B U R N

For the past couple of days I have been helping out with Designing for Services, a series of collaborative workshops bringing together social scientists, service designers and technologists in order to rethink the practice and concept of service - who might benefit from what and how?

For me, it represents a joyful return to the more practically orientated days of user involvement, prototyping, and all the interesting stuff that makes technologies take off. Only difference now is that we are not dealing with tangible outcomes.

When academics speak of interdisciplinarity, it usually involves getting together with people (other academics!) who are slightly different than themselves. Slightly. In this case, however, the divergence is felt in every single interaction, making it an ideal setting for contestation and re-negotiation of knowledges.

Very interesting.

Here is a post to get your brain going on this fine Saturday.

The Economist: Voting with your trolley, can you really change the world just by buying certain foods?

This story, adopting a very critical stance on the alleged advantages of organic, Fairtrade and locally produced consumer goods, has spawned a hell of a lot of debate in the past week.

Whereas the green movement is indeed caught up in a lot of hype, I do not think the Economist has done a very good job in unpacking the myths. The article does not engage critically with any of the arguments put forth, which should, of course, be the hallmark of journalism of this particular nature. Nevertheless, it works well as a provocation piece.

I do not have the time to write a comprehensive response, but several people have already attempted to do so:

Nullbull: Organic Food is Bad for the Environment - The Economist’s Sloppy Logic

Matthias Stürmer: Two Unbelieveably Weak Articles in the Economist

I love letters, and I can hardly think of anything more stylish than a handwritten note on thick yellowish paper, delivered in a wax sealed envelope. That said, I acknowledge that there are other, equally sophisticated(!), ways of conveying seasonal greetings: (more…)

Last night I attended a pre-Christmas celebration, Dutch style.

Among the entertaining events was a gift-exchange ceremony, in which all participants gave and received a present and even better a short poem. On the basis of these, you were supposed to identify the person responsible for your little surprise. It took me a few attempts before I managed to establish the right connection.

How was I to know that Remco, a rocket scientist and moon connoisseur (yay!), was born with a talent for lyrics. If you take away the flattering remarks, we were in a social setting after all, I believe his poem depicts my personality fairly well. This is what he wrote: (more…)