Designing Mobility: Pervasiveness as the Enchanting Tool of Mobility

PLUG – Play Ubiquitous Games -, is a research project that deployed a fully distributed RFID architecture in the Museum of Arts and Crafts in Paris. A pervasive game was designed: "Plug: the Secrets of the Museum" (PSM) where players had to find virtual representations of the Museum artifacts, scatter them around or tidy them in the right spots, or swap them with other players. The analysis of the players’ feed back showed that three main features characterize mobility when it is connected to pervasiveness. First, mobility appears as a way to read and collect information. Second, it is a tool to virtually mark the environment and the artifacts. Moving can be akin to "writing" a new scenario. Third, people become part of the network propagating and refreshing information not only on their mobiles but also on the RFID displays.