Transmission #36: Watch Interiors, iPod Rivals, the Case for Fossil Fuels, and Spite Buildings.
Design, ideas and other flotsam.
Hello. Welcome.
This is Transmissions by me, Marty Brown.
Apologies for the break in transmission, it’s been a busy few weeks. I’ve taken on a new role as Design Director at the incredible Culture Amp and so haven’t had the chance to sit down and tend to the incoming news.
What is Transmissions? It’s an ongoing, (usually) fortnightly newsletter that collates some of the more interesting stories, links, quotes and other curios that float my way.
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Design
Mechanical Watch
Bartosz Ciechanowski
This is just so fantastic. All engineering textbooks should be like this. Bartosz Ciechanowski is a game designer based in Poland, who in his spare time creates these wonderfully informative visual and interactive explanations of how complex systems work. In the past he’s looked at GPS, cameras and lenses and internal combustion engines, but this time, Ciechanowski takes us on a journey inside a mechanical watch, and meticulously walks us through, piece by piece, how it works.
On Design Thinking
Nick Foster, Medium
Design Thinking™️ gets another drubbing, this time courtesy of Nick Foster, Head of Design at Google X. The main criticism here is that Design Thinking™️ oversimplifies actual design, leaving a veneer of solutionism that is both unhelpful in addressing the challenge at hand, and ultimately pushes the whole field of design in an unhelpful direction.
Design Thinking offers up such a neatly packaged, curriculum-friendly topic, that it has quickly spread through universities, colleges, business training institutes, schools and even the Girl Scouts. As a result, the approach is increasingly practiced (and taught) by people with no formal Design experience, driving a simplistic attitude to Design, and serving to further obfuscate the complexities and detail required in any ‘real’ Design work.
…
Design Thinking didn’t change business at all, rather it changed Design into business, adopting its language, priorities and techniques. It sold out Design in an attempt to impress those in power, and in so doing lost its heart.
There are some reasonable critiques here, but also many, many straw men. Foster has issues with what in many cases amounts to simply bad execution of useful design thinking techniques. When Foster attacks some of the more reductive claims made by those shilling design thinking, he is confusing the way that Design Thinking can be sold with the way that it is usually practised. Yes, design thinking neatly cuts projects into finite stages and deadlines, but I’ve almost never seen an actual project run like that. It’s always messy. As it should be.
From my vantage point, what design thinking offered (offers?) was never a perfect solution, but rather a bridge into a design-oriented perspective for companies for whom innovation was stagnant and new ideas were rare. It helped open the door for conversations about experimentation, trial and error, tangibility, a focus on customer needs, and greater cross-company communication and collaboration. I’ve seen these methods awaken very conservative and very operationally-focused companies to the utility of design-oriented methods. It’s helped these companies go on to establish whole design departments, whose mission it is to go beyond the introductory (and yes, sometimes reductive) methods of design thinking, into the kind of design that Foster clearly values as a more ‘pure’ form of design.
Not every company can be Google. For those that aren’t, Design Thinking may not be a panacea, but it can be a step in the right direction.
Shuffled by the iPod
Ernie Smith, Tedium
Apple has decided to retire the iPod. As its reign comes to an end, Tedium explores the many, many competitors to the digital music throne that Apple’s device vanquished. Remember the Zune? Well what about about the Archos Jukebox Series? The Diamond Rio?
Ideas
The Modern World Can't Exist Without These Four Ingredients. They All Require Fossil Fuels
Vaclav Smil, Time
A sobering extract from ‘Bill Gates’ Favorite Author’ Vaclav Smil’s book, How the World Really Works. Essentially, says Smil, we are destined to continue to rely on fossil fuels for the foreseeable future because they are so intrinsic to the creation of four materials we cannot imagine 21st century life without: cement, steel, plastic and ammonia (used in the making of fertiliser). Sigh.
Quote of the Week
We went upstairs. Under low pipes and cobwebs were many old sofas, and two plastic tubs with an alligator in each. “These were a gift to Gavin, from this guy, before he went to prison,” Tim said. I asked what was going to happen when they outgrew the tubs. He pointed to a picket coop of unsound construction.
– Kent Russell, Mithradites of Fond du Lac, Believer Magazine
Chart of the Week
Other
🏡 Wonderfully petty: spite buildings. Constructions made purely to annoy others. Link
🇵🇱🇺🇸 There is a Polish LARP group that roleplays as contemporary Americans. Link
🎮 Japanese crew making real-life recreations of video game scenes. Uncanny. Link
See you next fortnight!