Analysing the Efficacy of using Wearables for this Project - Katie

• It can't be produced by different manufacturers because there's no way to guarantee that they will all perform to the same quality. The only way to promise that all your wearables will have the same functionality is to have one manufacturer. This manufacturer will then have to be given a public tendering.

• Will it be free to everyone? Will it be a two-tiered system, where people on social welfare will receive the watch for free but everyone else will have to pay? How much will each watch cost? Will there be high uptake if people have to pay, or will people be too sceptical? Will people be forced to pay for one, like a TV licence? What happens to a family of six, for example, who are not on social welfare or otherwise considered to be living above the bread line, who are now obligated to pay for six watches?

• If anything goes wrong with this first batch of wearables, which will already take quite a lot of public funds to build and distribute in the first place, they will have to be re-tendered. A new batch of watches will have to be built and distributed to once again guarantee equity across the population. Even if every single wearable in this first batch has the same functionality as the next and works just as intended, what is the strategy for long-term upkeep? How long will each watch last if they are not damaged by the wearer? Will people have to go to specialists to get routine maintenance on their watches? Will people have to pay for this maintenance? How often do they plan to update the technology-- both the software and the physical watch? 

• If the wearer manages to break their wearable through some sort of accident, will the State be able to guarantee a replacement in a short time frame after the damage being reported? If they don't replace it quickly, then this citizen is now more vulnerable if an earthquake does occur. If they suffer injuries as a result of not having access to the warning technology, could this leave the government open to litigation?

• Will wi-fi be required for this warning to reach everyone? Broadband signals are not equally distributed across all regions of a country, so what will happen to people in black spots? Broadband is also vulnerable to outages during natural disasters in general, so is it a reliable system to depend on during disasters? If not broadband, what new system will these electronic watches across the country be tuned in to? Will we be using radio waves? 

• How will we be able to guarantee that everyone in the population has the digital literacy required to use these watches? Will we run workshops for older people and integrate it into our education syllabus for our younger people? 

• Will the State not be obligated to set up a new department to help run this operation? Without a new department, how will they be able to have a team of experts who are up to date on the protocols and available at all times should a sudden disaster occur? 

• How will we guarantee that our product works just as effectively for the hearing and sight impaired during a disaster? Will we have to manufacture separate products or integrate special settings for them? Will this require some sort of settings navigation? This once again brings us back to the question of digital literacy and what will we be required to teach people about the watches. How can we guarantee everyone will have access to this information and that everyone will eventually be taught how they work? 

• What happens to visitors to New Zealand? Is there a stock of wearables kept to the side for tourists or people there for business? Do they have to wear them for the duration of their trip and then return them upon departure?

• How will we be able to guarantee that the network these wearables work from is safe from hackers? How vulnerable is this system to being hacked and being used to induce mass panic about a fake disaster or being used to herd people to a particular space?

• If these wearables took the form of hats, how would they be able to distribute hats that fit the heads of all their wearers? Will people be obligated to send in measurements for the size of their head to the government? Will there be style options, or will everyone wear the same hat everyday for the rest of their lives in fear of missing out on an earthquake warning? What happens if their hat blows away, or gets left on a train seat just before the warnings start? What happens if you become involved in an accident as a result of the natural disaster and the hat flies off your head from the impact? In a state of emergency, can we really expect everyone to have access to the same singular object? 

• This is why integrating the response into technology available in public infrastructure is the most equitable response possible. Depending on the traffic light system to light a pathway to safety is also the best way to guarantee a close to universal understanding. People across the world could recognise that red means stop, don't go here, and green means go this way. Utilising sounds and physical landmarks could be utilised to help the sight impaired follow the pathways towards safety. Tourism boards could help distribute information about it through online resources, travel guides and safety demonstrations. Airports and train stations could display signs that use simple symbolism to communicate this information in a way people from across the world could understand. 

• The AI could help direct emergency services to the areas worst affected and warn them about potential dangers they've detected. It could flag what supplies are required in these safe zones people have been directed to and then bring them whatever they need, be it blankets, food, water or medicine. 

• In regards to using AI as part of this brief, do we have to consider how all this data will be stored or how this AI will be run? Will we need to set up new data centres to hold the data being collected by these AI, and all the data being used to train them? AI is notoriously expensive to run. Bill Gates' personal donations are the only thing preventing ChatGPT from going bankrupt in the next year. How will all of this be funded?