The basis for the metaphor is a description of the suitcase. The suitcase is a container, it can contain ideas, objects, processes, thoughts and histories. It allows these things to travel. The suitcase is individual. Everyone packs it differently. It is contextual. What it contains depends on where you're going. It is indispensable [just ask Tonny.] The suitcase is small enough to transport. It can contain infinite possibilities. It allows for multiple narratives. So there is more than one case scenario. Here are some:

The No Man's Pursuit-Case

The story starts with an empty transparent suitcase and an empty book inside. Alice writes down an idea on the book and gives the suitcase to Bob. Bob has to (1) add something (2) explain how it helps to achieve the idea. "Something" can be anything: a manual, a memory stick full of data, a cellphone, a magic wand, a stethoscope, a borgesian list of things, a laptop, an idea. Explanations have to be clear and concise.

At some point, either the case is full of things or the original "wish" is fulfilled. In both cases, people come with their own transparent suitcase, gather around the original case and (1) modify the original idea, (2) grab 1-3 objects from the original case. And the game goes on like this forever.

The self-replicating case I

The self-replicating, itinerant suitcase comes with an instruction booklet that indicates how to produce another Copy, a clone of the suitcase. The copy will then further travel and clone itself. At some point some suitcase will get back to the origin.

The project is skill-based, not conveyor-belt based (it's about producing new abilities, not about “transmitting knowledge”). Someone should be able to instruct the new builder. the instruction is likely to happen in small groups, possibly in 1-to-1 settings. Practical knowledge is circulated. An advantage of this is that each suitcase can remain in the possession of each further instructor.

At some point in the process there can be an exhibit of all suitcases that get back to the original point: how much do they differ from the originals? What stories do they tell? (The instruction booklet would contain some indication of the starting point/ending point of the process, an address.)

The project presents some challenges. Where can one find materials for the clones? (The challenge can become an essential part of the project.).

The Suitcase is not expected to be a mini-object. Although many of its functionalities can be packed into an item the size of a Smartphone, it is important to consider the dramatic impact of a large object that can be displayed and manipulated. Scenographic effects are to be taken into account.

The self-replicating case II

The self replicating Suitcase is self replicating. Teaches you to make a suitcase

• It demands you develop hard skills and patience
• It teaches imitation as the first step towards creation (nothing is created in a vacuum)
• It comes with a history but provokes individualization
• It allows you to imagine other Case scenarios
• To make the Suitcase you need and want
• It teaches you to identify your needs and wants

• It insists you pass it on
• It provokes new friendships and builds a suitcase community
• It can be given to artists it is a starting point for an exhibition
• It comes with a narrative
• It invites you to share your own story
• It teaches you the narrative possibilities of inanimate objects
• It opens up economic opportunities allows you to open a suitcase business

What I Know Is Africa

A traveling yet permanent exhibition around schools in Africa. It fits into a suitcase. The existing content for the exhibition (at its launch) is media-rich content on the cities that we have discussed. This requires a person to transport it (this could be someone's very job, or it could be done by a volunteer network of teachers, based on trust/good will of people who carry it). The student is both a learner and a participant. He/she has the ability to shape the interaction between the elements of the exhibition and change them for the next learner/participant who can choose how they wish to participate depending on whether or not there is connectivity. The suitcase contains devices that send and receive: a laptop, a notebook, a pen, a recording device, a camera. The student can participate by using the devices to simply record something they learned in school, that they feel might be informative and educational for others to know. The student can start something new (i.e. an article) or add to something already existing. The suitcase carrier is then responsible for digitizing or uploading any content that has not been added online. We register some keywords/phrases that oriented our reflection:

Discovery / The product of many authors / Not tied to financial gain / Collaborative / Educational / Provider / Accepting feedback and participatory / Iterative / Distributable / Can be localized / Customizable / Can be disseminated at-large / Can be adopted / Translatable into different contexts / Cross-cultural.

The Wikit

The content of the case:

1. a mobile phone
2. a music player
3. one recipe of your favorite food and drink
4. the scent of the town (the city smell)
5. one map of the town (might be on the mobile)

The shape of the case: it's a bodycase that has to be wearable.

The material of the case: textile or fibers of the place, sustainable and recyclable.

Urban Transformations in Dakar (exhibition)

A suitcase for children, two types:

A suitcase for visit

Child action:

1. be confortable
2. ask questions, give answers
3. create events
4. leave a trace
5. be surprised, arise, possess magical objects

1. socks (no shoes but socks)
2. a "why" space (1)
3. interactive floor map / kit for creating a map
4. materials for drawing
5. magic kit (2)

(1): white wall to write on it; mobile phone number for sending SMS free (a screen will display the SMS immediately) (2): magic wand, laser pointer, instruments for interacting with the exhibit's interface, (pen for drawing on touch table)

A Suitcase for going out and back

Child action:

1. Make questions, give answers
2. To search (catch the world)
3. ...

1. A "why" card
2. A searcher kit
3. ...

Art and community

The suitcase contains: a pen, a notebook, a XO laptop, sensors (temperature, light, humidity), a microphone, a movie camera, a projector, a radio broadcasting system. The first project is a workshop letting autistic children use a XO to express themselves through various media: drawing (by hand and through the Paint activity on Sugar), recording their voices, playing music, taking pictures, shooting small videos (either with the XO or the movie camera).

The second project would be about using sensors as a way to create either a performance or an installation in a public space, e.g. An artistic and pedagogical exhibition about water: the sensors would track people's movements (by temperature, visual moves, noises) and computers would send visual or auditive feedback.

The third project, taking place in a rural context with illiterate people, would use the suitcase to let adults from two villages aware of the risks upon oceanic environment (like mangrove plantations). The suitcase will be used to record testimonies of people, collect scientific data, project pictures, and record interventions from the final conference.

Scenario Exquisite

The pedagogical suitcase (PS) contains a fixed part, a semi-fixed part, and a variable part:

• the fixed part comprises a set of technological tools, some fairly state-of-the-art and possibly costly, such as [see Bastien's list]
• the semi-fixed part comprises a set of software, databases and low-tech devices, suited for the needs of the user
• the variable part is the complex chronicle of the use of the suitcase: the initial instructions, modified and augmented by the user; the recording of the major events in which the suitcase was used; the logbook; the musings of the user(s) about future uses, significance etc. of the suitcase -- technically speaking, it is a multimedia memory, with the usual displaying, indexing and search apparatus.

Each PS is an individual object with an internal self-representation.

A number of new-born identical PSs are produced and distributed at the beginning : PS1, PS2, .... , PS50 (let's say). Users 1, 2, .... 50 get a hold of their respective baby and customize it by determining the semi-fixed part of the baby. Each user then deploys her individual PS, whose memory is loaded with the experience; it may also occur that the semi-fixed part gets modified along the way: useless stuff is discarded, some stuff is added, some is updated or replaced by something better.

At the end of a predetermined period (eg: 1 year), each PS is handed on to the next user on the list: PS1 goes to user 2, etc., PS50 goes to user 1. The modifications and enrichments of the semi-fixed and variable parts do not aim at preserving the past, so that user 2 may well discard or overwrite stuff passed on by user 1. So that each user can keep a record of their experience, a full description of her machine at the moment she passes it on is uploaded in a Central Archive.

As a refinement of the procedure, one could clone a PS at the end of a period, and hand on each clone to 2 (or more) different users. PS1, for example, would give rise to PS1', PS1 would then go to user X and PS1' to user X'.

On top of this, we could have a process of Darwinian selection (blind or reflective): relatively uninteresting PSs would be eliminated (in fact, rebooted or re-initialized). The most successful PSs would be cloned.

Even better: instead of plain cloning, we could have reproduction with (blind or guided) modification.

Conclusions

One can object that laptops resemble suitcases – why not use laptops instead? Or even smartphones? The answer is that the suitcase allows for some visual and manipulation modularity. You can take objects out of it. A much too compact suitcase may be a problem. You may want to have different objects at hand, not a single iPhone-like object.

Pick the case you want from the luggage rack.