Allen
Rabinovich '04
aramis @ mit.edu
(617) 225-7240
Undergraduate Research Assistant
Aesthetics and Computation Group
MIT Media Laboratory
Hello.
I work with the Aesthetics and Computation
Group under the mentorship of Dr. John Maeda at MIT Media Laboratory,
because I believe that the future of communication is in the hands of
those who have excelled both in engineering and visual arts.
I
have worked on a few different projects while here, but I try to center
my research on developing systems that attract the users with their simplicity,
yet are capable of accomplishing challenging tasks. The problems I like
to solve come both from the domain of pure engineering (such as developing
the actual "engine" that drives the system) and from the domain
of pure design (developing the very interface that makes the system highly
usable.) Help yourself to the sections below to find out more about my
past and ongoing projects and, well, other things.
Gallerea
Part of Dr. Maeda's "Open Atelier", this is a www exhibition
system with a simple, yet powerful interface for creation and maintenance
of an online museum with multiple galleries. In addition to the online portion of the interface,
a new way of data input to a website by means of a telephone is being
developed (the curator will be able to create audio commentary for exhibits
over the phone).
Uses: Python 2.2, dedicated mySQL server (RedHat), Microsoft's TAPI and
SAPI libraries, Pythonware's PIL. See it being
built (username: aramis, password: abc123).
UniVote
Created in light of the farce election of 2000, this is an online system
that permits its users to create and conduct their own votes and polls.
While intuitive and easy to use, the system does not restrict the user
in virtually any way (as most of the systems of this kin do) and creates
clean, easy-to-use voting pages.
Uses: Perl. Currently offline for a rebuild, see
screenshots.
Resume
A formal list of a few things I have done. Goes back to when I headed
the New York City Math Team (that was last century, but vanity is still
here). See it right here (PDF).
Photography
Yeah, I do that, too. Here are
just a few, more are coming.
AI Projects
Two semi-large a.i. projects done under the direction of Jacob
Beal, a cool graduate researcher at the MIT AI Lab: Deskworker
Scheduler & Spam Filter (PDF).
Russian Samurai
A software/hardware project for a LEGO robotics competition at MIT. Russian Samurai
is a smart robot with grabby arms.
In Memoriam:
Douglas Adams
(1951-2001)
My small tribute
to an incredible genius, whose clear mind made the world quite a bit better.
Namistai
Namistai is a Sanskrit word that means "I bow to the divine in you."
It's a greeting, a welcome, an invitation
to communicate.
IM Me
I live in the Internet these days, so say hi. My screenname's KeenHarlequin,
on AIM.