speculative design introduction
DESCRIPTION
A quick introduction to the notion of speculative design for a pop-up class called "The Decay of Digital Things" at Stanford's d.school.TRANSCRIPT
SPECULATIVE DESIGNThe Decay of Digital Thingsdecay.io/dschool Elizabeth Goodman, Andrew Lovett-Baron, Maryanna Rogers
SPECULATIVE CULTURE
“The way that our society imagines itself through its forward-looking disciplines”— Bruce Sterling
Blade Runner
“When people think of design, most believe it is about problem solving. […] There are other possibilities for design: one is to use design as a means of speculating how things could be — speculative design.”
Speculative design image goes here
Dunne + RabyEnergy Futures
WHAT IS SPECULATIVE DESIGN?
Dunne + RabySpeculative Everything, p2
A TAXONOMY OF FUTURES
Redrawn from Speculative Everything redrawing Stuart Candy
DESIGN FICTION
“During the Indian Civil War, the Dharavi slums of Mumbai were flooded with refugees looking to escape the conflict. The Mumbai authorities, distracted by defence of the city and facing an already over-populated and poverty stricken slum could do little to maintain a semblance of civilised life in the area. Sometime later a cache of biological samples appeared through the criminal networks of Mumbai, in the vain hope that it might provide new marketable narcotic opportunities. The collective drive and expertise of the refugees managed to turn theses genetically-engineered fungal samples into a new type of infrastructure providing heat, light and building material for the refugees. Dharavi rapidly evolved its own micro-economy based around the mushrooms.”
Tobias RevellNew Mumbai
Open questions
THE AESTHETICS OF SPECULATION
SuperfluxSong of the Machine
Near Future LaboratoryCorner Convenience
Open questions
EVALUATING OUTCOMES
SPECULATIVE DESIGN SHOULD…“open up all sorts of possibilities that can be discussed, debated, and used to collectively define a preferable future for a given group of people: from companies, to cities, to societies.”
Speculative Everything, p6
The Extrapolation Factory99¢ Futures
Open questions
WHOSE FUTURES?
Neil BeloufaKempinski
TO SUM UPSpeculative design is…
Intended to be provocative rather than predictive or prescriptive
Illustrative of relationships of production, consumption, and circulation
Instantiated in objects as well as words
Amy CongdonBiological Atelier: “Extinct”