Ged Carroll

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  • Google Music China

    I spent some time in Shenzhen and tried the Google Music China service. It was unlike anything else I have seen and was designed especially for consumers in mainland China.

    Google Music China

    Google Music China is impressive in terms of the size of its catalogue and ease-of-use. You have a mix of western artists and Chinese artists on the service. There didn’t seem to be a lot of censorship going on. You could download the full expletive riven Eminem experience. The music is downloaded into your computer as MP3 files and doesn’t have any DRM on it. I put it into my iTunes library. The service is powered by a Chinese partner for Google, which becomes apparent when you look at the URL on the page for an individual track.

    There didn’t seem to be a restriction on the amount of music that you could download. I got a mix of material from jazz to techno including a number of albums by The Jazz Messengers.

    Much of the music seems to have been licensed through the US right holders of the music; such as this Astralwerks license for a Fat Boy Slim track below.

    The service is free, in that I didn’t have to pay per track, or pay a subscription. Instead the music is ad funded with display ads as shown below.

    Google Music banner ad

    I do wonder what the click through rates are on the adverts that periodically get vended on the service?  More China-related content here.

  • Stussy Bearbrick

    Shawn Stussy just threw down on a Stussy Bearbrick. Admitted the Stussy Bearbrick looks pretty lame. Imagine if you set up your own company and you named after yourself because you signed all your work. Over time your signature became the most valuable design asset of the company. Over time you decide that you want to take some of your hard earned cash, take time out and do the stuff that you actually enjoy. You leave your business, having been bought out.

    However, you then have the problem of seeing your name plastered over absolute tat.

    taking your name in vain

    Welcome to Shawn Stussy’s world. They guy invented streetwear as we know it. He mixed American classics like the oxford cotton button down, denim and t-shirts together. On top of that he added American workwear beloved of surfers.  Shawn also got Japan and what they could bring to the table back when everyone else was just thinking about Sony.

    And then the copy and paste aspects of punk culture. There is a reason why Stussy designs come off like old school fanzines. They both come from a common cultural route. The backward SS was a homage to Chanel. The repeating pattern a nod to the luxury brands from Gucci and Louis Vuitton to MCM.

    Supreme, Palace, Neighborhood, Off-White all are following in his footsteps.

    I am a big Stussy fan and it is a rare season where I don’t buy something from their collection. It is hard to keep banging out new streetwear, season after season, even when you’re delving into an archive like Stussy has.  But some of the stuff ends up being pretty ropey and I sympathise with Shawn Stussy’s predicament. Which is why I look forward to seeing what his long-awaited new venture S-Double Studios will come out of the trap with. More on luxury here.

  • Bomb, Book and Compass: Joseph Needham and The Great Secret of China by Simon Winchester

    Bomb, Book and Compass

    Simon Winchester’s Bomb, Book and Compass delves into the history of science and innovation. The old adage of the victor writing history applies not only to wars but also the history of innovation and science. Everything you were taught in school about the history of science is likely to be wrong. It usually having a European focus; from the Greeks and Romans to the Italian-based renaissance via the wisdom preserved within the monasteries of Europe during the dark and early medieval ages.

    Book, the book and the compass

    The Chinese, in comparison, were seen as inscrutable and cunning rather like the Fu Manchu character of Sax Rohmer’s novels but less sophisticated than their European counterparts. This diacotomy helped assuage the consciences of empire-builders who had designs on the riches of the Chinese market, from bringing away silk and porcelain to finding a ready market for Indian-grown opium and laying the foundations for the modern-day heroin trade.

    Up until the European’s arrived China was the world’s largest manufacturer, counting for about 30 per cent of the economic activity by value in the world. This time of weakness is what the Chinese refer to as the century of shame, which was finally laid to rest when they claimed back Macau in 1999.

    Joseph Needham

    Bomb, Book & Compass is the story of Cambridge biochemistry professor Joseph Needham and his quest to find the real truth behind the history of science and China’s role within it, he did this during the chaos of the second world war, when he had the chance to get at the documentary evidence.

    He then spent the rest of his life curating and writing material for a vast series of books Science and Civilisation in China. These books were not only a historical record that put China closer to the centre stage position that they deserved in science, but also put the country on a more even standing with the ‘civilised world’ restoring or enhancing its reputation. In some respects Needham’s work could be considered to be the largest unpaid (in that China didn’t pay for it) corporate reputation campaign in the annals of public relations.

    Bomb, Book & Compass is a compelling read, by turns adventure, travelogue and political intrigue. I would recommend it, if nothing else for the very human portrait it paints of Joseph Needham as a man of great intellect and passion, but also a man with some very human failings. More book reviews here.

  • Heirloom Design

    Saul Griffith in a presentation he gave as part of the Long Now Foundation talked about the environmental impact of our stuff. The possessions that we own make up about a quarter of our lifetime carbon footprint. The way to reduce this is to have stuff that lasts longer, and that we want to keep longer. From this came the idea of heirloom design.

    IMGP0699.JPG

    It isn’t new, Sotherby’s and Christies have made very good businesses selling old stuff, Patek Phillipe talks in advertisements as the watch-owner not actually being the owner but the custodian to pass the timepiece on to the next generation and Rolex has an excellent reputation for taking lifelong care of watches it sells.

    1.JPG

    So its a new framing of an old idea, it has been adopted by some eco-conscious businesses such as Howie’s Hand-Me-Down range: a set of bags and a jacket that are so well made and so durable that you want to keep them for their natural life. The examples that are given are a Montblanc pen and a Rolex watch; both of which require considerable upfront investment as well.

    Dieter Rams

    However design also has a case to play in this: look at the prices on eBay for a genuine Charles Eames recliner, or any of Braun’s consumer electronics offerings; classic cars fetch a far higher premium than their newer, more sophisticated cousins because of their styling.

    A second factor comes into heirloom design: design for servicing. Pretty much every part on my Technics turntables are replaceable, contrast this with the Denon DVD player I had which I had spent similar money on, yet the manufacturers couldn’t repair as they didn’t have the parts; or my Nokia E90 communicator which would have cost more to repair than two new Nokia E-series phones. Nokia’s Vertu phone range with their over-engineered cases and dealer-replaceable future proof guts may be the way forward.

    The personally most ironic thing for me is that my Dad has bemoaned the quality with which things have been made for the past 30 years and is a staunch believer in progress through industry may finally have something to agree with the environmentalists on.

    A number of brands practice heirloom design already but don’t shout about it:

    Suggestions from a quick poll I did on Twitter included

    • Bialetti with their user serviceable coffee pots
    • Caterpillar
    • Timberland
    • BMW – they certainly have the service network and they have built up a reputation for having a good build quality
    • Kenwood – the shortwave radio and communications manufacturers
    • TAG (presume they meant TAG Heuer) – not too sure that I would agree with this one, or some others suggested such as Apple, Panasonic and Sony; at least in their consumer goods especially with Panasonic doing away with the 1200 series of turntables
    • DEWALT
    • Dyson
    • Le Creuset
    • Mag Instrument Inc. (Maglite torches)
    • The North Face
    • Stanley Hand Tools
    • Aga
    • Herman Miller – particularly the Aeron chair
    • Cyrus Audio
    • Stokke prams, car seats and other stuff for early childhood
    • Tumi luggage

    Kudos in no particular order to Ruby Quince, Ana Mangahas, Becky McMichael, Stephen Holmes, Tom Wynne-Morgan, Robin Clark and Abigail Harrison for their heirloom design suggestions.

    Which brands do you think represent great heirloom design? Feel free to leave a comment. More design related posts here.

  • Black precious resin & Montblanc

    I had a short haul flight and went over the duty free catalogue on Swiss Airlines. This section on Montblanc pens stuck out at me because of its wording. Each pen was described as being made of ‘black precious resin’. Click on the image if you want to see a larger version.

    Precious Resin Montblanc spiel

    So what does black precious resin actually mean? One would presume some form of black shiny plastic, which doesn’t seem quite so precious. Now the use of plastic isn’t a bad thing in pen manufacture. For instance fellow German writing instrument manufacturers Pelikan and Kaweco both make writing instruments out of plastic, but they also don’t charge over 300 pounds for a ballpoint pen.

    Plastic feels thoroughly modern. It defined the post-war world and accelerated further with globalisation. Black precious resin isn’t particularly rare in itself like ebony wood or precious metals. 

    What the black precious resin explanation misses is the real elements at the heart of Montblanc’s authenticity:

    • History: Montblanc is actually over a century old as a firm
    • Country brand: It’s pens are still made in Germany, so it can take advantage of the German country brand: precision manufacturing excellence and craftsmanship
    • Craftsmanship: making a pen write smoothly is an art, too much ink and you will get splodges. A badly designed nib or ballpoint mechanism will scratch the paper, deliver the ink unevenly and even stain the writer
    • Design: One of the reasons why Montblanc managed to upset A.T. Cross in the market for luxury pens because their pen design feels much better in the hand because of its fuller barrel size

    But none of these factors are reflected in the description of the Montblanc pens featured in the duty-free catalogue, instead we get smoke-and-mirrors which engenders distrust and makes for an authenticity FAIL.