Render of the NOX tag layers: e-paper, circuit board and battery stacked into one thin tag
Research: screenshots of one day of screen time, 145 pickups, most triggered by push notifications
Research: the journey of a push notification from arrival to reaction
Paper prototypes: testing tag shapes and sizes by hand
Tag states: a new message shows the sender's initial, then grows bolder with urgency up to a countdown
Hardware prototype: e-paper display driven by an Arduino
E-paper test: the display showing the message If these walls could talk
The final drop-shaped NOX tag, paper-thin, held in hand
NOX app on three iPhones: tag detected, connect screen and app icon
The NOX thesis booklet

NOX

NOX – Filtering the Noise is my bachelor thesis in Product & Interaction Design at KHB. It started with one day of screen time: 145 pickups, at least 133 of them triggered by push notifications. So I asked how we can filter what really matters in a constant flow of information, and pick up the smartphone less.

NOX is a paper-thin, drop-shaped e-ink tag you stick to a wall, a mirror or a shelf. It shows only the essentials, a sender's initial and one keyword, right where they matter. Hold your phone to the tag to read the full message. It is not a new screen, but a quiet gatekeeper for your notifications.

FAQ

NOX – Filtering the Noise is my bachelor's thesis in Product & Interaction Design at KHB.

It started with a self-study of one day's screen time: 145 pickups, at least 133 of them triggered by push notifications.

Paper first. The process followed the Double Diamond, the divergence–convergence model popularised by the British Design Council in 2005 and widely used as a method in design.

Two surveys showed that 55 % of participants receive more than ten push notifications a day and 68 % feel stressed by them.

I tested paper and film tags around my flat, then e-ink displays on an Arduino and an NFC-powered e-paper – for these, the interaction itself had to be developed and programmed.

Supervised by Prof. Carola Zwick, Mika Satomi and Prof. Dr. Patricia Ribault.

Each NOX tag is an NFC tag, connected to the NOX app via Bluetooth and assigned to selected apps; their notifications go quiet on the phone and appear where they are relevant – the medication reminder by the sink, the next appointment by the door.

The e-paper display shows the sender's initial and one keyword, increasing in weight with urgency; holding the phone to the tag opens the full message.

The final build stacks a flexible PCB, a bendable battery and a round e-paper display at about 7 mm, with 2 mm as the target.

Design ResearchIoTInformation DesignPrototypingUX Design