Basically all alarm clocks work the same: at a specified time they start making so much noise that you get up just to shut them off. This is all very well for normal, disciplined people, but for those of us who like to sleep-in, it doesn’t really work.
Over the years I have become submissive to the “rule of the alarm clock” but I still find myself in situations where I have managed to completely ignore the “bells and whistles” and blissfully oversleep. There are thousands of different alarm clocks on the market but they all work in the same way: you set the time you want to wake up and then they pester you till you do. Alice Wang, a graduate of MA Design Interactions at the Royal Academy of Art, decided to re-explore the concept of the alarm clock.
Her idea was to find a wake-up method that would adapt to how we live today and provide different solutions to suit people’s different physical and emotional needs. She came up with two concept clocks that are very different in their approach:
“Perfect Sleep” – is a friendly alarm clock that is set according to how much time you want to sleep instead of when you would like to get up.
The “Tyrant” alarm clock is an unorthodox alarm clock that promises to unleash the wrath of all the people you know if you don’t obey it and get up. From the sound of the alarm, you have three minutes to get out of bed and turn it off, otherwise it goes through the contact list on your mobile-phone and randomly dials one of your contacts.
If it dials my mother I’m OK, she gets up at five-thirty every day (!), but just trying to imagine it placing a call to one of my other relatives or any of my clients makes me break out in a cold sweat and sprint out of bed. The thought of waking up in such a frightening way is definitely not enjoyable but I must admit it would do the trick, I can’t see myself sleeping through this wake-up call.
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