iasdr07 [4/4]
..the beginning of the end.
Today’s keynote speaker was Steven Kyffin, from Phililps Design.
His main point was that philips design wants to be connected with the research community.
*that’s why his talk was titled “Creative Consortium“.
He introduced us the TO:DO:SO (technology objectives : design objectives : strategy objectives) approach used in Philip’s visionary projects through the (y2006) “lifestyle home” project. scenario 01 / scenario 02 / scenario 03
The point of this approach is that they involved all the research departments in Philips to conduct this project, and besides the cool concepts and personas they developed, the results remained unused by Philips’s business units 
The reason is that the ideas generated were too big, and nobody knew how to start to implement them! And this generated so much frustration in both ends (design/business) that Philips Design decided to change its whole approach.
Their clients want to know it all, (of course) but in small digestive pieces…
So, they started the i-engine (idea engine). Aiming to do smaller things, and use the know-how they generate to develop ideas and pack them in a “business” way, so their clients can “buy it or not”.
So, instead of selling “the time to generate ideas”, they are selling the idea itself.
They jumped from solving problems asked by the clients, to giving solutions proactivelly.
Now they are working on Probes and media mediators.
Next>
Later on I snipped in to 3 sessions talking about the role of “design support organizations“… nothing new here. An Australian guy started saying that Australia does not really need product design because they don’t produce things, but they need communication design to help sell the imported goods…. (easy approach I think). Another guy presented a comparative study of design promotion organizations between Japan, Korea, Germany and UK. The insight is that even if most of those organizations are government-related, there’s still room for private organizations like the Design Center of Toyama and the Design Center Stuttgart that they are making money while promoting design. Cool!
Next>
ecoDesign and Sustainability
Unfortunately, two speakers didn’t show up :(, they were supposed to talk about “A problematic Approach of the Science of Sustainable Design” and “Glocal Product Design”… really a pity.
Who showed up, but virtually, was Marc Richardson from Monash University.
He talked about “Re-Design: Design for reassembly“, as part of the Veil project being done at the Eco Innovation Lab.
His main point is that a new profession could arise called “re-designer” whose paractice would be to design products with alternative life components to be assembled locally… (read more here)…
Design products with long time components
and short time recycling
this means: make products that don’t last too much (like the ipod), but make them with components that can be re-used in another cycle of production or even in another products.
He used Xerox and Freitag to exemplify re-design….
I wonder if Isn’t there any other product / company to talk about????
Almost all the eco-talks use the same examples!, I’m tired of hearing the same.
*I highlight the fact that he made the presentation via webcam, (to reduce his carbon-footprint he said)… This situation added a layer of weirdness to the session, specially when an anthropologist from the public wanted to ask him a question regarding the “loss of personal interaction when designing through internet”, and the speaker could not listen her clearly… so she had to lean towards the laptop and speak her question next to the mic, and the presenter was looking her through the screen… it really reminded me to the Max Headroom show
The next presentation was made by a Taiwanese guy who spent 1 year researching “the sustainable value of urban design” to came up with the conclusion that rich people don’t care about energy saving because they can pay for it…. [wtf! nothing surprises me at this point…]
Another eco-sustainability talk was made by a Korean Phd student under the title of “A Study on the Guideline for Analyzing Eco Design Value System and Establishing Product Design Strategy”. Pretty interesting but too academic for my taste, I can’t visualize a busy practitioning designer dealing with such theoretical unpractical information in his/her daily working projects.
from 3Rs : Reduce, Reuse , Recycle
to 4 Ls: Low(impact), Less(resources), Long(lifespan), Last(shared)
The day ends here, if you want more,
wait 2 years and head to Seul for the iasdr2009
