Insights 12.27

Design:

• Notable logo / brand moves in 2016. Some feel trivial: Netflix goes for a folded look, Instagram absorbed some net art visuals, Mastercard went flat, Kodak went retro. Others are aesthetic harbingers of deep societal change like a flag to represent a nation composed of refugees or the "Make America Great Again" hat. Visual design both reflects and attempts to shape the cultural era it lives in. For 2017 we should watch carefully for attempts to harness the power of design for ill; for anyone that would gussy up hateful ideas in a gloss of perfectly kerned letters and fresh logos. Though it feels more vital and immediate now, in any time we owe it to each other seize upon opportunities that leverage design to tell the best stories about our human potential for creation, growth, and unity. 

Upgrading Ourselves: 

• A lovely little swords-into-plowshares story: Superflex Inc is working to commercialize its soft exoskeleton technology that was originally developed with military funding, but instead of equipping soldiers with super-human strength, their latest products will help augment the ailing bodies of the elderly. Superflex says their tech will be so low profile that people can wear it underneath their clothes, which would make it some of the most minimal assistive technology ever.

 

Up in the air: 

• 7-Eleven, more known for their convenient cornucopia of endlessly rotating hot dogs, cigarettes, snack foods and sodas than their high technology ambitions has completed a number of successful aerial deliveries by partnering with the drone company Flirtey. Sometimes by the time the future we've been promised finally arrives, it feels strangely mundane. 

Automatons: 

• Bridgewater Associates is the world's largest hedge fund organization and they're trying to replace much of their management with automated decision making via software. The firm is already known for a workplace atmosphere of intense scrutiny and pressure, so maybe workers there are a little more willing to welcome robot overlords. 
• When it comes to hands-on, blue collar work in the U.S. the mental images of the rugged coal miners of Appalachia or the oil field workers of Texas are invoked more often than most. But just as manufacturing has seen the power and influence of human labor decline, new technologies coming online are going to do the same for the oil industry, with some analysts predicting a 40% reduction in jobs over the next few years. While these jobs may be offset somewhat by new opportunities in software engineering, sensor R&D and other automation inputs, there's no guarantee that those roles will be filled by workers in the same region which could serve to increase the gap between the coastal haves and the central U.S. have nots.

Just a Game: 

• Food as a visual proxy for vitality and power has been a standard in videogames from the very beginning, from Mario popping mushrooms to turkey legs in Castlevania and combat rations in Metal Gear Solid, digital foods assist in telling a story about the aesthetic and experiential world of the game. Eater has an article on the unprecedented realism of food in the latest Final Fantasy release, and how gathering ingredients and "cooking" are intrinsic to the flavor of the game. 
• The wild amount of precision engineering and design research that goes into building a-more-perfect mouse for elite videogamers.

More next week. 

Insights 12.19

Design:

• We live in an era where information overflows the vessel of our attention; an endless glut of "content" pushed out through dozens of platforms, some physical, some digital, some algorithmic bubbles, some self-selected . Lisa Maria Martin makes an argument that designers are responsible for making information legible and honest - that information literacy is inherently a design problem. Filter bubbles and fake news present a huge problem for society and everyone involved will need to make sure their professional efforts work to disarm those traps, rather than playing into them for the sake of clicks and dollars. 

Building Things:

• LiDAR, (a method of sensing distance and three-dimensional forms with light) is essential for best practices in everything from surveying, agriculture, robotics and self-driving cars but these sensor systems are driven by some fairly expensive precision technology. The company Velodyne says they can change all that with some new fabrication methods that output solid state LiDAR sensors - for less than $50 per device. 

Automatons: 

• The New Yorker takes a look at software and robotics devouring jobs and disrupting economies. There's a lot of familiar ideas and data in the piece, but enough good analysis, interesting anecdotes and clever writing to make it worth a read. Lines like "Picture the entire Industrial Revolution compressed into the lifespan of a beagle" stand out as instances of a writer flexing their uniquely human mind to stay ahead of the automation onslaught. 
• For the nerdier, dirtier, deeper dive into what's happening with remapping human / machine relationships in labor and automation, here's a talk from Leif Jentoft of RightHand Robotics, discussing the high costs of system integrators (an aspect seldom mentioned in media coverage of automation tech outside of industry publications) as well and how human behavior encourages spending on predictable robotic solutions (e.g. significantly higher absenteeism following a major sports event or over a weekend). 

Just a Game: 

• A little history of the marketplaces for virtual goods in videogames, and some commentary on how the digital products gamers were shelling out money for had more to do with aesthetic value than "utility" (think costumes instead of stronger weapons). The article goes back to the late 1990s, the days of Ultima: Online and Diablo, but the human tendencies driving these behaviors go back to the earliest points in our history: adorning ourselves with unique objects to project an inner sense of ourselves out into the world to dazzle and impress others. While it seems unusual to pay "real" money for immaterial goods, it's a sliver of economic activity that keeps growing, and companies involved in augmented reality (like Snap Inc.) are placing some big bets on it becoming more significant in years to come. 

Roadmapping the Future: 

• Voice-driven interfaces are growing fast, and Amazon has a strong lead with over 6 million U.S. homes using some version of it's Alexa-enabled Echo products. While millennials are parodied as a screen addicted, hyper-socially networked generation, future generations might be known for a more hermetic flavor of consumer solipsism. If it gets us further away from advertising and attention economies, maybe that's not a bad thing. 

More next week. 

Insights 12.12

Design:

• Pantone unveils its color of the year for 2017 - it's called Greenery: a "refreshing and revitalizing shade, Greenery is symbolic of new beginnings" - it seems like brands are recognizing a hunger for optimism in the face of ongoing bad news and a general pessimism about the entirety of 2016. 
•  Seasoned tech reporter Walt Mossberg says that current consumer tech trends are putting form too far ahead of functionality, and creating inferior (if good looking) user experiences. We think the rise of power derived from being a platform is a piece of this bad-for-user puzzle, with the big tech companies content to make devices that intentionally do not play well with others, seeking to own the whole tech ecosystem of the end user. This leads to lots of clumsy and frustrating work arounds, turning the promise of greater convenience via technology into an annoying chore. So if you want to get ahead as a tech company building consumer products maybe take the bolder stance of being generous with your customers and making things that work for their needs first and foremost, even if it cuts into your product ecosystem opportunities.

Building Things:

• An interesting interview with Astro Teller, talking Google X, moonshot projects, and what can/should kill ambitious endeavors. Google has been trimming back a lot of these big-opportunity, high technical risk blue sky projects in the last year. We will see if that trend continues as they tighten up spending overall.
• From Backchannel: a little behind the scenes at Pebble's downward trajectory that led to selling, and canceling crowdfunded products that seemed promising - but will never ship. 

Automatons: 

• Costs are falling, deployments are increasing for soft robotics: machines with flexible, conforming, non-marring grippers and actuators. It's an area of innovation that we've been involved with for awhile - much of the tech has spun out of research labs at MIT and Harvard, the Boston area has become a bit of a hub for robots of the squishy variety.
• Big tech companies are focusing on how to get you out of brick-and-mortar retail as fast as possible, and without human cashiers. This past week saw stories on Panasonic's efforts, as well as a slick video from Amazon of a (theoretically) quick and seamless way to get in and get out of their stores. What is a gain of convenience could also be a loss of privacy, with more specific sales data linked & stored to identifying info. Future data breaches for big retailers could lead to even more damaging PR events. 

(Dis)trusting Technology: 

• Post-election there has been a great deal of talk about filter bubbles - Wired suggests that our future blindspots might come from our butler-like bots that listen to our requests and serve up information, news and feedback, but maybe only what we, or they, want us to hear.
• Connected children's toys may be a little too connected - allegedly eavesdropping on conversations and sending that info to a software company known for its government contracts in defense and intelligence sectors. If that doesn't get your thinky-face emoji sense tingling, we don't know what will. Maybe go with some wooden toys for this year's holiday season gifting.

Roadmapping the Future: 

• Farhad Manjoo at the New York Times writes about the decline of gadgets, at least when we define gadgets as consumer electronics widgets. The rise of the do-almost-everything smartphone, enabled by massive strides in miniaturization means we don't need nearly the same amount of discrete products to do the handful of jobs traditionally left to gadgets (record sound, take a video, take a picture, make a call, send an email etc.). From the perspective of reduced carbon and e-waste, this at least has the potential to be a very good thing - we are doing more with fewer products. What the article seems to miss is that there has been, and continues to be huge growth when it comes to adding 'gadgets' or instrumentation/IoT-type products for commercial and industrial applications. In our opinion and experience, the single-function gadget isn't dying, it's just gone professional.

More next week.