Revs at Stanford
We are less than a week away now from the launch of a major new program at Stanford devoted to the history of automobile design, and a whole lot more. I am heading the faculty effort with Cliff Nass and Chris Gerdes. Here is a press report from Andrew Myers in Stanford Engineering. Anyone who [...]
Optimism and transformative design
Transformative Design, my class about design thinking that makes a real difference, run with Meghann (Dryer of IDEO) and Bernie (Roth of Stanford Engineering), opens again soon in the d.school. I got thinking seriously about its themes this weekend at a fund-raising event organized by Castilleja School, where Helen teaches and Molly learns, on the [...]
Bentley B35AE
Fuel cap. Bentley B35AE, built at the Rolls Royce Derby works in 1933. Raced by Eddie Ramsden Hall in the 1930s and then again at LeMans in 1950. Now part of the Collier Collection in Naples, Florida. My lab is working towards the launch of a new initiative at Stanford, the Revs Program, which will [...]
things – beyond objects
Two new books add depth to my long-running ruminations on the character of things. Nonobject, by Branko Lukic and Barry Katz, was published this week by MIT Press [Link] It’s a rather beautiful book about Branko’s design work. Barry (and Bill Moggridge in his foreword) provide fascinating commentary. The nonobject is inbetween, relational, interstitial, combinatory. [...]
dot com material culture
Start-up company Box dot Net – preparing for its move to new offices. I usually prefer the term “design studies” over “material culture studies” – the term typically used in cultural anthropology for a focus upon humanity’s material accoutrement. I don’t think the distinction between material and immaterial or intangible is always that useful (isn’t [...]
Steampunk in Oakland
Jack London Square, Oakland. Waterfront/docklands development. Steam punk bar furniture in The Chop Bar [Link] Last week the BBC reported a new fund raising campaign to rebuild Babbage’s Analytical Engine – his steam powered programmable computer the size of a house – [BBC Link] – Wikipedia on Babbage – [Link] Model of the never-built Analytical [...]
Automotive futures – featured on iTunes
Leading Matters – Download free content from Stanford on iTunes. The iTunes Facebook page is today featuring the event hosted by Stanford’s “Leading Matters” last May when we debated the future (and past) of automobility – see my blog entry here – [Link] Here is what Apple says (on its wall at the moment – [...]
Design, RES and RESPUBLICA
In Tokyo for EPIC – Ethnographic Praxis in Industry Conference. 6th edition. [Link] Some summary points from my keynote. How could I not respond to Kenya Hara’s wonderful opening keynote and his emphasis on the dialectic of making and its deep connection with human being? [Link] The range of research techniques and methods that I [...]
ethnography in industry – an agenda
In Tokyo for EPIC – Ethnographic Praxis in Industry Conference. 6th edition. [Link] I listened to all the talks and went to as many of the workshops and exhibitions as I could. Here are the items on the agenda: context: the shift from a focus on product development to services, experiences, platforms how ethnography can [...]
d.ethnography
In Tokyo for EPIC – Ethnographic Praxis in Industry Conference. 6th edition. [Link] Wonderful comment this morning from Victoria Bellotti (PARC) – that archaeology is dethnography Absolutely – (d)ethnography – d.ethnography – the intermingling of dreams and mortality, utopia and the realities of material constraints, the angel of death whispering in the ear of aspiration. [...]
Kenya Hara: emptiness
In Tokyo for EPIC – Ethnographic Praxis in Industry Conference. 6th edition. [Link] Kenya Hara, Art Director of Muji, has opened the conference with a beautiful meditation on emptiness – “ku”. For me, Kenya was talking about human being and how it implicates the world of things. This Henckels knife fits the hand of the [...]
EPIC 2010
In Tokyo for EPIC – Ethnographic Praxis in Industry Conference. 6th edition. [Link] How to improve the design of things – take people seriously – be human-centered look beyond the artifact – design systems, scenarios, stories, experiences, interactions don’t assume the designer knows it all – find out, pursue research and conduct fieldwork Ethnography, anthropological [...]
does innovation have a method?
The Hamaguchi Protocols I am in Tokyo University at the iSchool [Link], a new research and teaching initiative focused on creativity/innovation and human centered design. Visionary leadership provided by Hiroshi Tamura and Hideyuki Horii. I am here as part of a symposium with Hideshi Hamaguchi, Director of Strategy at Ziba Design. The topic – does [...]
radical innovation – the DARPA experience
I reported the talk about his robotic cars given a couple of weeks ago by Stanford’s Sebastian Thrun – [Link]. “Stanley” and “Junior” had competed and won two DARPA Challenges to build autonomous vehicles – cars capable of driving themselves in complex real-world environments. (See Stanford Racing and Sebastian’s web pages – also DARPA’s own [...]
Automotive futures
This weekend Stanford “Leading Matters” ran one of its alumni events in Santa Clara. Members of CARS (Center for Automotive Research at Stanford), now including myself, talked about the past, present, and future of auto-mobility. Great presentations came from Sebastian Thrun (robotic cars and Google), Chris Gerdes (driving at the limits – he brought his [...]
human centered design – the "T" character
This post is in a series of commentaries on a class running at Stanford, Winter Quarter 2010 – “Transformative Design” ENGR 231 – [Link] Real world problems don’t fit into neat disciplinary categories. We hear much about the importance of interdisciplinary or even transdisciplinary work. (Multidisciplinary implies keeping the disciplinary distinctions we need to bridge?) [...]
design – cultural literacy
This post is in a series of commentaries on a class running at Stanford, Winter Quarter 2010 – “Transformative Design” ENGR 231 – [Link] This evening – a group of friends and colleagues discussing education and schooling with Tony Wagner. Our warm and welcoming hosts were Joan Lonergan and John Merrow at Castilleja School. Topics: [...]
Archaeological project design
Encountering the work of FARO in Flanders (see blog entry – [Link]) prompted me to think about our own project in the Roman borders at the Roman town of Binchester – VINOVIVM.org – and particularly in relation to the Council of Europe’s Faro Convention [Link] I talked about the implementation of broad principles and policies [...]
Steampunk at Oxford
What if the Victorians (with their steam engine industrial aesthetic) had had access to digital technologies? What if a Victorian design sensibility had not been eclipsed by modernism and its minimalist aesthetic? What if technologies such as dirigibles, analog computers, or digital mechanical computers (such as Charles Babbage’s Analytical engine) were still with us? Steam-powered [...]
design – narrative
This post is in a series of commentaries on a class running at Stanford, Winter Quarter 2010 – “Transformative Design” ENGR 231 – [Link] The other day I was reflecting upon storytelling in connection with the pragmatics of design, seeing both as performative – located, time-based, adaptive – [Link] (see also on Odysseus and Hermes [...]
anthropometrics – the Museo Cesare Lombroso
This post is in a series of commentaries on a class running at Stanford, Winter Quarter 2010 – “Transformative Design” ENGR 231 – [Link] Anthropometrics – part of human factors design. Its roots lie in nineteenth century anthropological science, and forensics. Measuring the distances between eyebrows for evidence of criminality, correlating shapes of skulls with [...]
archaeology – design
This post is in a series of commentaries on a class running at Stanford, Winter Quarter 2010 – “Transformative Design” ENGR 231 – [Link] Everyday detritus – Roman – the indeterminate quotidian Today I ran a session about archaeology and design. (A tighter focus than my recent case for pragmatology and pragmatogony – [Link]) I [...]
fields not objects
This post is in a series of commentaries on a class running at Stanford, Winter Quarter 2010 – “Transformative Design” ENGR 231 – [Link] Pragmatology [Link] – the (non-existent) discipline of things – doesn’t deal in objects. Things are not discrete, but nodes, gatherings of otherwise distributed flows, relations – fields of connection, not objects [...]
archaeology > design
This post is in a series of commentaries on a class running at Stanford, Winter Quarter 2010 – “Transformative Design” ENGR 231 – [Link] Pragmatology and Pragmatogony I like to say that archaeologists deal in the history of people’s relationships with stuff, with things. And this covers a lot – basically 150,000 years of human [...]