I really enjoyed reading these articles about interactivity. It was interesting to hear different people’s opinions of what it is. For me personally, I would say that physical interaction would be using your body to illicit a reaction from a device. Physical interaction done well would cause the user to use more than just a small part of their body (i.e. just their fingers or eyes), and would fit in with actions that we use in our everyday lives in the goal of a seamless transition. I think there’s a reason that we use buttons and switches and other physical objects to control things, and that’s because we like the feeling of different components over a screen. One example I found interesting is the LG Instaview refrigerator which allows you to knock on the fridge door twice to change the window taking up all of one door to turn transparent so you can see your food inside. As far as Crawford’s thoughts on interactivity goes, I think he is fairly accurate in his description.
Berry College Physical Computing 2017 