A fundamental tenet of Humblefacture is the importance of scale. Yes, material composition of products is important. And certainly the location of production realative to use is also key. But the concept of scale implies that there are some intensities, or sizes, or durations which are simply too large to fit within the Humblefacture framework. The reason for this, it turns out, is that there is one common unit we all share - the human.
Showing posts with label manufacturing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label manufacturing. Show all posts
Humblefacture might sound like a great idea, with two conditions. First, it will be possible in the future, but not now. And second, it only works for things like furniture, and maybe bikes, but nothing complex. In fact, the principles of Humblefacture can be applied to even the most complicated types of products, and using existing fabrication technologies. A perfect example of this is how the SSG framework, developed at The Humblefactory, allows currently available electronics to waste less, keep value longer, and most importantly, better meet the needs of their users.
A couple weeks back, I gave a talk at the Dorkbot Seattle chapter meeting about the ecosystem of digital manufacturing. You can check out the video of the event below. You can also check out the slides, and links for the presentation in this previous post. Click through for part two after the break.
Last week, I gave a talk to Seattle's local Dorkbot contingent. The meeting was awesome: around 90 dorks, all ages and backgrounds, all talking fab. What more could you want? The talk was about the state of the Digital Fabrication Ecosystem today, and I think that this topic is hugely important to the development of Humblefactories in the future, particularly because digital fabrication puts more power in more people's hands. Mark Ganter gave a great talk about his Open3dP powder printing formulas. Willow Brugh also gave a great introduction to Jigsaw Renaissance in Seattle -- you can read more about why she's a maker here. And, Matt Westervelt from Metrix Createspace in Seaettle gave a demo of a Makerbot makerbotting. You can download the slides of the talk in PDF form here (or browse them above), but there are plenty of links that I couldn't include. Read on for a more thorough linkfest and discussion.
Seems like every week there is some new type of punk steering aesthetics or technology. From punk rock, to post-punk, Cyberpunk, Steampunk, even Biopunk, these gritty ways of life have tried to gain your interest and allegiance. Humblefacture, thought also an ethos which could result in a distinctive styling of product, will hopefully escape the fadish fadings of these movements. But in order to imagine what Humblefacture might become, it might help to compare it to the latest crowd of punks onto the scene -- the Bushpunks.
Make magazine is the Jefferson or Lenin of the open hardware movement, and this week, they didn't disappoint with an end-of-year roundup of open source hardware projects. Make has always emphasized the fun side of making, so as you can imagine, the list is more about blinkeys and videogames than real marketplace game-changers, but there are some gems in the mix. Perhaps the most exciting of the bunch is the Elphel open ethernet camera for sheer brawny real-world competitive chops. Be sure to check out the medical devices and digital fabricators. I know there are more great project out there than Make had a chance to post, so be sure to share your tips in the comments here or on the original make post.
What can a puzzle that is not really a puzzle teach us about the future of product design? Actually, maybe a lot. The above image shows a Jigazo puzzle -- like so many things, only available in Japan -- which has been assembled to display the face of a child. This isn't anything special, since puzzles already are able to faithfully depict any face, or any other image, for that matter. What makes Jigazo unique is that its single set of pieces can be arranged to display any face. The company even offers the option to run your image through software which will generate build instructions for a unique puzzle. In fact, this un-puzzle is more like a paint-by-number: reconfigurable, generic parts which derive function through their structure. This shift in thinking will have far-reaching impacts as it continues to be applied to product design.
Maybe it's the smell of pencils and college-ruled paper in the air, but politicians in the U.S. are going positively education-crazy. Arne Duncan, education secretary, gave an interview and speech disclosing radical overhauls of our current "No Child Left Behind" policy. President Obama urged students to stay in school, and work hard to learn the skills that would help them compete in a global market. There is good reason that these important people are spending time and effort looking into the affairs of children. Simply put, we have problems to large, numerous, and long-term to be dealt with by the current generation of workers. The question is, how can you train a generation to fabricate a new future without giving them the tools of fabrication?
There is a persistent dream (or self delusion) among eco-minded product designers that somehow, manufacturing before the industrial revolution was "better"; Cottage industry was safer, or cleaner, or fairer, or used fewer resources -- or all of the above. Often, this ideal is backed up with anecdotes of textile mills replacing home-spinners, or IKEA replacing cabinet makers. Certainly, these stories of machinery displacing or invalidating jobs (The British still use the mechanistic term "made redundant" to describe layoffs) are true -- but does this mean that a socially sustainable future must involve some return to pre-agricultural cave dwelling? Of course not. But charting a path to such a future requires a re-examination of the human difference between a tool and a machine.
It's all well and good to say that making is speech. It is something else entirely to work toward truly "free" making -- a goal made more difficult by the fact that the primary "oppressors" of freedom of making are systemic and economic, rather than individual or governmental. Simply making a law, like we did for speech, won't work. Instead, we need to identify new methods and research directions which will lower the systemic barriers of entry to making. I believe that three primary directions exist for this exploration.
Humblefacturing the future has positive implications for all kinds of things, from improving economic stability, to greater personal freedom. But one more crucial added bonus of working toward a more humble, visible, local way of making will be the effect on the people involved in that making. In the recent bestselling book "Shop Class as Soulcraft", author Matthew Crawford explores the real impacts that tangible technical labor has on the development of elementary and secondary students. Indeed, since the 1980s the rise of rhetoric about the coming information economy, and the need for "knowledge workers" has driven a serious recline in the way we value manual labor, particularly skilled labor. But as we have seen in the 30 years that followed, more information didn't decrease our need for complicated physical fabrication. In fact it has only increased with growth in robotics, nanotechnology, and a need for new materials to meet the need for carbon neutral and renewable objects. To get a better idea of the scope of the problem, and the potential for the solution, check out Matthew's original essay for The New Atlantis. And we know that our readership is full of makers, so sound off in the comments about your experiences with making for the soul.
I gave a talk introducing Humblefacture to the world at last week's Ignite Seattle conference. You can see the video of the talk above, and link to the slides on slideshare here. The manifesto has since grown by at least one point, and a thorough exploration of the ins and outs of defining this movement is forthcoming, so stay tuned. In the meantime, we at Humblefacture would love to hear any feedback you might have.
We humans have it pretty good. Blessed by evolution's wheel of fortune with binocular vision, seriously honkin' brains, and opposable thumbs, we've turned ourselves into the uncontested tool leaders of the animal world. Those tools enhance our capabilities more than any claws, fur, or antennae could. We move faster, fly higher, change the courses of rivers and even affect the temperature of the atmosphere. All this can give a mammal a pretty big head -- big enough to think that without us to save it, nature is somehow in danger.
What is the difference between a sweater and a pile of yarn? Nothing is added to the yarn to make a sweater; the yarn weighs the same before knitting as after. Yet the sweater is obviously different than the pile. The energy of knitting might seem to be the difference, but we could make make just as many random knits in the yarn -- expending the same energy -- and end up with a knotty pile of yarn. A knotty pile is definitely different than a regular pile, but it's also significantly different than a sweater. So, if it's not added matter, and it's not added energy, what's left? Answer: Information.
Localism is precious. American Apparel's "locally made" t-shirts command a premium and are worn by hipsters the world over. "Locavore" has joined the ranks along with "vegan" and "vegetarian", and even has the approval of Oxford's. Local production has huge benefits, from reducing energy required in transport, to allowing consumers to form connections with their producers, to limiting negative environmental and social impact of manufacture. But even with so many potential benefits, the majority of materials and processes we use to make items simply do not lend themselves to local-scale manufacture.
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