DSDN 171 assignment 9

My belief is that the ideological message behind most design today seems to be very orientated towards the catering to many but making individual.  What this means is designing objects that while mass produced and basically the same, can be modified to almost get the exact experience that the user wants.  The message seems to be that while everyone is different, we all basically want the same thing.

Vid.1

This idea is used as a selling point in many products especially technological devices such as phones and laptops.  The above example of this is the iPhone.  This advertisement from earlier this year uses the world "you" a lot.  This is a way of selling to the audience a design which while designed for everyone, is specifically for you.  This is the same with most mobile devices these days, almost every advertisement  for these product uses the word "you" at least three times.  The reason for this is people are more likely to go and by this product for themselves rather than just having one for the family because it is for the individual, so the company makes more money.  When you think about it still supports the mind set between the 50's and 70's of consumerism, as seen in Pavitt's text[2], but on a larger scale.  Instead of selling just to the lady of the house hold who does the shopping, they are selling to everyone and getting a larger consumer base because of this.

Reference.
Vid. 1   ??(2011, March 26). Apple Pub : iPhone 4 TV Ad Retina Display (VO - Mars. 2011 - HD)[video file]. Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ruJFBf83k9g




[2]          Pavitt, J. (2008). Design and the Deomocratic Ideal, Cold War Modern: Design 1945-1970 (pp. 72-91) London: V&A Publishing.

DSDN 171 Assignment 8

I agree with Hannes Mayer's argument that design is a product of science driven by new technology and the potential to mass produce the design.  It is because of this view point that we have most of things we do today. For example, if designers had not used the technology of computers and designed them in such a way that they could be produced for the masses at a good price, the world would be a very different place.  Although I agree with this the is one thing that I believe that Mayer missed and that was the influence of art.

Fig 1

I believe that design to today is a combination of both art and science.  Science is very important as it tells designers how to make an object with a function that works.  For example, the above picture is of Microsoft DOS(Disc Operating System)  While it had the same functionality of more visual operating systems these days, it was not immediately obvious where to go if you wanted something, as you had to call commands to find things.  This is where the art comes in.  Artist know how to convey a narrative to an observer so applying this to the design of an operating system they were able to make it so that the operating systems became more intuitive and needed less prior knowledge to use.

For science to do something for the masses it needs art to interpret it so that they can understand what science has done, in turn art needs science to give it a reason greater than just making beautiful things.  Design in the combination of this, so that the discoveries of humanity can be put to use by the greater population.

References


Benjamin, W. (1992). The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction (pp. 211-244 ) in Illuminations, trans. Harry Zohn. London: Fontana.


Fig 1: Edward H.(2002) "MS-DOS Prompt MemoryCheck" Retrieved September 23, 2011, from http://www.subsowespac.org/sh_xp/silent_hunterxp.shtml

DSDN 171 Assignment 7

I believe that a "symbolic universe" for this era  would be the one based on a structure of communication.  In a world where communities/families can be separated by thousands of miles, something that is happening more often as people have to look elsewhere for jobs, communication is becoming of bigger importance as people want to keep in touch.

One instance of this is social media websites such as Facebook and Twitter.  People use these to keep in contact with people who they cannot see in person often, such as friends and family overseas.  People also use it to try and contact people who they would normally not be able to contact, such as celebrities.  They also play games with each other over vast distances.  The communications of today allow the world to be almost one community.

The media and designers are helping the world become this one community by designing faster and cheaper communications that become more accessible and easy to use allowing more people to keep in contact with the ones they know and also meet new people of similar likes.

DSDN 171 Assignment 6

I agree with Benjamin's argument that asking for the authentic print of a print of a photo is pointless.  This is because there is no one authentic print as many copies have been made and they should be all of around the same quality and all portray the same style of the photographer due to them being copies.  It may be worth asking for the original negatives, but even then until they are processed into prints there is very little  aesthetic worth in the negatives, unlike an original painting which has the style of the artist only in the original.

In this era of digital design and manufacture I also believe there is no role of authenticity in the products.  This is because even when the authentic digital copy of a program or a song is even moved from one folder to another the file is copied to the location.  This means that the authentic copy can not be moved around with out technically becoming non-authentic.  The only thing that could be asked for that could be considered original is the first disc made of the software or print of the image but even then it would basically be the same thing if you bought the second or the third so there is very little point.

Authenticity does not have a role in todays digital media due to every copy being the same as the first and still conveying the exact same ideas that the creator had when the made the "original" copy.

Reference


Benjamin, W. (1992) The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction (pp. 211-244 ) in Illuminations, trans. Harry Zohn. London: Fontana.