Lastly, I would like to introduce some other impressive discussions among the two-days discussion held from morning till night by a wide variety of speakers.

The thing was a lack of education in the real scene of interactive design was becoming a big problem in creativity in the world. I myself also proposed this subject and it was really impressive that I could recognize this fact here. The problem is they do not have common language between the user and technologists, or between designers and artists, and today there’s a cross-termination that makes communication difficult in the real scene. Not only in the real scene of production but also in education, there’s a tendency that giving importance on how to use the latest software rather than assimilating the know-how and ideas from the context of interactive design and media art. It was really impressive that many speakers had a feeling of crisis that this tendency might prevent the aesthetic and creative development of interactive design as a common awareness.

As a means to solve this problem, we need to communicate the history of design and media art attractively, and to realize a certain place again where technology and design can fight each other while making full use of each good point. It should be possible to realize it since the history and stories surrounding the past interface as a result connected directly with the real scene of high technology are attractive enough. There should be a platform that allows people to collaborate each other while appreciating each creation, and the ideal type of designer who can step up by being proficient in those communication is Joshua Davis. The fact that young designers and students at Numer got together to communicate with Casey Reas, who has been exploring visual interface at the MIT Media Lab where these solutions were taking shape, was a sufficient proof of the real need of it.

To go to the developing of interactive design, you need to have more criticisms and comments, to give a challenge to technologies, to collaborate more, and to keep improving your education as a resource of creativity. Each person needs a global relationship in order to carry out them naturally. It’s not too much to say that this Numer.00 conference functioned well as a good opportunity for young designers in interactive design, to create a relationship and to collect information. It needs to continue creating such relationship and network to realize the Numer’s purpose. I got a feeling that the current situation in Paris was somehow like the current one in Japan. To improve the position of interactive design, we must improve ourselves who are involved in design scene and also to improve the interactivity of the scene and society surrounding ourselves first. It’s worth watching over how Paris will version up as an interface in the future.

Numer.00
Date: December 9th and 10h, 2000
Place: Ecole Nationale Superieure Des Beaux-Arts
Address: 14 Rue Bonaparte, 75006 Paris
https://www.numer.org