[p2p-research] Fwd: VW's open and transparent Factory in dresden - Germany

Sat Oct 10 19:15:11 CEST 2009

see
http://blog.p2pfoundation.net/the-shift-from-human-centered-to-resource-centered-design/2009/10/15

*The Shift from Human-Centered to Resource-Centered
Design*<http://blog.p2pfoundation.net/the-shift-from-human-centered-to-resource-centered-design/2009/10/15>
*[image: photo of Michel Bauwens]*

Michel Bauwens
15th October 2009

 The modern green response to these new environmental and social pressures
attempt to make things better through new or altered methods of consumption.
We’ve seen an explosion of everything from recycled paper to hybrid cars to
green cleaning products to energy efficient electronics as purported
solutions. This, unfortunately, is flawed logic — digging slower won’t stop
a hole from getting deeper. By placing human (market) needs at the center of
the equation, we inherently place our (human) needs above all others,
driving us further from sustainable practices by emphasizing aspects of
convenience and short-term gain over appropriate solutions that deliver
systemic long term prosperity.

>From a very interesting re-think of design
philoso<http://greenerdesign.com/blog/2009/09/30/how-design-post-consumption-economy?>phy
by *Eric Wilmot*:

*1. User-centered design is no longer appropriate*

*“In the spirit of progress and “triple bottom line” (i.e., economic,
social, environmental) development, how might we start to discover new
opportunities that generate wealth without destroying our planet? How might
we challenge our existing approach of framing problems to provide more
holistically responsible solutions that continue to drive economic growth?

To understand where we need to go, it’s important to understand how we got
here. Contemporary design and marketing practices have emphasized
“human-centeredness.” Human-centered has become synonymous with
“user-centered,” which historically relates to the designed interactions
between technology and humans. Microsoft Windows was a user-centered
solution to the then-classic DOS operating systems.

However, the current interpretation of human-centered has expanded to
indulge human desires at the expense of other equally critical
considerations. This is a dangerous interpretation that has become default
for many leading academic and professional creative practices. Don Norman
explains the main concern of such unquestioning adoption of human centered
approaches: “The focus upon individual people (or groups) might improve
things for them at the cost of making it worse for others.” *

*2. Calculating true cost*

*“How then, might we begin to start designing solutions that inherently meet
ecosystem needs first, while creatively and iteratively creating economic
value and stimulus to bring concepts to reality?

Hartmut Esslinger, the founder of frog design, has recently called for the
disclosure and integration of Ecological Load Factor (ELF) in pricing the
stuff we consume.

Load is a term for how much negative ecological impact is incurred by the
making, shipping, use, and disposal of a product or a service. His call is
not the first in this topic area.

This notion of true pricing is one such call made by pioneers like Paul
Hawken, Amory Lovins, Janine Benyus, Ray Anderson, William McDonough, and
the plethora of players in the current sustainable business movement who
continue to challenge and innovate ways of creating economic wealth while
simultaneously improving associated social and environmental conditions.

What is striking about these leaders is their ability to uniquely approach
problems in ways that break conventional human-first approaches. Maybe they
start with the target (zero-waste) and reverse engineer, or perhaps they
look to nature and biomimicry as inspiration for new ways to approach
chemistry. What is inspiring about these approaches is that they are slowly
becoming recognized as valid inspirational approaches to reframe the way we
look at the world around us, and design in a more balanced and benign
fashion.”*

On Sat, Oct 10, 2009 at 4:19 PM, Paul D. Fernhout <
pdfernhout at kurtz-fernhout.com> wrote:

> Michel-
>
> :-)
>
> Still, one fernhoutian is probably more than enough for any list. :-)
>
> We're probably better off if you remain the best bauwensian you can be. :-)
>
> Anyway, thanks to Dante for bringing the link to my attention; I posted it
> yesterday to the OM list as well. That is a beautiful factory, and a well
> made video that shows the potential of automation and better design to
> improve our lives (better design both of products and of production
> practices).
>
> And I expect those trends to continue, especially as they begin to capture
> direct attention at government levels, like for environmental reasons:
>  "Sustainable and Lifecycle Information-based Manufacturing"
>  http://www.mel.nist.gov/programs/slim.htm
> "The United States needs to prepare for a future where products are 100%
> recyclable, manufacturing itself has a zero net impact on the environment,
> and complete disassembly and disposal of a product at its end of life is
> routine."
>
> We're perhaps seeing a general consciousness raising about manufacturing,
> perhaps coming more from the environmentalism side than the abundance side.
>
> As Ryan posted a month or two ago, this is another robotics related link:
> "High-Speed Robot Hand Demonstrates Dexterity and Skillful Manipulation"
>
> http://www.hizook.com/blog/2009/08/03/high-speed-robot-hand-demonstrates-dexterity-and-skillful-manipulation
>
> A central issue of technology and society is that "technology is an
> amplifier". So, technology (even robots hands) at the very least allows
> fewer people to do more (even if we can quibble about whether you can ever
> remove the people from the loop entirely). With robot hands like that, you
> would think one person could supervise the robot hands and do ten times as
> much work as if they were doing the work themselves by hand. Or, the work
> might be ten times better in some other qualitative way (durability, or low
> defect rates, or a more functional design).
>
> So, one can ask, for how long will there still be people doing even skilled
> physical labor in that VW factory, given that technology in that Japanese
> lab? I'd say most of the people in the VW factory may soon be there just for
> show too (or security and safety) -- if they are not already. :-)
>
> A US workforce that was 90% agricultural 200 years ago went to 50%
> agricultural 100 years ago and then went to 2% agricultural today. That
> percentage is probably still falling (like from robot milkers), even as it
> maybe has gone too far, since a lot of people like to farm and want to farm
> and can't get the land, and smaller local organic farms are better for a
> variety of reasons (less environmental impact, lower transport costs, more
> security, more fun, more sociality, better jobs, kinder to any animals,
> etc.).
>
> A US workforce that was about 30% manufacturing fifty years ago has gone to
> 12% manufacturing today. Where is that trend going? Offshoring confuses this
> simple trend, but it can't explain it all. In another fifty years at that
> rate (or likely much sooner with 3D printing and similar things),
> manufacturing as well may be at 2%, same as agriculture, and personally, I
> think that would be a high estimate, where we count "design" as
> manufacturing. :-)
>
> Construction jobs may follow this trend too, as building techniques
> continue to get more automated, and as better tools let fewer humans do more
> with less. Marco Giustini posted this link to the OM list recently:
>  "3D printing buildings: interview with Enrico Dini of D_Shape "
>
> http://www.shapeways.com/blog/archives/217-3D-printing-buildings-interview-with-Enrico-Dini-of-D_Shape.html
>
> What happens if services overall in the USA follow this trend, too, driven
> by better computing and improving AI and robotics, broader internet access,
> improving speech recognition, better materials, better designs, and more of
> a DIY attitude?
>
> Perhaps they already are? As a historic example, film tinting in the 1920s
> through 1920s was an enormous service opportunity, until we got widespread
> use of color film.
>  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Film_tinting
> My parents had a black and white photo of them when they were newly married
> that had been tinted by hand.
>
> Telephone operators were also in big demand for decades for pushing plugs
> around until we got automated switching.
>
> Granted, up till now, there have been many replacement jobs to make up for
> innovation as demand has grow in other areas (and as schooling, prison, and
> war have removed people from the workforce).
>
> Sure, new jobs will come up that need doing, but how many? And how easily
> will they be automated?
> "[p2p-research] 60 jobs that will rock the future... (not)"
>
> http://listcultures.org/pipermail/p2presearch_listcultures.org/2009-August/004216.html
>
> The question revolves around if demand is limited, IMHO.
>
> Now, I feel demand is limited even with abundant resources (energy,
> materials) because healthy humans don't need too much stuff or too much
> external services (though they all need some, often less than they have
> right now). Also, for security reasons, if you can generate a lot of your
> needs locally, while still having access to a network for backup and
> diversity and exchange, you are more intrinsically secure.
>
> But, the implication of your alternative suggestion that resources are
> limited also implies demand is limited in the long term, but by "supply
> side" issues. :-) If we did not have enough energy and materials to make
> more stuff, then people would just have to learn to live with less, whatever
> they wanted. Clearly, people can live with less and still have happy lives,
> as our hunter/gatherer past shows.
>  http://www.primitivism.com/original-affluent.htm
>
> So, either way, demand will be limited for stuff, directly on the demand
> side (me) or indirectly from the supply side (you), even as our industrial
> productivity continually improves.
>
> Now that I think about it, if you were right about resource limitations
> (not that I agree), then one might expect permanent mass unemployment to
> accelerate even faster? :-)
>  http://www.marshallbrain.com/manna1.htm
>
> If we were content to live with the same quantity and quality for many
> products as we had in the 1950s in the USA (like, from limited demand for
> whatever reason), it is likely that hardly anyone would need to be working
> now at all. The issue is, how far can that trend to increasing quantity and
> quality of goods consumed continue? And, is it really healthy, anyway?
>
> From something written around the early 1990s, and productivity has maybe
> doubled again since then:
>  "The Overworked American"
>  http://users.ipfw.edu/ruflethe/american.html
> """
> Since 1948, productivity has failed to rise in only five years. The level
> of productivity of the U.S. worker has more than doubled.  In other words,
> we could now produce our 1948 standard of living (measured in terms of
> marketed goods and services) in less than half the time it took in that
> year. We actually could have chosen the four-hour day. Or a working year of
> six months. Or, every worker in the United Stares could now be taking every
> other year off from work-with pay.  Incredible as it may sound, this is just
> the simple arithmetic of productivity growth in operation. But between 1948
> and the present we did not use any of the productivity dividend to reduce
> hours. In the first two decades after 1948, productivity grew rapidly, at
> about 3 percent a year. During that period worktime did not fall
> appreciably. Annual hours per labor force participant fell only slightly.
> And on a per-capita (rather than a labor force) basis, they even rose a bit.
> Since then, productivity growth has been lower, but still positive,
> averaging just over 1 percent a year. Yet hours have risen steadily for two
> decades. In 1990, the average American owns and consumes more than twice as
> much as he or she did in 1948, but also has less free time. ...
>  Most economists regard the spending spree that Americans indulged in
> throughout the postwar decades as an unambiguous blessing, on the assumption
> that more is always better. And there is a certain sense in this approach.
> It's hard to imagine how having more of a desired good could make one worse
> off, especially since it is always possible to ignore the additional
> quantity. Relying on this little bit of common sense, economists have
> championed the closely related ideas that more goods yield more
> satisfaction, that desires are infinite, and that people act to satisfy
> those desires as fully as they can. Now anyone with just a little bit of
> psychological sophistication (to go with this little bit of common sense)
> can spot the flaw in the economist's argument. Once our basic human needs
> are taken care of, the effect of consumption on well-being gets tricky. What
> if our desires keep pace with our incomes, so that getting richer doesn't
> make us more satisfied? Or what if satisfaction depends, not on absolute
> levels of consumption, but on one's level relative to others (such as the
> Joneses). Then no matter how much you possess, you won't feel well off if
> Jones next door possesses more.How many of us thought the first car stereo a
> great luxury, and then, when it came time to buy a new car, considered it an
> absolute necessity? Or life before and after the microwave? And the fact
> that many of these commodities are bought on credit makes the cycle of
> income-consumption-more income-more consumption even more ominous. There is
> no doubt that some purchases permanently enhance our lives. But how much of
> what we consume merely keeps us moving on a stationary treadmill? The
> problem with the treadmill is not only that it is stationary, but also that
> we have to work long hours to stay on it. As I shall argue [later], the
> consumerist treadmill and long hour lobs have combined to form an insidious
> cycle of "work-and-spend." Employers ask for long hours. The pay creates a
> high level of consumption. People buy houses and go into debt; luxuries
> become necessities; Smiths keep up with Joneses. Each year, "progress," in
> the form of annual productivity in creases, is doled out by employers as
> extra income rather than as time off. Work-and-spend has become a powerful
> dynamic keeping us from a more relaxed and leisured way of life…
> """
>
> Another aspect of the credit part they reference, helping explaining the
> downturn (essentially that the productivity gains went to the upper class
> and then were loaned to the workers, until it all collapsed):
>  "Capitalism Hits the Fan"
>  http://www.capitalismhitsthefan.com/
>  "Neoliberalism As Water Balloon"
>  http://vimeo.com/6803752
>
> Anyway, by the above analogy, we should be able to all work two hour days
> if demand is limited back to 1950s levels. Or, we'll see 75% unemployment in
> the commercial sector. :-) Still, raising a family well, or being a good
> neighbor, or improving Wikipedia and writing free software and making free
> art and free music can no doubt take as much spare time as anyone has to put
> into it.
>  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Professional_amateurs
>
> The only worry is that our dominant social ideology is not p2p-ready. :-)
>
> --Paul Fernhout
> http://www.pdfernhout.net/
>
> Michel Bauwens wrote:
>
>> impressive ... almost became a  fernhoutian ...
>>
>> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
>> From: Dante-Gabryell Monson <dante.monson at gmail.com>
>> Date: Sat, Oct 10, 2009 at 12:22 AM
>> Subject: VW Factory - Germany
>> To: "Paul D. Fernhout" <pdfernhout at kurtz-fernhout.com>, Nathan Cravens <
>> knuggy at gmail.com>, Michel Bauwens <michelsub2004 at gmail.com>
>>
>>
>> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nd5WGLWNllA
>>
>
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>
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>

-- 
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