US – Fisher-Price has produced a video speculating on the relationship between parenting and play in 2025.
- The toy-maker worked with design consultancy Continuum to produce the video
- The work explores the potential for quantification technologies integrated into the home to act as a parenting tool
Fisher-Price’s concept video, The Future of Parenting, is set in a family home as imagined a decade from now. It features babies, toddlers and parents interacting with a range of toys and gadgets, many recognisable evolutions of current Fisher-Price products, augmented with near-future technologies such as multimaterial 3D printing, smart fabrics and holograms.
The video also focuses on the potential for sensors built in to fixtures and furnishings to act as a powerful parenting tool, tracking elements of a child’s development and feeding back that data across interactive displays. ‘We found parents aren’t heavily into assessment. They don’t want judgement in how their child is progressing, they want information, but they’re not looking for big data to assess their child,’ Mark Zeller, vice-president of design at Fisher-Price, told Fast Company.
The Big Picture
We’ve been tracking the Personal Information Economy since 2011, but while the desire for quantification continues to grow, consumers are increasingly aware of the anxiety that access to such data can cause. Fisher-Price is playfully imagining how to make this wealth of information empowering rather than distressing.