Ged Carroll

Category: design | 設計 | 예술과 디자인 | デザイン

Design was something that was important to me from the start of this blog, over different incarnations of the blog, I featured interesting design related news. Design is defined as a plan or drawing produced to show the look and function or workings of a building, garment, interfaces or other object before it is made.

But none of the definition really talks about what design really is in the way that Dieter Rams principles of good design do. His principles are:

  1. It is innovative
  2. It makes a product useful
  3. It is aesthetic
  4. It makes a product understandable
  5. It is unobtrusive
  6. It is honest
  7. It is long-lasting
  8. It is thorough down to the last detail
  9. It is environmentally-friendly – it can and must maintain its contribution towards protecting and sustaining the environment.
  10. It is as little design as possible

Bitcoin isn’t long lasting as a network, which is why people found the need to fork the blockchain and build other cryptocurrencies.

Bitcoin uses 91 terawatts of energy annually or about the entire energy consumption of Finland.

The Bitcoin network relies on thousands of miners running energy intensive machines 24/7 to verify and add transactions to the blockchain. This system is known as “proof-of-work.” Bitcoin’s energy usage depends on how many miners are operating on its network at any given time. – So Bitcoin is environmentally unfriendly by design.

On the other hand, Apple products, which are often claimed to be also influenced by Dieter Rams also fail his principles. They aren’t necessarily environmentally friendly as some like AirPods are impossible to repair or recycle.

  • Index funds + more things

    Index funds may be conspiring against the very same investors who fund them | Quartz – interesting analysis on index funds, surely this would also be the issue with ‘shareholder value’ in general?

    Oracle’s cloud sales – Business Insider – short term numbers for long term losses

    Shanghai Street View: Wealth Explosion – high street wealth management products, explains a lot. This could all go wrong and explains China’s regulations against shadow banking. The problem is a lack of supply for Chinese consumers to invest in. Savings accounts give poor returns, the stare market is way oversubscribed

    Exclusive: Amazon planning drive-up grocery stores with first coming to Sunnyvale — sources – Silicon Valley Business Journal – it feels like a retrogressive move to me. I think of drive-thrus as being representative of 20th century America. The drive-in cinema, the drive-thru/drive-in fast food restaurant a la McDonalds or American Graffiti

    What Really Killed Homejoy? It Couldn’t Hold On To Its Customers | Forbes – which sounds very dot com in its nature

    Apple Watch to Be Sold at Best Buy – Digits – WSJ – interesting how this doesn’t fit with their initial luxury positioning

    Nike, Apple agree to $2.4M settlement in suit over false FuelBand claims, Apple to pay nothing – I guess tis scuppers Nike’s wearable ambitions and possibly Fuel being part of a wearable eco-system. More related posts here.

    If what you say is useful, people will pass it on | SiliconAngle – if they see it at the right time…

    Official Google Webmaster Central Blog: Update on the Autocomplete API | Google Webmaster Central Blog – basically it was a drain on resources that didn’t provide Google with useful data

    Firefox is getting audio indicators to show noisy tabs, and will let you mute them | VentureBeat | Dev | by Emil Protalinski – brilliant for them auto playing videos in my RSS feeds

  • Hacknet + more things

    Hacknet

    Some Australian developers have made an immersive game about hacking that will be distributed on Steam when released. It’s called Hacknet and here’s the trailer.

    Roger Linn

    Great panel discussion with three great designers of electronic music instruments: Roger Linn (LinnDrum, Linn 9000, Akai MPC originator), Dave Smith (Prophet 5, MIDI inventor) and Tom Oberheim (Oberheim Voice synthesisers). The LinnDrum

    The Latin Rascals

    Great early mix from The Latin Rascals who were influential remixers, influential producers of freestyle tracks and makers of epic tape edits back in the mid-1980s. The Latin Rascals did amazing remix work, even for the likes of Bruce Springsteen, the Force MDs, the Pet Shop Boys and Duran Duran. They influenced and eventually worked with Arthur Baker and Civilles and Cole. One of the Rascals Tony Moran still produces and DJs.


    Canadian Caper

    Amazing psychadelic artwork drawn by Jack Kirby, that was used to sell in Argo to the Iranians and everyone else for that manner. Argo was a science fiction film project that the CIA used as a cover in order to get diplomatic staff out of Iran during the revolution. Kirby’s drawings were supposed to be concept art and the escapees were pretending to be location scouts. This operation went to be known as the Canadian Caper. It was adapted into a film featuring Ben Affleck called Argo. The original space opera envisioned by Jack Kirby never got beyond the artwork that I have linked to. You can read more about the Canadian Caper as the operation has since been called here.

    Syd Mead inspired animation

    Amazing Mobius / Syd Mead inspired animated video. More design related content. The vivid world that the animator creates is nothing short of stunning. The use of flat colour gives a kind of ‘anti-anime’ feel to the video. Instead it feels like I am looking at a Mobius graphic novel and hallucinating the movement on the page.