Prodrome is a speculative neuro-monitoring wearable designed to detect behavioural deviation before conscious awareness. Marketed as preventative healthcare, the device continuously monitors neural activity to identify instability, risk, and divergence at a pre-symptomatic stage. It promises safety through anticipation. Acting before the individual understands what is happening to them. Framed as assistive technology, Prodrome quietly shifts authority away from the user. Automated escalation protocols, locked controls, and tiered monitoring subscriptions establish a system “Temporarily Unavailable" and "Automatic Escalation Active" signal a decisive transfer of agency. The system does not suggest. It intervenes.
The project constructs a believable consumer product ecosystem through device design, interface architecture, packaging, and speculative advertising. Minimal clinical aesthetics and premium material editions disguise institutional power structures beneath the language of optimisation and care. Prodrome explores a near future where autonomy is conditional, behaviour is continuously scored, and detection precedes awareness. When the system knows before you do, who is accountable? Who is in control?