----- Original Message ----- From: "Tony Duell" <ard at p850ug1.demon.co.uk> To: <cctalk at classiccmp.org> Sent: Friday, December 05, 2008 4:59 PM Subject: Re: The drift of a knowledge-based societ to a gadget-value-based The more we advance the more the tools we use do most of the work and the less designers need to know about what they are designing. All I see is devices that have more storage and more CPU speed so you can cram more software features into them, not exactly whole new designs using different concepts, materials, form factors, and unique thinking. You used to get more crazy stuff when one person pretty much designed everything, now that people use the same design tools and things are done in groups you tend to get the same old but slightly different. Very little general research is done anymore, and that's where people and companies used to get their ideas for new things from. TZ

Tony Duell wrote: I was going to type a huge message about this, but I'll try and keep it short... I suspect things are at the best we'll get, unless there's a radical change in the way products are designed and the consumer shops for them. The problem right now is with the consumer, who is dazzled by feature lists and shops according to face-value. Until people demand better (more serviceable, longer-lived, reliable, well-built and well-designed) products *and are willing to pay the higher initial costs for them* then we're going to be stuck with a society that thinks mediocrity is the norm. That change *might* be somewhat forced in an increasingly-populated, resource-starved planet, but it still needs people to demand better rather than demanding cheaper. (And all of this is OT, and we know Jay is alive and well, so maybe I'll just head for the bunker now :-) cheers Jules