Where La Laptop Hits El Camino: The OLPC Roll-out in Peru
After months--nay years--of anticipation, criticism, setbacks and praise, the One Laptop Per Child program is finally taking the diminutive slab of highly-designed tech to its intended audience in a large way. Peru, one of the earliest and strongest supporters of the OLPC, is beginning to ship them in large numbers to some very poor school districts, and MIT Technology Review has a well-researched tale of how it's all going. The findings are cautiously encouraging.
First and most gladdening, it appears that the laptops are truly ending up in the hands of the students who need them most; several references are made to communities and schools that are poor, but "not poor enough" to participate in the program. Secondly, the point about the raw economic effectiveness of the program is driven home by Oscar Becerra, head educational technologist at Peru's Ministry of Education:
These tools will land in the hands of first through sixth graders who in many cases never even had books--at home or elsewhere--and whose teachers themselves had little education. They will not come cheap; Peru is spending about $80 million on the laptops--nearly a third of the education budget normally available for capital expenditures--plus about $2 million for teacher training. Becerra characterized the sum as a special appropriation meant to bring schools up to date. "To distribute all these books would cost five times the cost of the machines," he estimates. "We are reaching the poorest schools in Peru for the first time in history."
Scrutiny on Peru's program will be high, but if it works the way the Ministry (and the teachers) are hoping, the delays, price hikes, and exasperation over the "give one, get one" program will become footnotes in one of socially-engaged design's great success stories.
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RSS Alert: New Gallery up at Core77: Milan 2008
If you've been overwhelmed by the mass of hype from Milan in the last weeks, take a breath, save yourself some time and checkout out core's fresh picks from this year's Salone Internazionale del Mobile.
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April Fool's or something far more serious? How the design world gets punk'd every single day.
La Tour Awful: The Truth Is Rendered, by Alissa Walker
David Serero wants you to know, first of all, that it was not a hoax. It was not, as many claim, a publicity stunt. And it was certainly not an April Fool's joke. "We do have this tradition also," the Paris-based architect told me in an email. "But our project was released three weeks before. Isn't that a little early?"
For those three weeks, whatever it was unfurled through the design world like gigantic Kevlar petals rippling open atop one of the most iconic structures on the planet. By late March it was common knowledge that Serero Architects' winning idea had claimed victory in an open competition to temporarily remodel the public reception and access areas for the 120th anniversary of the Eiffel Tower.
On March 24, the Guardian synthesized the information from all the blogs and took it it one step further, reporting that Eiffel Tower officials had issued a statement confirming that the design had indeed won its competition. But two days later the Société d'Exploitation de la Tour Eiffel actually did issue a statement--this is translated from French--"[We] did not launch any invitation concerning the installation of the top of the monument and the Parisian cabinet of architects quoted never stood as a candidate to any consultation launched by the company."
In three short weeks we went from from gawking at our monitors in disbelief, to raising flutes of Champagne on a temporarily-bolted 580-square-meter viewing platform, to gawking at our monitors in disbelief again.
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Dell's ReGeneration Finalists Announced
Dell's ReGeneration "sustainable computing" competition released its five finalists last week (on Earth Day, if you must know), and reactions are mixed.
With more than 500 entrants from an unspecified number of countries, and an exhaustive list of competition requirements, chances are good that submissions ranged from hard-science to blue-sky, and that maybe some of them didn't look like they were designed by Apple, but you wouldn't really guess it by looking at the finalists.
There's some clever ideation in the featured designs, and the promising concepts of modular recycling and thin-client systems as ways of reducing consumption pop up a couple of times, and for that we applaud both the applicants and the judges. Polling some wonky engineer friends and looking through the frequently exasperated comments, though, it appears that much of what was selected is either too far-fetched to be meaningful (Power Flower PC, anyone?) or little more than a nicely rendered take on a long-established technology.
In any case, the winning design is a matter of public vote, so if you have an opinion, let Dell know, and us too.
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Book Review: The Endless City, by Ricky Burdett and Deyan Sudjic
An enormous orange compendium, The Endless City approaches architecture itself in scale, scope and design. All of the little details are right, from its visually comfortable grid to the stunning panoramic long-exposure photos of cities and urban sprawl. The result of a joint project between The London School of Economics and Deutsche Bank's Alfred Herrhausen Society, the book contains so much data, information and statistics that some facts even needed to spill some over onto the cover. Despite the imposing cover, the information and opinions within prove not only to educate but also to inspire.
Before discussing any book on urban planning, it's worth first addressing the elephant in the room, and her name is Jane. The Death and Life of Great American Cities by Jane Jacobs stands as a triumph of urban planning literature. By criticizing the architecture establishment and deriding the work of Robert Moses in reshaping New York, Jacobs entrenched herself into the urban planning cannon. Jacobs' work is small, accessible, and heartfelt. Anyone who has ever walked through an empty park, or pondered why portions of cities that governments push toward growth often fall into disarray would be well served examining her work. The Death and Life of Great American Cities reads as a cautionary tale for anyone hoping to adopt Le Corbusier's towers and parks as a mode for urban planning (as though walking past any project in America wouldn't be enough). Jacobs speaks lovingly about the diversity of the city streets, the need for a heterogeneous population and a "neighborhood" actively engaged in monitoring or policing its own behavior and growth. Walking down the quirky and vibrant streets of lower Manhattan, I can't help but feel that any other thesis would be tragically misguided. Consequently, I remained concerned until reading this book that urban planners might still hold some megalomaniacal tendencies. I was proven wrong only part way into the introduction and I still had a lot more to learn.
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Airplane seat design: ignore your seatmates at a 30-degree angle
While air travel is still in a dreadful state, at least progress is being attempted in the area of design. Thompson Solutions has designed new "Cozy Suite" airline seats, which are staggered at angles to give you a) slightly more privacy from your seatmates, b) a place to lean your head and maybe get some shuteye, and c) more legroom.
Some of the claims seem overinflated; we can't see how the additional two inches of legroom mean the window guy can get to the aisle without the other two passengers having to get up, but that's what they're claiming. And while it doesn't look like the tan ones, photo above, recline--it looks more like the bottom and lumbar regions of the seat slide forward--the orange ones, photo below, clearly do.
With most airline seat innovations being made for higher-paying Business- and First-Class customers, it's a surprise that Delta will reportedly begin installing the seats in their Economy sections by 2010.
via dvice
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Exploratory research and participatory design
BusinessWeek covers Nokia's recent Open Studio initiative in three slums on three continents where participants were encouraged to come in and draw their dream phones using materials and space provided by Nokia. Jan Chipchase writes on his blog,
One of the research methods Younghee and the research team have been experimenting with in the past year of working in shanty towns is setting up Open Studios in an attempt to engage a broad cross section of the community whist offering people different ways to articulate their wants and needs. We used a competition to design your ideal future phone as a vehicle for collecting data and the photos here show three of the 200+ entries from Buduburam near Accra, Favela Jacarezihno in Rio de Janeiro and Dharavi in Mumbai. It's easy to fixate! on! design! sketches! but bear in mind these are but a small part of the Open Studio - a lot of the research value comes through follow up interaction to help understand why participants chose these designs and how their design decisions are relevant in their context.
BusinessWeek slideshow featuring 15 phones including the 'Paz' which emits a sound wave that brings peace to any argument, fight or even war.
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Spec It Green
The New York Industrial Retention Network (NYIRN) hosted the Spec It Green seminar last night in New York City. NYIRN works to strengthen New York City's manufacturing sector. This series of seminars focuses specifically on Green Building and the advantage of using local, sustainable building supplies and manufacturers. Green vendors were on hand to show their wares, followed by a discussion moderated by Erika Hanson, a green designer and consultant. Panelists included Monica Becker (above), a toxicity guru at RIT; John S. Howell, Director of Research and Development at ISLAND Architectural Woodwork, Inc; Chris Garvin from Terrapin and Cook+Fox Architects; and Amanda Clontz, Sustainable Construction Manager for One Bryant Park. The presenters each emphasized the need for greater communication between designers, manufacturers and contractors to ensure complete fulfillment of green initiatives. A bonus from the evening was a list of green resources compiled by all the panelists. Check out their faves here.
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Concrete But Different #3: Concrete Tableware
What comes after Concrete Curtains (huh?) and Inflatable Houses (huh?). German designer Alexa Lixfeld shows us with Creacrete.
Creacrete is a concrete based material which is highly dense making it possible to create filigree and thin-walled objects out of concrete. Unlike usual ceramics, Alexa uses the novel aesthetics of Creacrete for the design of tableware. Special processing makes it possible to achieve this glossy surface which is new to concrete. A nano-scale coating makes the cups and plates hydrophobic and food safe.
Last year, Creacrete has been recognized with the iF concept award - reason enough for Alexa to continue her concrete explorations. Let's hope we'll be the first to know if she updates her tableware with "concrete cutlery?"
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Samsung's new pebble; iPod slowdown
Coming out in June is Samsung's new "pebble"-style MP3 player, the YP-S2. Seemingly designed so it can be easily smuggled into prison, the $40 device will store 1GB, and the attractive design means the iPod Shuffle may finally have some viable competition.
Will we see more attempts to loosen Apple's death-grip on the MP3 market? Well, according to Google Trends, the iPod is on the decline....
via infosync world
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New electric vehicle with an unusual form factor
Canadian teenager Ben Gulak has invented a rather unusual vehicle: a unicycle with two wheels. Well, isn't that just a bicycle, you say? Not if the wheels are next to each other.
Powered by an electric motor, Gulak's Uno only has an on/off switch and is controlled like a Segway: lean forward to move forward, lean to the side to turn, lean back to slow down and stop. Segway-like gyros keep you from falling, and because the wheels operate independently of each other, the Uno can turn on a dime.
We have no idea where the kickstand is, and Gulak has no idea when the Uno will go into production; he's currently seeking investors.
via daily mail
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Femme Den: Design for females, without "pinking and shrinking"
"Women are still underrepresented in the design industry," says designer Erica Eden, of Smart Design. To combat that, Eden and three other female members of Smart's staff (Agnete Enga, Yvonne Lin, and Gina Reimann) have started Femme Den, an in-company initiative to address the needs of female consumers without alienating males by merely 'pinking and shrinking' existing products. As Eden explains:
A significant number of women live on their own, or are single parents, and have to use products that were not really designed for them. We don't adapt products to specifically target men or women, but we work to create cross-gender products...we believe that by understanding how gender plays a role, our designs will appeal to the largest audience and achieve [best-selling status.]
Femme Den will be presenting their most recent findings at September's IDSA conference in Phoenix, Arizona. Click here for their website.
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And finally, Five People Killed By Their Own Inventions
Neatorama's list of inventors who've died in the pursuit of creation is one that I'm sure many core readers could add to. If only Franz had Wayne Enterprises to offer a bit of R&D suppport.
Franz Reichelt was a tailor who was convinced that the next big thing was a coat that doubled as a parachute. So he got busy sewing and developed just that. To test the coat/parachute (coatachute? Paracoat?), Reichelt climbed up to the first deck of the Eiffel Tower. He told authorities that he was going to use a dummy to test the invention, but at the last minute he strapped himself in and jumped to his death in front of a large crowd of spectators.
I was going to link the youtube footage but it's a little disturbing.
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Special thanks to Aart van Bezooyen, and Niti Bhan for their contributions to this weeks newsletter!
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