TwitnicTable: The All Knowing Twitter Table Surface!

The knowledge that is harbored by Google is probably the worlds most complete, but that doesn’t mean it is the all knowing pool of answers. Humans still battle questions everyday, and it can sometimes be hard to find the exact answer you need if your question is complex and multifaceted.

The only way to really find the right answer is to ask other people with the same interests as you, but with more extensive skills and knowledge in the area. But how do you do that when you are miles apart and maybe don’t even know anyone that has those skills and knowledge? There are of course Internet forums where you could inject your question and wait for a reply. However, that can sometimes yield answers that you are not even interested in, and the question may be interpreted differently thus the answer being something completely else.

The Twitnictable is a collaborative concept technology that is designed and developed by Jeroen Coelen, Laurens Prins and Parizad Saremi. It enables students to ask a question through Twitter while using the hashtag #IDtable. The table, for example, in the cafeteria will light up and the interaction is in full motion. Everyone that is interested in the hashtag will get your question, and as soon as someone has the answer for your question, it will be written out on the table in front of you.

The table, which has a projector hovering above it, is lit with LEDs that will track gestures and print out any tweet that is related to your question. It’s yet another easy way to engage a group of students in a more social environment, instead of just tweep-to-tweep conversations. We all need to get a little more social every once in a while, otherwise we’ll get stuck in front of our screens, and I am sure there are serious consequences to that.