Interval Research (1997)

I consulted for Paul Allen’s Interval Research Corp. in 1997 and 1998, working for early Apple innovator Joy Mountford, in her group focused on inventing new consumer electronics devices. In particular, we were interested in creating systems for casual music making by non-musicians. As part of this, we designed and built several working prototypes, including the MusicBox project that is written up in Bill Moggridge’s book Designing Interactions.

We also worked on a system that linked children’s books to the Web via simple color spots on the printed page. I received two patents (6,164,541 – Methods and systems for providing human/computer interfaces, 6,411,994 – Interface system for providing content using context hotspots) for my work at Interval.

As part of my work leading the group under Joy, I worked with a range of musicians and designers, interfaced with product design companies IDEO, Astro Studios, and engineering company Moto. I also worked with Neal Bhadkamkar and others on business planning, creating detailed Bill of Materials for proposed products, and researching potential commercialization options.

It was at Interval that I became convinced that tangible interaction was the key to future forms of innovation.