Sebi said: "I guess a way to rephrase the question would be: 'When will they start providing services instead of products?' "
I think that's a shrewd way of looking at it, and it begs another question: When will we demand that? It's like all service. We have to support the services we want and refuse to settle for less. That means we (the end users) are the only ones who can assure sustainability; and if we don't take responsibility for that, "they" won't either. A case in point (and a perennial favorite target) is Microsoft Windows. I retired a Windows 2000 computer last year after Microsoft announced the last and most insidious irreparable security flaw in an OS that I generally liked pretty well. I'd already maxed out the RAM potential on the motherboard, and I hated to discard the computer, but it really wasn't suited for an upgrade to XP. So just for laughs I wiped the hard drive clean and installed Ubuntu Linux, which recognized and configured all hardware, configured for the existing wireless network and "just worked" from the start. I've since installed a ridiculous number of open source programs for everything from web design and graphics to desktop publishing and sound editing, and what I have now is a computer customized to my own eclectic needs. I was fretting the other day about overtaxing the only internal drive, and checked my available drive space. I was stunned to find I'm using only 11.5 gigabytes on a 60-gig drive. I'd estimate that similar software on a Microsoft system would weigh in at roughly three times that. Does anyone really think all the hardware we throw away is useless, or that all software must be endlessly expandable? That's the same thinking that gets us more laws instead of better laws. Maybe we've just accepted an irrational premise from manufacturers who measure their success in terms of production and sales, period. If so, we do have the power to change that. I think sustainable technology and sustainable design principles are increasingly important, but I don't anticipate much support from government or the business sector. The U.S. Dept. of Energy lost funding for its sustainable design initiative in 2002: http://www.pnl.gov/doesustainabledesign/index.html With a multi-trillion-dollar budget deficit, I don't see that coming back anytime soon. It would be a good niche for some forward-thinking university research, as NC State has done for universal design: http://www.design.ncsu.edu/cud/index.htm . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Posted from the new ixda.org http://www.ixda.org/discuss?post=26306 ________________________________________________________________ Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ....... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe ................ http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines ............ http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .................. http://www.ixda.org/help
