What exactly makes us say that something is „very well designed“ and what is it that makes us say: „This design is a mess!“ We could look at Design as a form of organisation that happens naturally or is man-made. There are certain forms, typologies and shapes that we take for a more or less stable, more or less distinguishable unit. The horse, the tree, the city, the electrical grid , the computer network, etc. When we see that unit, we are usually not inclined to say „My, that horse is very well designed or organised!“ Horses are what they are, their design follows a genetic script, the horse is an organism that has developed over millions of years, and all its’ internal organisation is „natural“, which means, it is „self-organised“. The grand design for a horse has never been made by someone. Nobody ever said: This animal will look like that and it will operate in this way and now, let’s build it. The principles that led to the existence of horses are the same that have led to all other natural phenomena. Horses are optimised to live in a certain environment. That’s why Shetland ponies are smaller and heavily coated. Generally, a colder and harsher climate leads to smaller and more „compact“ organisms, due to the requirements of energy efficiency. Energy efficiency is one intrinsic design property of all living things. Think coniferous trees that use needles instead of leaves. Having said that, one should recognise that this property alone stands in sharp contrast to the capitalist principle of maximising profit. Then comes the city. Here it gets a bit more complicated. Where does the city begin, where does it end? Are there clear boundaries? Traffic is a mess, but does that mean that the city is a mess, too? The city center has been build in the 13th century, so how can it be NOT a mess with all today’s traffic? The environment for the city has changed, so its actual state is not optimised for the new environment. Because of a changing environment, you need a high potency for flexibility. Is that flexibility already designed into the structure of ____________ (whatever it is that you are building) ? The human brain has a remarkable potency for flexibility and adaptation. It can „upgrade“ quite easily, compared to other, man-made operating systems, like computer networks or electrical grids. These are rather rigid and actually very vulnerable, as the latest blackout in South America has shown. (the two are actually co-dependent - as in "CDM = co-dependent mess" - which makes both of them even more vulnerable) . So, if you want to survive and thrive in the digital habitat, remember that, unlike the natural habitat, that operates with the principles of energy efficiency and some degree of flexibility (like, for example, mobility), the design of the digital habitat is man-made and that makes it rather rigid, it’s not energy efficient and its organisation is most probably not „intrinsic“.
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AuthorThomas Behrens Visual Communication is not only taking part in the digital transformation - actively and passively - he will also reflect on it. Hence the blog. Archives
January 2021
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