14 DAY TRIAL // Concept mobile phones are always something to feast our eye with, and the newly spotted BlackBerry Empathy is among those devices that can easily offer a visual delight, though a unique one, that's for sure. BlackBerry Empathy is, undoubtedly, one of the most bizarre concepts we've seen around the web. Especially since it is accompanied by that biometric feedback ring.
The concept device came to life as the result of a project held by RIM Blackberry at the Art Center College of Design, and has as its authors designers Kiki and Daniel.
Their main focus was on the development of an interface that would integrate human emotions with the idea of social networking, and this is how the Blackberry Empathy concept came to life.
The specs of this device would include a transparent OLED screen that would become opaque when interacted with. On the front, the phone is full touch, while packing a physical keyboard on the back.
“It is of course touch based and all the user’s connections are shown graphically so you can see who is connected to whom. Each contact has an avatar that is encompassed by two colored rings,” Daniel states on the matter, Yanko Design reports.
“The inner colored ring shows the contact’s previous emotional state, and the outer ring represents the contact’s current emotional state. It is important to show the shift in emotions in order to see how an event has affected that contact.”
According to him, one of the important features this contept device was designed with was the “Emotional Health Chart,” aimed at monitoring the emotional health of the user indefinitely.
“One would be able to see how a certain event, or phone call/ message has affected the user. Obviously, if the chart shows someone is always upset, there would be a problem… If permitted, a user would be able to view other user’s charts as well,” Daniel continues.
With Nokia announcing not too long ago that it developed an application that can make the phone sense the situation one is in, and act accordingly (by turning to 'In a meeting', or 'Sleeping' modes), this concept seems closer to become reality at a certain point in the future.
