Description:

I’ve grown up as a young female who thought that freckles and moles were a defect of my beauty.With the recent rise of skincare trends, there's a lot of misinformation and risk roaming around within the over-saturated skincare market. On top of this, the UV levels are rising globally and in New Zealand on top of an already thin Ozone layer.

In 2015, more people died of skin cancer in Aotearoa than those on our roads. And yet with only 3% of New Zealand’s health budget is spent on prevention Kiwis are becoming increasingly in danger.

Freckles and moles can develop at any age. However, it is more common to develop them as a child. If you notice a new mole as an adult, surveys have shown people are less likely to seek professional advice due to our modern-day lifestyles and the rising cost of living, which also affects our access to sunscreens.All are blurring the key concerns of healthy skin practice and putting our younger generation at a growing risk of skin cancer, especially later in life.

This inquiry led by design thinking and a human-centred approach explored how interactive technologies can enhance our everyday lives by assisting us to become more aware of the early signs of skin cancer and safe skin/sun practice.

Freckl aims to support 20-35-year-olds in realigning their personal sun-safe measures against their own skin’s health and overall function, rather than creating a picture-perfect appearance. The creative media campaign interacts with a web-based app and messaging chatbot, to encourage the user to ‘check up’ on their skin or #getspotted for any new or concerning moles or skin clusters.

The web app itself is based on the familiarity basis of a messaging interface. Although chatbots have had a bad reputation in the past I believe that having an assistive dashboard backed by the growing perks of Artificial intelligence could make this a productive health conversation and a chatbot that's worth wild.

From the creative media campaign, users can scan a QR code or NFC link to access the Freckl website from here they can jump right into Freckl chat, learn their skin profile, build sun habits and converse about any skin concerns they have. Freckl will provide actions and resources based on the requests through Ai. Upon registration, the web app uses push reminders to keep users updated on their local UV levels, skin checks and facts alike.

Ultimately, Freckl explores how the future of technology like a chatbot based on artificial intelligence could aid more accessibility to the future of New Zealander’s skin health. Saving lives with early detection, and with the right funding could lower the numbers in one of the countries with the highest Melanoma rates in the world.