IF PRODUCTS COULD SPEAK

TOWARDS A MODEL OF SUSTAINABLE DESIGN

JEN VAN DER MEER

NYU ITP

WEEK 2: FEBRUARY 2, 2009

RECALLED 1_29_2009

RECALLED 1_29_2009

RECALLED 1_31_2009

1_30_2009CPSC DELAYS LEAD AND PTHALATE TESTING

REQUIREMENTS ON CHILDREN’S TOYS BY ONE YEAR

EMPORER PENGUINS FACE EXTINCTION BY END OF CENTURY

NEWS WHICH DOESN’T BODE WELL FOR THESE GUYS

1_26_2009SOME GOOD NEWS:

STATE REGULATIONS OF AUTO EMISSIONS

TODAY’S FOCUS:

THE CONSUMER’S ROLE IN REVERSING THE ENVIRONMENTAL CRISIS:

_Population x Consumption_Need vs. want_Levers of change_Spimes again_Ethnography_Examples, ideas

POPULATION x CONSUMPTION

“Over some 60 million years, Homo sapiens has evolved into the dominant animal on the planet, acquiring binocular vision, upright posture, large brains, and — most importantly — language with syntax and that complex store of non-genetic information we call culture.

However, in the last several centuries we’ve increasingly been using our relatively newly acquired power, especially our culturally evolved technologies, to deplete the natural capital of Earth — in particular its deep, rich agricultural soils, its groundwater stored during ice ages, and its biodiversity — as if there were no tomorrow.”

_Paul Ehrlich, author of The Population Bomb

POPULATION x CONSUMPTION

“Too many people are under the delusion that such a disastrous end to the modern human enterprise can be avoided by technological fixes that will allow the population and the economy to grow forever.

The point, all too often ignored, is that this trend is being driven in large part by a combination of population growth and increasing per capita consumption, and it cannot be long continued without risking a collapse of our now-global civilization.”

_Paul Ehrlich, updated: The Dominant Animal: Human Evolution and the Environment

NEED vs. WANT

See: Photographs of Peter Menzel.

Material Things.

NEED vs. WANT

35 percent of Americans surveyed aspired to reach the top 6 percent of the income distribution, and another 49 percent aspired to the next 12 percent.

Only 15 percent reported that they would be satisfied with "living a comfortable life"-that is, being middle class.

But 85 percent of the population cannot earn the six-figure incomes necessary to support upper-middle-class lifestyles.

Susan Fournier and Michael Guiry, University of Florida, 1991.

The result is a growing aspirational gap: with desires persistently outrunning incomes, many consumers find themselves frustrated.

NEED vs. WANT

Dearly beloved.

We are gathered here today, in the midst of economic calamity, to ask if we really should be gathered here today, in a funhouse of merchandise designed to send us deeper into debt.

NY Times. Feb 1, 2009. “Our Love Affair With Malls is on the Rocks”

NEED vs. WANT

NEED vs. WANT

The bulk of green product innovation has been focused on the power of the purse to “drive the business case” for green.

VOTING WITH YOUR WALLET.

Green consumers are known to pay a premium for the purity of the objects they are seeking, and businesses have lined up to appeal to this desire, and reap the high margin returns.

What are the contradictions of green consumption?

HOMEWORK: LCA

LEVERS OF CHANGE:

BUYING.

Consumer spending now accounts for two-thirds of global economic activity.

USING.

The “use” phase of a product lifecycle is often the phase that provides the greatest environmental impact or harm, to the earth and to its creatures.

DISPOSING/RECYCLING:

Americans recycled and composted 85 Million tons of the 253 Million tons of total municipal solid waste produced in 2007.

SPIMES AGAIN

1. New forms of design and manufacture are appearing that create novelty.

2. The production methods are not sustainable. The status quo uses archaic forms of energy and materials which are finite and toxic. They wreck the climate, poison the populace, and forment resource wars. They have no future.

Challenge: guide the vectors of #1 so as to finesse the consequences of #2.

SHAPING THINGS

Artifacts. Man made, man operated. Machines. Complex artifacts that have a non-man, non-animal energy source. Products. Widely distributed commercially available objects, manufactrered in large quantities. Gizmos. Highly unstable, user alterable, baroquely multifeatured objects, commonly programmable, with a brief lifespan. Spimes. Manufactured objects who begin and end as data. Information melded to sustainability.

SHAPING THINGS

Effective intervention takes place not in the human, not in the object, but in the realm of the technosocial.

There’s not enough time in the world for people to sacrifice infinite amounts of opportunity and cognition. This means that in a Spime world, designers must design, not just for objects or people but for the technosocial interactions that unite people and objects.

SHAPING THINGS

When the entire industrial process is made explicit, when the metrics count for more than the object they measure, then Gizmo become Spimes.

SO THEN:

Consumer behavior is a lever of change.

The “use” phase of a product lifecycle is often the phase with the highest impact environmentally.

So then… we will change the world by creating Spimes, which will inform us how to use objects in a more effective way, and will tell us also when these objects are causing us harm.

WE’LL NEED SOME ETHNOGRAPHY

Good behavior is often overstated in traditional query-focused research.

Everyone flosses and exercises when asked.

Gap between intention and action. _Approximately 50% of consumers say they want green stuff. _Only 5% actually shop that way consistently.

What are the factors limiting change? _Price too high._Too inconvenient._Don’t want to compromise for a lower quality product._Don’t trust green claims, no standards.

WHAT EXPLAINS GREEN BEHAVIOR?

Rational choice vs. less-than-rational choice

Individual self-determination vs. social conformation

Internal values, attitudes, intentions vs. external antecedents such as incentives, social norms, institutional constraints

“Always” Recyclers are more motivated because they connect the dots between their recycling effort and emotional drivers

“Always”:

Find immediate reward in emotional benefits

Are more able to ladder their behavior to a positive outcome

Do not require more tangible benefits/ information to engage

in recycling

Recycling has become second nature

CONNECTED

“Sometimes”:

Lack a motivating connection to recycling

Are unable to see the effect of their recycling behavior (or lack of)

Seek more tangible benefits/information (rational)

Are easily distracted from the path of recycling

DISCONNECTED

Source: National Recycling Coalition Ethnography Study

EXAMPLES OF DESIGNING FOR ETHICAL USE

Greenbox

http://amee.cc/

Torture Me Elmo: Do Humanlike Machines Deserve Human Rights?

Daniel Roth, Wired Magazine.

NEXT CLASS:

Reading: Shopping our Way to Safety. Part II: Assembling a Personal Commodity Bubble for One’s Body, Chapters 3, 4, 5, pp. 97 – 168.

Assignment due next class: Interview a consumer who self-identifies as “green,” to determine their stated motivations, and actual behavior in selecting and using green products. Prepare a one page report of your findings.