Mikal Hallstrup of Designit.dk frames the dilemmas faced by designers, particularly when their product is intended for an entirely different culture or geography. Here's a snippet:
Prabhu Kandachar, associate professor at TUDelft, told a story that illustrates this ethical dilemma perfectly. A company developed an affordable ultra-sound scanner for the Indian market. It was meant to improve pregnancy healthcare and pregnant women's quality of life. But the company soon discovered that the scanners were being used for gender selection. How should the company deal with this? Stop designing? Seek answers from the ethical experts? Keep designing, learning and trying to solve something that seems unsolvable? Or proactively attempt to design new behaviour patterns and value sets in the country so the product is used as intended? That's according to a western value set, at least. As a designer, I think the way forward is focusing on context. Address and understand the underlying contradictions - whether they be cultural, economic or social - and make the solution fit. And most importantly, remember that policies and visions alone won't bring tangible differences to users' everyday lives - to achieve this, we need well-designed products and services. What do you think is the responsibility of the designer? What is the role of ethics in product design? Retrieved from coree77.com on 18/3/2013
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1. What are the aesthetic and functional design factors of this PSE? Back in October, some users were upset when Apple unveiled the fourth-generation iPad just seven months after the previous model arrived. Now the Brazilian Institute of Politics and Law Software (IBDI) has filed suit against Apple, claiming that the quick release of the iPad with Retina display constitutes “planned obsolescence” with regards to its predecessor, the New iPad.
According to Brazil’s Jornal do Comerciao, IBDI believes that Apple could have implemented the technological updates of the iPad 4 into the iPad 3. By not doing so, they believe that Apple took part in unfair business practices. Were Apple to lose in court, iPad 3 users in Brazil could receive some compensation. "Consumers thought [they were] buying high-end equipment not knowing [it] was already an obsolete version," says IBDI attorney Sergio Palomares. The New iPad and iPad with Retina display are different in three ways. For one, the current generation tablet includes an A6X processor versus the A5X processor that came with the discontinued iPad 3. It also includes a FaceTime HD camera. The previous model included a VGA front-facing videophone camera. Finally, the iPad 4 includes Apple’s new Lightning connector. The iPad 3 included a 30-pin connector. It should also be noted that iPad 3 buyers who had purchased their tablet within 30 days of the iPad 4 announcement were able to make a return. In addition, some retailers extended this policy even further. This isn’t the the only bad news for Apple coming out of Brazil. Earlier this month, Cupertino lost the Brazilian trademark for the iPhone. Retrieved from mashable.com 26/2/2013 1. IBDI believe that apple took part in what? 2. How many ways are the New iPad and the iPad with retina different? 3. What are the three differences? 4. How could this be an example of planned obsolescence? 5. What did apple do to possibly make them exempt from this unfair practice they are being accused of? Last month's post on "How a Woman with No Arms Dresses Herself" did not get the amount of responses I was hoping for, but I still feel designers can make an important contribution towards easing the challenges that handicapped folk face. Daily activities that you and I never even think about, like getting in and out of a car, are problems for the handicapped that need evolutionary design solutions. And from what I'm seeing, there aren't enough interested designers tackling these problems in user-friendly ways.
Let's look at how people without the use of their legs get in and out of their cars, and bear in mind that they have to get both their bodies and their wheelchairs in and out. First up is Chelsea Zimmerman, who runs a blog called Reflections of a Paralytic. Note the little things, like how far she has to stretch to close the door: Breaking down the wheelchair and hauling the chassis inside the car behind her seems incredibly cumbersome. Although motivational speaker Tamara Mena has a car with rear suicide doors with a larger opening, the process doesn't look much easier than Zimmerman's. Note how the top of the wheelchair catches on the seatbelt: The unnamed Ohio man who runs the Paralyzed Living channel on YouTube has a slightly different approach, where he breaks the wheelchair down and hauls it across the front of his body to get it into the car: The little details seen in each video, like Zimmerman's use of a plywood plank, Mena taking advantage of the locked steering wheel to stabilize herself, and the last guy's mention that pull-out door handles are much easier for him than the pull-up variety, are all illuminating. If anyone reading this has design suggestions for how to improve the ingress and egress issues you've seen here, please do sound off. Retrieved from core77.com 22/10/2012 Name the factors involved in this problem? What do the words ingress and egress mean? Sketch a solution to the problem. Write a survey about the problem to discover how other students feel about this situation. Look & feel
For me, the iPhone sits more comfortably in my hand. I've been using one for a while now, and I could be saying this because I'm used to it. I think it's going to depend more on your hand size and how you use your phone. If you have small hands, the iPhone is going to sit better in your palm. The Galaxy is a little too big for my liking, but this might suit people who like the extra screen real estate that comes with the Galaxy's 4.8 inch screen, compared with the iPhone's four inches. Apple has said it made the iPhone 5 only taller and not wider than its predecessor so a user's thumb could easily slide from one corner to the other without having to reposition the phone in their palm. This is probably a good idea. I found myself repositioning the Galaxy in my hand numerous times and this gets frustrating, especially when you're walking out of a shopping centre with bags on each arm and trying to browse the internet at the same time. Both phones are good-looking, and some might even say sexy. But they aren't immune to scratches, which on the black version of the iPhone are quite noticeable. The Samung Galaxy has just out sold the iphone4s in the last financial year quarter 1. What is the reason for the recent succes of the Samsung Galaxy? 2. Give your opinion on whether you think the Samsung will out sell the iphone 5? 3. What factors would need to be considered when launching a new mobile phone onto the market? 4. What do you think Blackberry need to do to make there new Blackberry 10 successful? This post was originally published on Mashable. If Polytron Technologies has its way, you'll barely be able to see your next smartphone. The Taiwan-based manufacturer has released a futuristic-looking prototype for what it hopes will be the world's first transparent smartphone. The product, which remains in its early stages, is made from Polytron's Polyvision Privacy Glass. The glass is opaque when powered off, but its appearance transforms when electricity is applied. According to Polytron's website, "the liquid crystal molecules line up, the incident light passes through, and Polyvision looks clear". Technically, the glass design isn't completely see-through — the batteries and SIM card remain visible, as does the power switch up top. The otherwise translucent concept design, with its dual-sided, multi-touch display, currently runs no operating system — it's just hardware. Sam Yu, Polytron's general manager, told Macworld, however, that "All handset makers are looking to work with us. The technology is mature." Polytron aims to achieve a fully functional transparent smartphone, in limited production, by the end of the year, Mobile Geeks reported. Article retrieved from SMH on 19th March 2013
In high school we were taken to meet a guy who made "antiqued" furniture. It was all freshly made in his shop, but he had an array of objects—chains, bottlecaps, and even carefully-selected rocks—that he'd flay, pound, drop and grind against each piece to give it a calculated weathering. The results were convincing, but one of my classmates sniggered something about it being fake. The man asked the kid if his jeans were pre-faded, or if he'd bought them like that. Whether clothing or furniture, there's a history for beating things up for aesthetic reasons; but how far should we take that? Francesco Pavia, a designer who hails from Venice, has extended it into luggage with his Crash Baggage line. What is the first thing we think about when we buy a new suitcase? We worry that it might get ruined. The damaged case! An innovative travel philosophy that has opened the way to a whole new way of conceiving the suitcase: that of the non-handle with care, where damage is no longer a problem. Crash baggage already has the typical dents that are caused by frequent use. Indeed, over time, the new dents give even more personality to the suitcase. All this without forgetting the functionality and comfort of an object that has been created using the most advanced materials. I kind of wish he'd make these perfect and then throw them down a concrete staircase, but the consistent dents indicate these come out of a mould.
In any case, what say you—yea or nay? 1. Who is the designer of this product? 2. Tha article talks about beating things up for aesthetics reasons, what does this mean? 3. What do you think the reaction of the market will be to this product? 4. What do you think the reaction of the design world will be? 5. Write down the design need for this problem? Article retrieved from core77.com on 6th February 2013 |
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