Image source: www.mobilemonday.nl
Yesterday evening, I was fortunate enough to have gone to the D&AD Lecture North event, as lectured by "Futurist" and Editor of Wired magazine, Ben Hammersley, after being directed to the tickets by design tutor, Amber.
Starting at 6.30- 9.00, the lecture was an insightful and inspirational talk about our responsibilities in terms of design, and how we need to evaluate our use and purpose for digital technology. Below, a few notes taken from the talk.
NOTES
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- Ben Hammersley, Editor at Wired Magazine
- Prime Minister's Ambassador at Tech City
- Futurist- "Makes stuff up for a living"
- Consult, Write/Publishing for the Government
- The future is already here- it just isn't easily distributed.
- You need to understand the forces that have effected us as people in technology.
- Moors Law- Microprocessor designer, 1958- designed microchips. Cost of microchip doubled every 12-18 months, this remained the case for years. For the same cost, computers get twice as powerful every year.
- Technology enchances so much that it becomes inexpensive, and easily accesible.
- Fundamental shift in the way that technology develops... "You don't use a horse to design a faster horse".
- Doubling of power every year.
- If it can be turned into a formula, it will be- if you can be replaced by a computer, you will be. ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE is more efficient, easier, cheaper. If you can be replaced by a programme, you will be.
- The week that Kodak was declared bankrupt was the week that Instagram was estimated at 1 billion... this is not a coincidence. Technologies are easily replaced. Moors Law pushes society on.
- Metcalfe's Law- Every additional person who joins a network effectively doubles the value of a network.
- Social constructs of the past 10 years- Structure of Western society- Hierarchy- Network.
- Two social tech groups, pre 1989, and post 1989... Cold War, No Internet, Nato, USSR/Hierarchy.
- 1989, Cold War finishes- first web server turns on. Geo politics have changed- no enemies.
- Social networking and internet allows you to share with everyone, the lines of hierarchy start to fall away.
- Two completely separate mindsets.
- The Daily Mail, for instance, isn't wrong, it's just "on a completely different planet".
- To a pre- 1989 person, the sense we develop from the need to check technology is bizarre. "Phantom vibrations".
- Quiet and noisy technologies.
- "Mentally noisy"- curiosity, a need to check messages.
- Fundamenta, physical closeness- "at one with your phone like no other technology".
- This becomes a habit, part of your mind.
- We no longer have to remember facts, but merely pathways- IMDB.
- Every new technology has backlash.
- Not having signal is the modern equivalent of being drunk.
- As designers, we have to start looking at how we pay attention to digital tools- or they will change us in ways we don't necessarily want to be changed.
- We're not shaping the internet- it's shaping us.
- We need to design it to shape it the way it shapes us.
- "Smart cities"- HP, Fujitsu, etc- Combination of laws- taking sensors to gather data and publish data (infographics) as an app, people can use that data to optimise their lives. Can see things moving in real time, making life better for everyone- everyone lives are optimised by the Smart Cities technology.
- Whatever the community wants to optimise is cultured by the ideology of the people that make it- fundamentally political (and ideological).
- What we design has to truly represent the values of whom we are designing for. These devices become part of the way you live your life- be careful how you change the way people live.
- Become aware and mindful. As a country, we have to discuss what we're making, and how it effects the way in which we live.
- We need to start looking for displaying text and information which isn't interruptive. Distracted every 15 minutes- distracted from work by technology. If you get interrupted, it takes around 15 minutes to get back into work- CONSTANTLY CONFUSED.
- Email and open plan offices are killing creativity. TOO MANY DISTRACTIONS... Can be damaging for the design process.
- We have to learn about the application of these communications and which are most appropriate for certain situations.
- Etiquette doesn't evolve at the same time as technology- consider the tech for the person and the situation.
- Simple > Complex > Simple... Designers all want allotments (ish)... Hype cycle... Tastes in technology, wanting something that is tactile and "real".
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