise it

was there and it and it has happened and
it has happened. *problems with the

quality". So I feel like we have this
opportunity to translate some of that

potential and bring it forward with us. We
are heading to an area where hopefully

this pandemic situation will be less
stressful and allow for more interaction.

But if we bring the lessons that we've
learned while we've been in lockdown, so

to speak, I think the amount of potential
that we can realize is going to be

phenomenal.

Herald: That's that's very inspiring.
Thank you. And then another question. Do
you have any success stories of achieving

your goal of inspiring the DIY and the

maker culture? And then so that someone
else could develop or even just fabricate

your prototype and then put it to use?
Yeah, Careables.ee is the is the website,

and I think you'll find several examples,
not necessarily ones that have made. I

mean, the engineering good examples that I
showed you with the switches there are on

careables as well, but we found I found
several examples of other people's

projects that were relevant to the
Singapore context and bringing those into

that physical space where these people
interact with makers and other people

allowed us to have that conversation. So
you just hand somebody a thing and they

say, Look, I understand what you're
talking about now. Can you make this for

me, but bigger or smaller or, you know,
hot chips or with the different texture,

and we're now able to do that. But there
are examples on careables that have

inspired that kind of conversation. So not
necessarily an actual object, but

definitely that interaction is facilitated
by looking at other people's good ideas

for assistive tech. The one that I talked
about with the little whearables. Reaper

ads in Iowa City. And that's what we're
working on at the moment. And it will be

made available for any. Anybody to
download, try it out for themselves. I

will just throw on screen. Our little
website where all these projects are

listed, and I'll point out this is the
one. So we're calling it an open source,

head mounted display. And you can find out
more about it over here. I hope that

answered the question. Herald: Oh, very
exciting. Uh, that's a really good cause.

Thank you so much for talking about your
project and your foundation. Of course.

Saad, thank you.
Saad: Thank you.

Herald: All right. All right. Thank you
for the time and attention, and we'll be

back with the next report in a bit.

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