« November 2006 | Main | January 2007 »
Shoe Norms
Shoes off facing in, or shoes off facing out? Whilst different cultures share sensibilities about clean and dirty spaces are there cultural differences in the way these spaces are entered and exited?
Writing from Gangtok | December 29, 2006 | Permalink
Reasons for Opposites
Airplane window shade pulled up rather than down. Emergency exit, where the vertical space above the window is otherwise used.
Writing from Bagdogra | | Permalink
Hear My Tunes
Writing from Darjeeling | December 28, 2006 | Permalink
Plank Order, Lock Positions
Writing from Darjeeling | | Permalink
Outsourcing, Relativism
Writing from Darjeeling | December 27, 2006 | Permalink
Shared Phone Practices
What happens when people share an object that is inherently designed for personal use?
A Nokia Research team set out explore this topic during a July 2006 field study in Uganda with a brief to understand how people share mobile phones. The research builds on prior research from India, China, Nepal and Mongolia and Indonesia.
An longish essay on Shared Phone Use can be found here, and a presentation co-authored with colleague Indri Tulusan entitled Shared Phone Practices: Exploratory Field Research from Uganda and Beyond can be downloaded from research dot nokia dot com here [7MB, PowerPoint]. A full list of related research can be downloaded from here , and you can sign up to be notified of new downloads by email info @ janchipchase.com with the word subscribe in the subject line.
The research team identified 6 shared use practices: an informal service called Sente that essentially enables a mobile phone owner to function as an ATM machine; mediated communication that neatly side-steps issues of technological and textual literacy; the ever popular practice of making missed calls; the pooling of resources to buy the lowest denominations of pre-paid airtime and extend the access days for the phone that is topped up; the use of community address books to reduce errors and (supposedly) encourage phone kiosk customer loyalty; and finally Step Messaging - the delivery of text and spoken messages on foot.
Whilst the baseline benefits of sole ownership and use of a mobile phone are personal, convenient, synchronous and asynchronous communication, the personal and convenient aspects of mobile phone ownership are compromised by sharing. This support the notion that phone sharing (as it is defined at the beginning of the essay) is seen as more of a transition to sole ownership than a naturally stable state.
For many poorer consumers in emerging markets other people's perception that you are connected is the status symbol, a sign that you have arrived and in some senses are worth connecting to. When most of the members of a person's peer group , or society are connected the focus of status shifts to the brand and model of device. phone ownership is not the same as use - if there are cheaper ways to communicate these will be used.
We are increasingly coming across what have termed unlikely consumers, where feature rich and once premium devices in the hands of the very poor and the myriad of ways the devices get there we have dubbed sideways adoption. Today the front-line of telecommunications innovation is in connecting the unconnected, and its a matter of time before today's unlikely consumers become tomorrow's innovators.
Heading to Sikkim early tomorrow for altitude + fresh mountains air, will return in the new year. Oh, and whilst no-one got it totally correct there is a winner for the blinged nano - will be shipped in January.
Writing from Darjeeling | December 21, 2006 | Comments (1) | Permalink
Specialist Media
People's Railway Daily on the Xining to Lhasa train.
Writing from Chengdu | December 20, 2006 | Permalink
Element Protector
Writing from Chengdu | | Permalink
Cool = Obey = Not Cool
An adapted Obey logo sits a top of the cap of a Lhasa rickshaw driver, buying logo free clothing often costs more in the local markets.
Writing from Chengdu | December 19, 2006 | Permalink
To Catch A Rat
Continuing the theme of rats, a rather playfully designed rat trap in Chengdu Airport.
Writing from Chengdu | December 18, 2006 | Permalink
Crossing Clean and Dirty Spaces
A Chinese gentleman on a train platform makes a phone call wearing white slippers. The slippers were provided for soft-sleeper passengers on the Xining - Lhasa Express for comfort, to avoid the need to put shoes on and off before climbing into a bunk, and to keep the bunks clean of regular shoes.
Cultures have different notions of clean and dirty spaces, take Japan for example. As a device that is both portable and engages our senses the act of using a mobile phone is well equipped to help us temporarily forget these boundaries.
Writing from Chengdu | | Permalink
Microbreak Advertising
The appropriation of a zebra crossing in Chengdu as a backdrop for advertising, somewhat similar to this in Tokyo's Daikanyama.
How will local government digital infrastructure be similarly appropriated?
Writing from Chengdu | December 16, 2006 | Permalink
Pleasures of the Flesh at 4am in Chengdu
A stopover in Chengdu to round off this Chinese leg of my journey starts out innocently enough propping up, and playing go with the regulars of the Little Bar and ends many hours later as a witness to, um, wanton abandoned consumption.
Every culture has its own equivalent to the 4am, pile-on-the-energy meal that rounds off a decent night out - after-hours clubbing in Tokyo followed by a hot bowl of ramen, richly filled bagels in London's East End or a pide in Kreuzberg. For my Chengdu companions that food is simply off my culinary radar.
It takes our taxi driver an age of cruising empty streets to find a suitable eating establishment though to be fair he has to cope with our frequent requests for changes in direction. Given that he picked us up from a street known for its bars at this time of the morning he should expect a degree of incoherence and anyway the meter is nicely ticking over. At three am on a Chengdu winter's night there aren't a hell of a lot of culinary options and on more than one occasion places that should be open are shut. We eventually pull up to a row of cheap blue plastic tables, each identically set with boxes of tissues and a cup of rough wooden chopsticks. The uniform appearance of the tables is in stark contradiction with what they represent - set back from the road are 6 small street eateries each in competition for our trade. A tout opens the taxi door and steers us to a table - only to be roundly ignored by my two female companions.
Each of the slippery steps down into the restaurant proper is a lawsuit waiting to happen. What's the Chinese equivalent to a greasy spoon cafe?
Hot glasses of water are first to arrive. This is swiftly followed by a pig's knuckle soup and the oily seal that has formed across its cooling surface is only broken by icebergs of bone, ligament and a floating white bean. When the final dish arrived it took a while for me to recognize the origins of the 3 skinned and identically shaped lumps of flesh and bone staring somewhat nonchalantly out of a pool of chili oil. As a non-local one of the pleasures of meal times in China is trying to figure out the origins of the food, the ingredients and style preparation so alien to a European. Ultimately it was the dental records and snout that gave it away. "It's stewed rat head" one of my companions grins matter-of-factly before donning a pair of disposable plastic gloves, selecting a choice skull, snapping open its jaw and with a happy abandon not normally associated with this time of the morning proceeds to suck the meat from the bones. I tell myself that ultimately there is little difference between a well cooked rat or pig or cow or lobster but years of culinary conditioning kick in.
I forget to ask what kind of rat makes a good stew. Are free range better tasting than caged?
If there's a future perfect link to all of this, and I'm not entirely convinced that there is, then it's the plastic gloves that Cecelia uses during the meal. Eating stewed rats head is a messy business and the plastic gloves make sense but I can't help thinking that another culture would have evolved some form of implement to help expose the meat, or alternately that an apron would be worn and that hands would be first used then washed. When a task process, whether eating a rats head or lobster, changing a car's oil filter or even sorting though a digital music collection is this messy how to contain the 'dirty' from the 'clean'?
A number of small-town China market stalls serve soup in a regular bowl lined with a thin, transparent plastic bag. When the meal is over the bag is thrown and the bowl can be reused without needing to be washed. (Not that I've ever seen it used this way, but the bag-lining-the-bowl design is well suited to being a doggy-bag-bowl)
How do the cultural differences in the ways we interact with food carry over to the way we interact with what is carried, and what we worn? How well would the stick-your-finger-in-your-ear Whisper Phone go down in this mass-market Chinese context? In a world of wearables it's a question worth asking.
Heading to Tokyo tomorrow to pick up supplies, a fresh change of clothes and a travel companion before the next leg of my December journey. Peace of mind is an open road, hand-luggage and the promise of good times ahead.
Writing from Chengdu | | Permalink
Recycling Collection Options
Writing from Chengdu | December 15, 2006 | Permalink
Rubbish Collection Norms
Flexible waste pick up in Chengdu above, and three forms of fixed rubbish drop off from Jardins São Paulo below. If I understand correctly the waste in Brazil isn't placed directly on the sidewalk for two reasons: to deter rats; and to allow trucks with water jets to blast the street whilst driving by.
Writing from Chengdu | | Permalink
The Sound of Flem Hitting a Dirt Floor
If you close your eyes and listen carefully to the sounds in next room you can hear a large pot of chai coming to the boil. The stove and its owner are out of view, but a weak shadow is cast over the corridor between our rooms. Before long the smiling owner appears, places two fresh thermos flasks on a shelf in the corridor before his foot steps recede back into his workspace.
After two hours of early morning wandering around Lhasa's back alleys it was time to duck into a small chai house for some sustainence. Three rows of red laquered wooden benches face the back wall, or to be more precise they face the TV that is perched on the top right hand corner of the back wall. Hours ago the TV would have been blaring out bollywood movies to a packed local crowd but for now it sits in silence reflecting the room back on itself. To my immediate right are three labourers two with heavily worn hands and sun-at-altitude etched faces who I assume they are in their 30's and with them sits a fresh faced 10 year old. In front of them three sleeping bodies try to make the most of the limited space and benches designed for sitting not sleeping. The labourers look up as I walk in, nod and then shift their concentration back to chai and cigarettes. The kid is also smoking.
The menu options at this time of the day are either to go for a large or a small themos of chai, the ordering-gesture for which is difficult to mis-interpret. These simple choices remind me of a road trip through small-town Mexico and walking into one-room bar that only sold tequila by the shot, half or full bottle. The other memorable aspect of that experience was that the main feature on one one wall of the bar was an open urinal - how many can't-pee-when-you're-really-not-watching men walked out of there with a full bladder. How many were sober enough to care?
If you shut your eyes and listen the distinct sounds of a space gradually reveals itself. Here, the clearest sound is the repeated slurping of hot chai from small glass cups. At regular intervals this is followed by a low thwump as the worn cork is pulled from the thermos followed by the sound of fresh chai hitting the bottom of an empty glass. Throats are repeatedly cleared of flem and spit is allowed to fall to the dirt floor. One of the sleeping dead emits the gentlist of snores though his sleep pattern is sharply interrupted by a kid repeatedly trying to use a lighter that appears to have run out of fuel.
Nobody speaks. Outside as the city wakes the nearest thing to vehicles going by is bell attached to a cycle rickshaw.
Covering most of the wall on my right is a panoramic poster of Lhasa seen from a nearby mountain range. It's designer has thoughtfully surrounded it with a printed a wooden frame. On another wall a poster of a Chinese teenage with a skateboard looks down on our little nativity scene.
In Lhasa 1 yuan buys a thermos of hot sweet chai plus whatever memories you can walk out with.
Writing from Lhasa | December 14, 2006 | Permalink
Informercials as a sign of a healthy productive society
The most frequently broadcast informercials on small hours Chinese TV are for energy drinks and breast enlargements. Whether the effects are accumulative? The latter promises to move ladies from an A cup to a C. There's a phone number to call but no web address.
Writing from Lhasa | | Permalink
Spiritual Places, Places to Get Drunk
Writing from Lhasa | December 13, 2006 | Permalink
Homes Away From Home
The train journey from Chengdu to Lhasa takes 48 hours and 3 minutes. Before boarding passengers have to sign a waiver form saying that they don't have any significant ailments and that they are medically fit to cope with altitude - the highest mountain pass the train travels through is at 5000 meters and altitude sickness can start at around 3500. The form has been roughly (mis)translated into English including 'passengers are not suitable travel to the plateau area ... when they have one of the following diseases ... (f) highly dangerous pregnant women'.
The good news is that after 12 hours on the train I've yet to be attacked by a highly dangerous pregnant woman. I do however have had to cope with a dining car waitress who runs a side-line in selling an eclectic range of goods and she appears at my door every few hours with a different tray of goodies. The magnetic jewelry was just that, and her super tough socks which she ably demonstrated by running a wire brush across its surface looked like a steal. Just before we pull into Lhasa she's tries to flog me some strawberry milk tea and a Chinese language train time table. I can't explain the former but a train buff might appreciate the latter. However despite having taken the trans-Mongolian express this time last year I'm not especially enamoured by trains.
My home for the 2 days is a soft sleeper - one of four bunks in train compartment. It's off season and I've got the space to myself. Travelers to Tibet are supposed to be on a tour group but last year I discovered a travel agent in Chengdu who can set up a group of one - here are the tickets, have fun. The train is modern and the compartment has an electricity power socket and each bunk a flat panel TV showing Chinese VCDs. Fortunately it cuts out half an hour into the journey never to return. The compartments next to me are filled with chain smoking, tangerine munching, card playing Chinese gentlemen on their way to a holiday Lhasa - their carpeted floor is littered with the detritus of, well, card playing, chain smoking, tangerine chewing Chinese gentlemen. Not bad for a no smoking train. It doesn't take long before they make themselves at home in my space.
The journey itself offers up all sorts of magic, not least waking to a moonlit and frozen steppes and gazing up to a constellation filled sky. That hissing sound? Oxygen being piped into the carriage.
A train cleaning crew stands to attention on the platform as the train pulls into Lhasa station, their mops and brushes presented like weapons on a parade ground. Lines of cleaning crews are a common sight at airports for some reason they always seem too dressed too lightly for windswept context. China has a habit of throwing up unexpected contrasts - on a late night arrival at Chengdu Airport watching a cleaning crew cycle in a column across the vast tarmac landscape under the shadows of sleeping giants going by names such as Sichuan Air.
My home for the next few days is the Yak Hotel. If you're in Lhasa this is a good place to be.
Writing from Lhasa | December 11, 2006 | Comments (2) | Permalink
Selling Up, Locking In
Checking in at the Raffles Swisshotel Beijing - "You want executive room for xxx Yuan more?" ... "Better view, 2 hours free internet..." followed by "If you pay now you pay 24 hours internet access for only xxx Yuan". A coke and fries with that burger sounds great and indeed the room does have a better view of the smog.
To what extent does the customer acceptance of these 'offers' depend on how jetlagged the guest is? What are the variable factors that affect acceptance rates?
And with all the new data floating around (including the extended flight passenger manifests that the EU kindly sends the US) when, in 2010 you're checking into the Mondrian the receptionist loadedly asks you whether you'd like you'd to pay for that thai massage now or later its because, literally they know exactly where you've been.
Writing from Beijing | December 5, 2006 | Permalink
Contextual Advertising
Advertising for train pass (Suica) equipped mobile phones advertised at the point of their intended use - the ticket barrier.
Writing from Tokyo | December 4, 2006 | Permalink
Societal Notions of Acceptable Anti-Social Behaviour
Smokers huddling around a smoking zone at the far end of a Shibuya train platform - a behaviour deemed as anti-social yet, by the very fact that infrasructure is present, accepted. A modern day opium den?
What similar behavours will future generations partake in? And how will society react?
6am Shibya station, waiting for the Narita Express.
Writing from Tokyo | | Permalink
Anytime, Anyplace, Anywhere (in Tokyo)
Shibuya Station morning commuters walk past a sign advertising Mobile TV. 10 things you didn't know about mobile TV here.
Cultural practices and the the likelyhood of technology adoption.
Writing from Tokyo | | Comments (3) | Permalink
Personal Cultural Radar
A lamp shade made from dozens of internal rubber sheaths of Tenga's - a Japanese single use penis pump.
For those of you who like to know how things work - a cross section diagram of a Tenga can be viewed here and its possible to contrast the internal differences between each of the designs that they make. The product packaging, its relative simplicity, and the rich sensory nature of its human interface when in use make it an interesting case study for user experience designers.
The lamp shade formed part of the Peace Needs a New Logo event in Aoyama and an element of its appeal (or otherwise) as an artifact is in understanding its origins. In practical terms it means having dismantled a penis pump which in turn implies having purchased and used one, or at least having spoken with someone who has. And whilst there are contextual, individual and cultural differences to what you discuss with whom, the obscurity of its origins, its display in a public space, and the very personal nature of a Tenga's use make this lamp shade a conversational bonding experience waiting to happen. As such it reminds me of the shift that is well underway in how we process the cultural references around us and how future changes in technology will in turn create new shifts in this landscape.
Today's mobile phone already combines the ability to process audio, visual and other sensor captured information. It is in essense an early form of a cultural radar - in tune with your personal preferences and the values you prescribe to. The quality of those carried sensors, the sensors in the world around us, the extent to which interaction is automated will only grow over time - leading to new ways of understanding our context. If you value the perspective and critical eye of WallPaper*, the New York Times or even Future Perfect then you'll simply sign up to their subscription service to apply their filter to your literal view of the world.
Given that part of the enjoyment of an object or service is in the process of discovery, in knowing and understanding obscure references, how does the designer/artist/creator remain two steps ahead when the links between things are inherently that much clearer?
As a valued reader kindly pointed out earlier this year Future Perfect is not half the site of Grant McCracken's This Blog Sits at The Intersection of Anthropoogy and Economics. When it comes to writing about culture I couldn't agree more. And finally credit where credit is due, during my travels to and from the mountains this week I finally managed to spend time on Adam Greenfield's Everyware well worth a read if you want a more systematic approach to understanding the ubitquitous world.
Writing from Tokyo | December 3, 2006 | Permalink
Tokyo Wayfinding
Writing from Tokyo | December 2, 2006 | Comments (1) | Permalink
QR Bar Code Meta Data
QR bar codes (photo below) embedded into the mosaic of the station posters (above) - each 'tile' is a separate bar code. Snap a photo of the bar code with an appropriate camera phone to follow the link. From Shibuya station.
Writing from Tokyo | December 1, 2006 | Comments (1) | Permalink
Density of People In a Space
With the communication+ devices fully integrated into what you carry you are the infrastructure and that fixed point with which you interact today becomes fluid. What factors affect with what or whom you interact?
Had the pleasure of catching a rush hour train this morning. Related thoughts from Sao Paulo earlier this year.
Writing from Tokyo | | Permalink
Large Buttons, Gesture Input
Spent the last couple of weeks observing an elderly relative first puchase then use a digital camera for the first time. What stood out? The touch screen on the Sony T50. Why? Human motor skills depreciate over time and the soft keys are larger and less fiddly than anything than can be squeezed on the physical form factor.
But the bonus? The speed at which a (relative) novice learnt and understood gesture based interaction - sliding her finger left and right, to navigate photos.
Writing from Tokyo | | Permalink
« November 2006 | Main | January 2007 »
Or browse the Future Perfect archives by keyword