Recently, American investors have started funding startups in 3rd world countries. It turns out that in Africa, the Middle East, and Southern Asia, there are a lot of artistic skills, without much local demand for the products. Well, Americans have both the funds and the desire to purchase these products. Some U.S. investors and charities have started providing funding for people in these 3rd world countries to start their own businesses based around these local arts. Among other things, the funding is used to obtain training, pay for raw materials, and start shipping the goods to the U.S. where they can be sold. Programs like this are helping to lift people in these countries out of poverty, and they are providing middle and upper class Americans with goods that are often of superior quality to factory produced products. The problem is that this does not do anything for our large numbers of people in poverty here in the U.S.
Helping starving people in 3rd world countries is a noble goal. Helping them in ways that reduce their dependence on us is even better. It cannot last though. We are not in any position to be giving people outside the U.S. significant amounts of our time and effort. Poverty is increasing in the U.S., and we have plenty of our own starving people that need our help. Our welfare system takes away some of the burden, but it adds others, partly because it is poorly designed. What we really need is not U.S. investors providing funds for startups in Africa. What we need is U.S. investors providing funding for U.S. poor. Most of these businesses that we are funding in 3rd world countries could exist in the U.S. as well.
Americans can make shoes and rugs and many of the other things that we currently import. Training is not that expensive, and it does not have to involve expensive trade schools. Things like knitting and weaving can be learned on the internet. Those with any level of artistic talent can learn how to make high quality costumes out of fairly cheap materials, and the current cosplay trend would help fetch some pretty good profits on this. Things like blacksmithing and metal casting are also easy to learn on the internet, and in most areas of the U.S. there are groups that would be willing to help with training for cheap or even free. This just brushes the surface. There is a market in fixing old toys. Learning to make simple web sites for individuals and small businesses is pretty easy. Many people with unusual talents have managed to make a decent income just recording and publishing YouTube videos of their performances. All of these things are artistic in nature, which means that they are not subject to the same sort of competition that normal jobs and products are. There are only two things most poor Americans are missing: time and training (and sometimes equipment and materials).
American investors and charities should be looking at the American poor, instead of, or in addition to, those living in 3rd world countries. They should offer funding, including enough for living expenses and training, for Americans who have or want skills in things that would provide the opportunity to start a small business based on artistic skills. Besides helping those in the U.S., this could also be quite profitable for investors. Demand for artistic products in the U.S. is fairly high, especially among the upper class. Art knives made by reasonably skilled blacksmiths can demand $10,000 a piece or more, for products that take about one month to produce. Hand crafted shoes can bring in a few hundred to a thousand dollars each for a week of work or less. An old doll that takes a few hours to clean, repair, and repaint can bring in $20 or $30 with a half decent job (more for an experienced artist). Hand knit or woven clothing and rugs can bring in a reasonable income as well. Many people have managed to make a decent supplemental income with YouTube videos, and good ones can bring in ad revenue for months or years after they are published, without any additional work. Even for those with less skill, these kinds of work can be done from home and supplement a poor income enough to make a significant difference.
What about those who are starving in 3rd world countries and do not even have food stamps to help them out? The more we help our own poor, the more resources we will have to help others. Every poor American we help out of poverty in a sustainable way is another potential donor, investor, or customer for poor people in other countries. Instead of looking at investing in Americans as a drain from funds that could be invested elsewhere, consider it an opportunity for a more sustainable investment model for everyone in need. Any investment that pays off will provide additional funding that can be used anywhere. In addition, investors might encourage Americans they help to invest in or donate money to organizations that help people in other countries. One rich person investing in some businesses in Africa will help a few people, until something happens that prevents that investor from continuing to invest (death or massive medical bills, for example). Several thousand middle class Americans donating money to charities that help people start businesses in Africa will ultimately provide far better funding and be far more resilient.
The best strategy here is probably a mentorship strategy. Investors should start investing in hobby-style artistic professions for poor Americans. They should provide paid or volunteer mentors for every person they fund. Those mentors should help beneficiaries manage their finances, find training, and setup their operations. The mentors can also report back to the investors, to allow them to bail as soon as possible when a beneficiary is not using the funds wisely. Another responsibility of a mentor should be to encourage beneficiaries to help out others once they are able to, and this theme should be repeated during regular meetings of the beneficiaries with the investors. With mentors, chances of success will be much higher, and imminent failure will be much easier to detect much earlier.
The long term effect of this will be to teach Americans that cannot find jobs to create their own. It will improve the U.S. economy, and it may even reduce the burden of the poor on the U.S. welfare system. More importantly though, it will provide Americans with the means to provide aid for others far better than we are currently capable of. A few rich investors helping the 3rd world poor start businesses to get them out of poverty cannot compete with what a robust U.S. economy composed of a large number of American middle class donors can do for them. A common religious theme applies here: You must help yourself before you can truly help others. To maximize the good we can do, we must first remove the mote from our own collective eye.
Showing posts with label art. Show all posts
Showing posts with label art. Show all posts
09 March 2015
12 October 2014
Technology Aesthetic
Technology has struggled with aesthetics for decades. Modern tech devices really do not look much better than early ones, except in a few rare circumstances. I doubt this struggle will ever end, because different people have different tastes. There are a few things that could be done to improve the situation though.
There are several options when dealing with aesthetics in technology. The first is hide it. This is probably the most common. The typical cell phone has an almost sleek looking body that serves only to hide the insides and offer very minor protection from damage (sorry, anything that is not waterproof cannot qualify as offering more than minor protection). Most desktop computer cases serve the entirely utilitarian purpose of providing a frame to attach internal components to, again offering minor protection. Laptops sometimes have customizable options, but still rarely serve any purpose well besides holding the components together and hiding them from the user. Hiding is, by far, the most common way of dealing with tech aesthetics. Real beauty is never a part of the equation. Even hiding is not usually done very well. An LCD screen encased in black plastic may hide the internal electronics, but it only barely does so. Looking at the screen, it is still obvious that electronics are inside. There is no suspension of disbelief; we all know what is hidden in there, and we cannot pretend otherwise.
The second option is exposing the technology. Circuit boards and electronic components can look aesthetically pleasing, but it takes a bit of care and effort. Some people in the tech industry enjoy the appearance of raw electronics so much that they will purchase computer cases with big windows on the sides, so the internal circuitry are visible. Most people, however, do not like the unfinished appearance of typical electronics. At a cost, it is possible to completely clean up electronics and make them look presentable in their own right, but this gets expensive very quickly as boards get larger (like the motherboard in a PC). Most smaller devices, like phones, include very sensitive radio frequency circuitry that would be difficult to expose safely, so exposing the technology is not always a viable option.
The third option, which has never been done very well, is hiding, but focusing on making the hiding place beautiful. Apple has tried this repeatedly, but still has not managed to get very far past basic hiding. Touch screens and capacitive buttons (as opposed to tactile switch buttons) help this a lot by more effectively hiding the technology, but white plastic is still clearly very modern and unnatural. The white plastic enclosures of most modern Apple products just cries out technology. The technology may be hidden on the inside, but the aesthetic advertises that this is a man made technological device. It may look pretty to some, but it does not do a very good job of hiding the technology.
There is a fourth option, which has never been done on a large scale. Part of the reason is that it would initially be expensive, and it might be difficult to keep up. This is changing the aesthetic altogether. This falls into the category of hiding, but it is far more flexible and more capable of beauty. This kind of hiding puts suspension of disbelief as the primary goal. Instead of enclosing the device in a mundane plastic enclosure, it could be contained in a wood (or realistic faux wood) enclosure. Correctly designed, an LCD monitor could be made to look like a picture frame. This could be mounted on an office wall, and if the cables were easily concealable, a static image on it could trick visitors into thinking that it was an actual photograph, instead of a computer monitor. A flip phone might look like a large locket. Buttons or keys could be made to look like stone (some sci-fi shows feature "ancient" technology that uses large stone blocks as keys for an input device). Brass or other metals (or even realistic metallic paint on plastic) could be used to make keys that appear to have been made during the Victorian era or earlier. Using materials that appear to be non-technological in nature it would be possible to hide technology in enclosures that do not advertise that technology lies within. It might still be obvious that a cell phone is a cell phone, but the user (and spectators) could imagine that the device uses magic or mechanics to operate, instead of modern electronics. The appearance of the device would not break suspension of disbelief.
Now none of these options are the "best." Poorly hiding the technology is probably the cheapest option. Exposing the technology satisfies a niche, but most people would prefer it hidden. Hiding with a focus on aesthetics has worked very well for Apple, and many people like the idea of carrying a device that is clearly high tech without actually exposing the technology.
Visually transforming technology could introduce a great variety of different aesthetics, and it could revolutionize how we interact with technology, but it would also carry some initial expenses. Making technology into artwork requires real artists, not just industrial engineers trained to focus on the most practical designs. Creating all of the hardware for producing beautiful technology would be fairly expensive. Eventually, this expense would largely disappear as fabrication technology improved, and much of this hardware would be a one time cost anyway, but the art costs would still linger. Ultimately, it would pay though. There are many niche markets (some fairly large) that would make this very profitable if managed wisely. Steampunk cell phones would probably sell fairly well already, without excessive marketing costs (word can get around quickly in the Steampunk community). A Medieval theme would be popular for those involved in Renaissance Fairs and SCA, as well as for some historians. Any variety of fantasy themes could be wildly successful (a cell phone could be modeled as a magical scrying device and an LCD monitor might have a frame that would be appropriate for a magic mirror) and the sci-fi market is largely untapped here as well (just within the Stargate series, there are at least 10 alien tech aesthetics that could be highly profitable; Star Trek and Star Wars would also be quite popular). Nature based themes (a realistic wooden case, maybe even with knots protruding slightly) could be popular with the environmentalist movement, and they might even appeal to primitivists who are not opposed to using some technology. Of course, there are nearly infinite possibilities in the anime and cosplay markets. Already, case upgrades with some of these themes are popular, but case upgrades are just pretty pictures attached to the phone. They do not beautify the phone itself. Some designs would justify adding as much as $50 to the price of a phone (possibly more for larger devices), and it would probably be easy to get an extra $5 or $10 even for simpler (but realistic looking) designs. The potential for profit is very high, and there are also possible reputation boosts for companies that do this well.
The point of this is not to denigrate current technology aesthetics, but rather to point out that they do not live up to their full potential. The market for utilitarian designs and designs that "feel" modern and high tech is saturated. There are multiple markets for designs that feel low tech or even no tech, but that are still high tech on the inside. There are markets for designs that feel like sci-fi advanced tech as well as designs that feel mystical or ancient. There are even markets for designs that feel like products of nature. Tech aesthetic does not have to be all about hiding the technology. It can be about making the technology appear to be more or less than it actually is. There is a place for purely practical designs, but in a world with billions of people, there are many that want more than just practical utilitarian devices.
A friend of a friend once used the term "fashion device" to refer to a potentially useful electronic device designed to fit into a specific aesthetic. Themed aesthetics does not have to stop at hand held or wearable devices though. Even a laptop or desktop computer, an LCD TV, or a computer printer could be designed to have decorative value in addition to practical value (in fact, parts of the steampunk community have altered laptop and desktop computers to look like something straight out of Victorian England; these are currently the ultimate in useful decorations, but the potential is practically infinite). Instead of hiding technology, we could be disguising it as other things. We could be making technology look and feel like something entirely different, and we could do it without sacrificing utility. Instead of ugly blocky speakers and screens framed in mundane black plastic, we could devices that are both works of art as well as useful tools. Our houses could look like art galleries instead of collections of ugly but necessary blocks of multi-colored plastic and painted metal. Long ago, aesthetics was considered more important in household devices. In antique shops, it is sometimes possible to find sewing machines, radios, and even old television sets framed in high quality wood with artistic embellishments. Modern technology has opened up many more aesthetic possibilities. Now it is time to take advantage of them and beautify our tech culture.
There are several options when dealing with aesthetics in technology. The first is hide it. This is probably the most common. The typical cell phone has an almost sleek looking body that serves only to hide the insides and offer very minor protection from damage (sorry, anything that is not waterproof cannot qualify as offering more than minor protection). Most desktop computer cases serve the entirely utilitarian purpose of providing a frame to attach internal components to, again offering minor protection. Laptops sometimes have customizable options, but still rarely serve any purpose well besides holding the components together and hiding them from the user. Hiding is, by far, the most common way of dealing with tech aesthetics. Real beauty is never a part of the equation. Even hiding is not usually done very well. An LCD screen encased in black plastic may hide the internal electronics, but it only barely does so. Looking at the screen, it is still obvious that electronics are inside. There is no suspension of disbelief; we all know what is hidden in there, and we cannot pretend otherwise.
The second option is exposing the technology. Circuit boards and electronic components can look aesthetically pleasing, but it takes a bit of care and effort. Some people in the tech industry enjoy the appearance of raw electronics so much that they will purchase computer cases with big windows on the sides, so the internal circuitry are visible. Most people, however, do not like the unfinished appearance of typical electronics. At a cost, it is possible to completely clean up electronics and make them look presentable in their own right, but this gets expensive very quickly as boards get larger (like the motherboard in a PC). Most smaller devices, like phones, include very sensitive radio frequency circuitry that would be difficult to expose safely, so exposing the technology is not always a viable option.
The third option, which has never been done very well, is hiding, but focusing on making the hiding place beautiful. Apple has tried this repeatedly, but still has not managed to get very far past basic hiding. Touch screens and capacitive buttons (as opposed to tactile switch buttons) help this a lot by more effectively hiding the technology, but white plastic is still clearly very modern and unnatural. The white plastic enclosures of most modern Apple products just cries out technology. The technology may be hidden on the inside, but the aesthetic advertises that this is a man made technological device. It may look pretty to some, but it does not do a very good job of hiding the technology.
There is a fourth option, which has never been done on a large scale. Part of the reason is that it would initially be expensive, and it might be difficult to keep up. This is changing the aesthetic altogether. This falls into the category of hiding, but it is far more flexible and more capable of beauty. This kind of hiding puts suspension of disbelief as the primary goal. Instead of enclosing the device in a mundane plastic enclosure, it could be contained in a wood (or realistic faux wood) enclosure. Correctly designed, an LCD monitor could be made to look like a picture frame. This could be mounted on an office wall, and if the cables were easily concealable, a static image on it could trick visitors into thinking that it was an actual photograph, instead of a computer monitor. A flip phone might look like a large locket. Buttons or keys could be made to look like stone (some sci-fi shows feature "ancient" technology that uses large stone blocks as keys for an input device). Brass or other metals (or even realistic metallic paint on plastic) could be used to make keys that appear to have been made during the Victorian era or earlier. Using materials that appear to be non-technological in nature it would be possible to hide technology in enclosures that do not advertise that technology lies within. It might still be obvious that a cell phone is a cell phone, but the user (and spectators) could imagine that the device uses magic or mechanics to operate, instead of modern electronics. The appearance of the device would not break suspension of disbelief.
Now none of these options are the "best." Poorly hiding the technology is probably the cheapest option. Exposing the technology satisfies a niche, but most people would prefer it hidden. Hiding with a focus on aesthetics has worked very well for Apple, and many people like the idea of carrying a device that is clearly high tech without actually exposing the technology.
Visually transforming technology could introduce a great variety of different aesthetics, and it could revolutionize how we interact with technology, but it would also carry some initial expenses. Making technology into artwork requires real artists, not just industrial engineers trained to focus on the most practical designs. Creating all of the hardware for producing beautiful technology would be fairly expensive. Eventually, this expense would largely disappear as fabrication technology improved, and much of this hardware would be a one time cost anyway, but the art costs would still linger. Ultimately, it would pay though. There are many niche markets (some fairly large) that would make this very profitable if managed wisely. Steampunk cell phones would probably sell fairly well already, without excessive marketing costs (word can get around quickly in the Steampunk community). A Medieval theme would be popular for those involved in Renaissance Fairs and SCA, as well as for some historians. Any variety of fantasy themes could be wildly successful (a cell phone could be modeled as a magical scrying device and an LCD monitor might have a frame that would be appropriate for a magic mirror) and the sci-fi market is largely untapped here as well (just within the Stargate series, there are at least 10 alien tech aesthetics that could be highly profitable; Star Trek and Star Wars would also be quite popular). Nature based themes (a realistic wooden case, maybe even with knots protruding slightly) could be popular with the environmentalist movement, and they might even appeal to primitivists who are not opposed to using some technology. Of course, there are nearly infinite possibilities in the anime and cosplay markets. Already, case upgrades with some of these themes are popular, but case upgrades are just pretty pictures attached to the phone. They do not beautify the phone itself. Some designs would justify adding as much as $50 to the price of a phone (possibly more for larger devices), and it would probably be easy to get an extra $5 or $10 even for simpler (but realistic looking) designs. The potential for profit is very high, and there are also possible reputation boosts for companies that do this well.
The point of this is not to denigrate current technology aesthetics, but rather to point out that they do not live up to their full potential. The market for utilitarian designs and designs that "feel" modern and high tech is saturated. There are multiple markets for designs that feel low tech or even no tech, but that are still high tech on the inside. There are markets for designs that feel like sci-fi advanced tech as well as designs that feel mystical or ancient. There are even markets for designs that feel like products of nature. Tech aesthetic does not have to be all about hiding the technology. It can be about making the technology appear to be more or less than it actually is. There is a place for purely practical designs, but in a world with billions of people, there are many that want more than just practical utilitarian devices.
A friend of a friend once used the term "fashion device" to refer to a potentially useful electronic device designed to fit into a specific aesthetic. Themed aesthetics does not have to stop at hand held or wearable devices though. Even a laptop or desktop computer, an LCD TV, or a computer printer could be designed to have decorative value in addition to practical value (in fact, parts of the steampunk community have altered laptop and desktop computers to look like something straight out of Victorian England; these are currently the ultimate in useful decorations, but the potential is practically infinite). Instead of hiding technology, we could be disguising it as other things. We could be making technology look and feel like something entirely different, and we could do it without sacrificing utility. Instead of ugly blocky speakers and screens framed in mundane black plastic, we could devices that are both works of art as well as useful tools. Our houses could look like art galleries instead of collections of ugly but necessary blocks of multi-colored plastic and painted metal. Long ago, aesthetics was considered more important in household devices. In antique shops, it is sometimes possible to find sewing machines, radios, and even old television sets framed in high quality wood with artistic embellishments. Modern technology has opened up many more aesthetic possibilities. Now it is time to take advantage of them and beautify our tech culture.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)