task 2D: objectified

let me first start by saying I REALLY LIKE THIS DOCUMENTARY.

What I thought when watching objectified was that it is extremely easy to become disconnected with the end result or solution when designing and I find that a constant struggle especially in studio where I sometimes have a strangely egotistical view that I should be brilliant and ground breaking then I think oh what can I make that's amazing instead of being practical and trying to improve a persons life or at least experience with this object.

Of course arguably the hardest part is making truly sustainable products due to the mass produced nature of our industry, but then this is where being realistic becomes most important. For instance if as a designer you had the honesty and humility to say like Karim Rashid does that my product is most likely temporary and will be replaced why can't my phone out of cardboard? It's almost as if we are trying to make some kind of permanent design legacy and our own ego is what contributes to a product's unsustainability.

Of course like Rob Walker says the name of the game is to sell things and the companies who are paying you will constrain you on materials and even forms etc. as long as it is cheap, but the real problem lies in the fact that most will want a new product next year and need it to make the current one dated. If sustainability is to really be addressed then the unnecessary production should cease. However this isn't going to happen unless a large societal shift occurs so where does that leave me as a designer? I'm now thinking Rashid is right and start making throwaway materials like pulped cardboard, bamboo's etc and embracing the throwaway life style.

task 2c: climate Change, Who killed the electric car

So interesting documentary really, it highlights the deeper problems in the sustainability an going green debate. Rather than the dreamy ideals of designers who say they will make sustainable products when the reality is that even if you manage to find a way to make a product that is actually viable aswell as being green (by that i mean; 1 is it cheaper or the same price as competition, 2 is it better than the competition in all or most aspects, 3 can you actually make it)this documentary shows that it is also not in a succesful market's intrest to let better technology succeed. While the case of General motors and the EV1 is an extreme example of a company 'cannabalising its own product' we see endless examples of companies in all industries actively restraining or witholding new technologies, if only so they can seem to supercede their own products once they have reached a market maturity, take televisions for example there were first flat screen, then plasma, LCD, now 3D. Each of these technologies came out after the previous had had say 3 years to build sales, then a new product is rolled out to take its place making your new plasma seem old and redundant.

So as a designer all you can do is try to keep driving good ideas forward and ensure diligantly that you provide clients/companies with not only more sustainable products but, cheaper, more marketable, better products. You can't beat them so join them (but keep your ideals). We have to be realistic/perhaps even pesimistic in our perception of why things will be made no matter how good the idea. You need to get companies more money than the had or at least convince them of that. Because yes they should have a moral compass and take responsibility for their actions but take a look around its the sneaky who succeed and the ones who staunchly proclaim morality are left to themselves or deemed crazy, I say be sneaky,play the game and design exceptional products so that money hungry companies can't afford not to go green.

photos of 1:1 scale model

reflection

This assignment was another challenge, designing a product service system was harder than just a product because in my opinion (at least with our garden) i think the best pss would eliminate the need for designing a new product. I think using a combination of existing parts would have been a lot more sensible but of course Industrial Design means we must design a poduct. I also struggled with the whole notion of being sustainable because real sustainability comes from a societal change and i couldn't help but feel some of the feedback comments throughout the day were flawed. If we must design a product then you must realise that Industrial design can only be so sustainable/ ecofriendly, an honest opinion would say that you should actually recycle or resuse existing things but of course we should have used more recycled materials. the whole thing was a good experience overall but again if we were designing a pss then we should have been trying to be truly sustainable and design a service system without the need for a P(roduct).

Our system uses hooked pots that could hang on our mounting panel or balconies and i think it turned out well but we'll wait and see. I thought some of the tools for behaviour change were useful but the MEPSS i thought was a redundant task that doesn't truly have an impact just an interesting way to graph.

Community Garden Product Service System

Ryan's thermal blanket

Julia's life ring