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Big Brother / Little Sister
When it comes to surveillance most people think of big brother, but increasingly its your (early adopting, tech savvy, sensor loaded) little sister. Which makes the whole notion of opting out of technology adoption one of whether to opt out of society. Exactly. Slides taken from this presentation [PowerPoint, 4MB].
Photos? Above - a selca moment in Seoul and below from a field study in Brighton.
A long weekend in Hokkaido kicks off in a few minutes, altitude + powder beckons.
Writing from Tokyo | February 29, 2008 | Permalink
Going Local
Readers on the other side of the globe (to Japan) can now head over to our local Satellite Design Studio in Rio de Janeiro located at the Design School of UniverCidade. It's a similar setup to our studio in Bangalore and reflects the need to absorb the local into the design process. More here.
Photos? The Rio dawn seen from the office deck during last year's field study and favela fonts.
Writing from Tokyo | February 28, 2008 | Permalink
Traces
A cable that runs between the body of this Japanese toilet and the seat - to power the under-seat heating. Having an exposed cable is a surprising design choice given the issues related to cleanliness and (male standing) splash-back. For any device (think flip-phone...) or system the internal and external ways of moving power/bits from A to B and the associated costs of each. Someone should bring together the toilet and mobile phones design communities for an, um, sit down.
The Domestic Traces Human Spaces flickr pool has some tranquil examples of, well, human traces in domestic spaces. How does this relate to this photo? In a country where heated toilet seats are common a warm toilet seat doesn't imply the recent presence of another human.
Related: traces from Brazil, India, China & Japan.
Writing from Mishuku | February 27, 2008 | Permalink
Common Tokyo Winter Ailments
Writing from Mishuku | February 26, 2008 | Permalink
Win Bose 3's - A Nation Decides
The competition for the most entertaining example of mobile phone anti-social behaviour drew in entries ranging from the inane to the insane, obviously encouraged by the chance to win a pair of Bose 3 noise cancellation headphones. You can read all the entries here.
It's decision time. Once you've reviewed the entries you can record your vote here.
Let the vote rigging begin!
Update: voting is now closed.
Update: in the true spirit of a dysfunctional democracy we have a clear, if vote rigged winner. Ta to everyone who submitted entries and Steve ping your address to info at janchipchase.com to receive your prize. No more shall you be cursed by ambient noise (unless of course you forget to charge the headphones battery)
Writing from Tokyo | February 25, 2008 | Comments (58) | Permalink
A Market For...
A stall selling water by the sachet can be frequently spotted in and around Accra where many homes have limited access to mains water.
Thought for today - for every neighbourhood: the proximity of individual dwellings to infrastructure - water, electricity, lighting, covered sewage, internet connectivity,...; the social dynamics that enable or deny access and to whom, and in what contexts; the markets that spring up to either extend access to those who don't be default have access, or to make it more convenient for those already do; and the technologies that are being created to make those markets feasible.
Lastly - how the whole dynamic changes as more of what we consider to be 'infrastructure' is bundled into ever smaller packages and becomes increasingly mobile?
Decent brew of coffee, K dozing in the next room, gaggles of joggers a-jogging under the balcony. Tokyo on a Sunday.
Writing from Mishuku | February 24, 2008 | Permalink
Sachets That Mimic
Sachet's mimicking the design of a tube. For what product and in what context is it desirable for the tube mimicking the design of sachets?
From Accra.
Writing from Mishuku | | Permalink
Google Obituary
The practice of showing side-by-side photos of the deceased - one recent the other taken from the past - photo from the Salt Lake Tribune. Compare the format to death notices from Singapore Straits Times, and the streets of Ghana and Iran.
When your ashes are being scattered in the future perfect what form will your obituary take? Drawing on a life time of digitally captured, archived, searchable experiences your life stream there for the taking, everything interlinked. Given the tone, form and purpose of the obituary format - to what extent will the digital you be rewritten after your death? And by whom? In part its a question of who controls legal and moral rights to the digital you - after your death, those remaining aspects of your digital life not yet archived by Big Corp Inc. auctioned to the highest bidder, the proceeds used to off-set the funeral costs. The dead, archived and indexed you is after all, an advertising opportunity. Go in peace and remember to click on the banner ads on your way out.
How important is it and for whom that the collective memory of you is shared, agreed? In a world personal profiles and mapped relationships an obituary that is tailored to reflect your relationship with the deceased is only a click away.
Google Obituary beta is rolled out in 2010 hits the global mainstream by 2021. Slow take up? The competition is well established, it takes time for life to truly go digital, and it takes a while for the life-stream generation to die off...
Writing from Los Angeles | February 19, 2008 | Permalink
Form, Context, Advertising
LAX luggage/baggage claim.
Writing from Los Angeles | | Permalink
Time Capsules
Portrait norms and technical capabilities communicated in a row of photos at the Ogden Regional Medical Center.
For a visit to a friend and operatee, coming off worse after an impact on the mountain, unfortunately.
Writing from Ogden | February 17, 2008 | Permalink
Open Here
Given that the 'open here' information not normally visible prior to opening - is its purpose to re-assure the user that they have made the right choice?
Writing from Salt Lake City | | Permalink
Audio Optional
Audio jack ATM machine, Salt Lake City airport.
Writing from Salt Lake City | | Permalink
Sustainability Summit Download
The presentation from last week's Systems, Cities and Sustainability Mobility Summit are now available. I'll expand on material new to regular Future Perfect reader's over the coming weeks. Download Coordination in the Future Urban [PowerPoint 4MB].
The slide below shows a dual SIM card that can be found in countries with a high proportion of pre-paid phones, a significant number of highly price sensitive consumers and an evolved mobile phone repair culture. It's a relatively simple street hack that combines two SIM cards into one SIM card form factor - enabling a regular phone to support multiple phone numbers on one phone. Imagine having AT&T + T-Mobile on one device. Click to enlarge photo.
The hack is a response to an existing behaviour - the practice of carrying separate SIM cards in order to reduce communication costs. It typically costs more to call someone on a different operator than the same and before this hack these consumers were willing to put up with the hassle of turning off the phone, switching in a new SIM card, and waiting for the phone to reboot.
Whilst in the short term it's something that will help consumers shave a few cents off their communication costs, it's the long term implications that should interest you service and system designers. In many parts of the world the mobile phone number functions as an increasing important form of identity, a single device may be shared amongst a family, friends or even village and the device is the enabler for activities ranging from banking and money transfers to capturing and sharing experiences. If, for the sake of argument a phone number is equivalent to a bank account what does it mean to have two or four or forty supported on one device? And returning to the issues discussed at the summit - what are the implications if the mobile device becomes the primary interface through which we view the city and access its infrastructure?
Yeah you're right - the hack is far from perfect - since most phone user interface's are not designed to support multiple SIM cards features such as the call log are compromised. And yeah there are already a few phones out there that support multiple SIM card slots. Clever you. But it is another example of a lo-fi hi-tech something that you can find today on the streets of Accra and Kampala but are unlikely to yet find in Tokyo, London or San Francisco.
SIM card photo photo taken by colleague Younghee Jungr during our Accra field study. Top photo of Ho Chi Minh City during morning rush hour.
Writing from Los Angeles | February 14, 2008 | Permalink
The Business, Consequences of Locating Stuff
"Garbage is useful stuff in the wrong place" from Alex Steffen at the sustainability summit. Big implications in a world where people who want stuff will increasingly be able to co-ordinate with people who have stuff or indeed - directly with the stuff itself. Garbage that negotiates its own collection.
Photos? A night spent under the stars in the Los Olivos hills and from earlier in the same evening - a fire breathing colleague.
Writing from Los Angeles | | Permalink
Textures
Writing from Los Olivos | | Permalink
A Sense of Scale
One ostrich egg equivalent in volume to between 20 and 25 regular chicken eggs.
Difficult to make tasty scramble eggs since you ask - a rough texture much like potatoes.
Related: That every culture has its own sense of scale.
Writing from Los Olivos | | Permalink
Customers First No Chatter
Why doesn't this say "Customers First. Chat"? In what contexts is chatter with customers likely to be encouraged? Perhaps a local small town grocery store using the personal touch to compete with the big chains.
And what are we doing in a Los Olivos Ralph's? Joining colleagues from our Espoo and Calabasas design studios to head off to a ranch for three days to figure out each other, our role in the mothership, and evolve a strategy for the coming year. This being wine country, we naturally have quaff a few bottles of decent wine.
The check-out yielded a wisdom of crowd moment: every team member tried to guess the total grocery bill though in the end the average was no-where near the final tally. A stupidity of crowds moment - no-one thought to buy breakfast cereal.
Writing from Los Olivos | February 13, 2008 | Permalink
Recycled, Upcycled: Remade
Is it possible to make an upcycled mobile phone entirely from recycled materials? One that consumers will want to buy? How about at a price that puts it within reach of the mass market?
If your interest is piqued take a look at the following concept called Remade developed by a number of my Nokia Design colleagues from our Calabasas Studio - Andrew Gartrell, Duncan Burns, Rhys Newman, Raphael Grignani, Pascal Wever, Tom Arbisi, Simon James, Pawena Thimaporn and Peter Knudsen. Photos and a video of Remade appear here, and I guess a more corporatesque press release (if you go for that kind of thing) will eventually appear here.
Of all the internal concepts I've followed this year this is one I keep returning to, not least because sustainability is a pressing issue in a billion+ products-per-year industry - but also because the team tackled a number of related weighty issues in what was a far reaching project. I hope that in due course more of their design thinking makes it into the public domain, not least to stimulate critical feedback from people like your good selves. (I’m happy to pass your comments onto the team - email info at janchipchase dot com so you can converse with them directly).
Some readers will recognize the use of the term upcycling from Cradle to Cradle and it’s fair to say that well-thumbed copies have been circulated and more importantly provoked debate within our community. And yes the concept evolves the thinking about cultures of repair and innovation that can be found on the streets from Accra to Bangalore to Chengdu. A presentation of this research can be downloaded from here (PowerPoint, 4MB)
Returning to the original question from this post: Is it possible to make an upcycled mobile phone entirely from recycled materials? One that consumers want to buy? At a price that puts it within reach of the mass market? The discussion is well underway.
These photos? We joined three two of the Remade team in Accra where they were in the middle of testing and refining the concept with the aid of the local population.The gent pictured? Owner, and talented entrepreneur of a neighbourhood mobile phone repair shop.
Writing from Los Olivos | February 12, 2008 | Permalink
Targets Practiced
Gender of shooter. Shooter's preference for gender of target.
Writing from Inglewood | February 11, 2008 | Permalink
Personalising "Cash"
This pre-paid and top-up-able Starbucks card guides the customer to "treat this card like cash" - and log on to their web site to create a personalised design.
When the donkey work of transferring a pre-determined and shared value from one person to another can be carried out digitally, to what extent is it desirable to have a tangible representation of that value? In what contexts? And as with this card, to what extent should the customer be able to personalise the tangible representation of that value - to what extent should the customer be able to design and create their own cash?
Thinking about the range of tools to create and reproduce physical things - what are the likely forms this currency will take? And given the degree to which people find comfort in nostalgia, who will be the first to re-introduce the sea shell as a currency?
Writing from Pasadena | | Permalink
Texture & Legibility
Writing from Pasadena | | Permalink
Investigative Design / Materials
The slides from yesterday's Arts Center presentation on Investigative Design can now be downloaded (PowerPoint, 4MB) - most of the material is taken from a previous presentation so regular readers will want to skip it. Thanks to Katherine Bennett for hosting and students for raising issues worth debating.
And the slide on credibility?
People are busy and your research is just one of many competing for your colleagues/client’s attention - they have their own opinions, have commissioned other studies and can draw on a range of experts. So why should anyone give your research the time of day? How to build credibility? For starters recognise and communicate the limits of (mostly qualitative) design research. We start out with opinions, and all things by the end of study we move onto having informed opinions or on rare occasions very informed opinions. Overstating the value of the research makes you a bullshitter.
Given the highly competitive working environments that exist, particularly in go-go corporate America there's a pressure to generate a bit of hype. Your colleagues are smart so give it to them straight, warts and all - to enable them to use the information with their eyes open. Don't consider your colleagues smart? You're in the wrong job.
Of course, in some instances the research doesn’t need to be credible - 'merely' interesting - a topic for another day.
And if you're wondering about the photo on the cover slide - snow flurries in a wintery Helsinki.
Writing from Pasadena | February 10, 2008 | Permalink
Curb Annotation
And rounding off today's fascination with curb crawling, this from outside a flower shop on Wilshire & 23rd, Santa Monica.
Related: extending street markings in Daikanyama and the geometry of Tokyo laid bare.
Writing from Santa Monica | | Permalink
Alignment. Effect?
The un/intentional alignment of the lettering to the edge of the pavement. The affects of alignment (and other forms of layout, naturally) on how the message is perceived. Considered from the perspective of the driver, pedestrians? And whether the alignment is merely an attempt by the the stenciler to save time during the creation process?
Writing from Pasadena | | Permalink
Boundaries / Rules
Writing from Pasadena | | Permalink
Competition / Win Bose 3's
The mobile phone's role as an instigator of 'anti-social' behaviour is legendary - whether its the delight of hearing a busy executive take a call on speaker phone to enjoying someone else's high fidelity speakers of their shiny new mobile boom box. But we should we be surprised? It's a device that is both portable, used in pretty much every context and that leads us to multi-task - and in doing so helps us to forget where we are and who we're with.
What, if anything, does this have to do with the photo above?
I'll send this pair of Bose 3 noise cancellation headphones to the most entertaining example of mobile phone anti-social behaviour to be posted in the comments below. The more local colour that explains the context the better, don't be shy, we're (probably) all adults here. Oh yeah, in the spirit of a dysfunctional democracy I'll let you choose the winner, and I'll overrule the result if the vote rigging gets out of hand. Let the games begin.
Updated: they're Bose 3's, not 2's Product page here
Closing date February 24th!
Writing from Tokyo | February 5, 2008 | Comments (43) | Permalink
Loan Advertising
Writing from Mishuku | February 4, 2008 | Permalink
Localisation Norms
Menu title written in English, menu items in Japanese, tax written in English, numbers in Hindu/Arabic/Western. What we know,what we assume our customers know.
Writing from Higashi Yama | | Permalink
View From Above. Proximate
The tools to discover the location of resources whether you're in a hurry to find helicopter landing pad (on the Tokyo hospital roof, above) or somewhere to buy a decent pair of flying goggles are becoming increasingly mainstream and increasingly pocketable - using technologies from base station triangulation, GPS to WiFi Positioning.
I'm intrigued about the knock-on effects of proximate awareness - the ability to sufficiently understand location based on the knowledge and mediation of other people who themselves have access to this technology. Think of all the services offered by a well equipped information kiosk made mobile, in the hands of a service provider. Or street hustler. We first came across proximate literacy during our research into illiterate communication practices [essay PowerPoint 6MB]. The idea of proximate anything should interest you because it speeds up the mainstreaming of technology - you get many of the benefits and drawbacks of a technology without having actually purchased it yourself.
Thought for today - the ways in which ready access to a product or service differs from actual ownership - in terms of cost, maintenance, use. Certainly topics for next week's Systems, Cities and Sustainable Mobility conference.
Cheers PFW for the view.
Writing from Tokyo | February 3, 2008 | Permalink
The Power of Repetition
The practice of kitting out a bunch of students in a uniform and sending them out onto the streets, in Shibuya (above) and Chengdu (below). Group advertising of this nature is relatively common practice in China in part because labour is relatively cheap, and in part drawing on a rich culture of public performance.
Related: Putting an advertising spin on everyday accidents, advertising labour and skills in Urumqi, the future of in your face advertising in Taiwan, the unique format of job advertising in Sao Paolo, and not least - figuring out the value of contextual advertising on a Shibuya escalator.
Writing from Shibuya, back of | | Permalink
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