Texting glances: Ambient Interludes from the Dublin Cityscape

*Summary This paper concerns a system, texting glances, that can create ambient interludes, moments of entertaining interaction in public urban space at which people gather such as a bus stop. The system proposes to introduce a personal yet sociable and visual activity into urban "waiting" spaces. Personal, because the input device is a cell phone; sociable and visual, because people can work together to co-construct a visual narrative. As people wait, they text to the system; the system responds to their texting by providing an image; as more people text the sequence of visuals plus text forms a multi-authored narrative. Texting glances is an ambient "waiting" game in which transient audience participants use SMS texting to evolve a visual story on a large display which is installed in a public space such as a bus or train station.