Doors of Perception Report
Quick Scan of Design and Innovation
By John Thackara
September 11, 2005

ON TIME
When we first began to organise the Doors of Perception conference
every two years, instead of annually, few among our community seemed
to notice. Nobody, at least, complained. This prompts us to ask: Did
you notice when this newsletter did not arrive on 1 September? No? We
thought not. It's for this reason that we find it more modern to send
you Doors of Perception Report when it is ready, rather than on a
fixed date. Like the Islamic calendar, it's observational, not
computational. Besides, for a near-daily fix, there's always our blog:
http://www.doorsofperception.com/

HOW THE ISLAMIC CALENDAR WORKS
http://www.math.nus.edu.sg/aslaksen/calendar/Islamic_Calendar.ppt

THE CELLULAR CHURCH
I carried two psychological burdens on the tour for my book In The
Bubble earlier this year. One was the knowledge that a competitor is
published every thirty seconds; every day I was on the road, the
ranks of new titles swelled by 2,880. My second burden was awareness
that Rick Warren's 'The Purpose Driven Life' sold 500,000 copies a
month during its first two years, and is projected to reach 100
million. I found it hard to accept that In The Bubble might not sell
so well. Now I know how Rick does it: He has built a 'Cellular
Church' that is based on small groups for whom his book is a kind of
primer. As Malcolm Gladwell explains in this week's New Yorker (12
September) Rick's small groups 'focus on practical applications of
spirituality...not on abstract knowledge, or even on ideas for the
sake of ideas themselves'.
http://www.newyorker.com/main/magazine/

CELLULAR DOORS
About one hour after reading Gladwell's article, I attended a small
group meeting of Doors persons in London. I cannot report that we
avoided discussions of abstract knowledge, or ideas for the sake of
ideas - but we had a good time. Kristi van Riet made a mini-movie.
http://www.vanriet.com/blogs/GANGES/archives/001399.html
And there are some pictures on Flikr here:
http://www.flickr.com/groups/97089260@N00
We're thinking of staging similar meet-and-greet evenings in Helsinki
(18 October) and Tokyo (31 December). Details will be announced in
this newsletter:
http://www.doorsofperception.com/mailinglist/

BRAIN BOXES
During a visit to the MIT campus a few weeks ago Doug Sery, my editor
at MIT Press, pointed out two large and expensive-looking buildings
that were being constructed to house neuroscientists. A generation
ago, the glamour building on the block was MediaLab - so I was
prompted to ask: What do these neuro guys do all day? Why are they so
well-funded? What does their work portend for the rest of us in the
medium term? Read more at:
http://www.doorsofperception.com/archives/2005/08/brain_boxes.php

DESIGNER HOBOS
How 'natural' are natural disasters? Large losses of life, and
destruction of homes and infrastructure, are regular features of
floods and hurricanes in many parts of the less developed world. The
latest, brilliantly-timed issue of Design Philosophy Papers points
out that for people, at last, these are not natural disasters at all.
They are the outcome of risky forms of settlement by large numbers of
people whose choices are limited by history and economic
circumstance. The result: More people are made refugees as a result
of the changing environment than by war or poltical conflict. In this
context, is it time to stop perceiving homeless people as a minority
underclass? Might not more of us become bums, hobos, tramps, beggars,
street kids, bag ladies, tramps and the like as climate conditions
degrade? If that happens, the survivial skills of the despised may
become highly valued.
http://www.desphilosophy.com/dpp/dpp_journal/journal.html

INFRA IS ALSO SOCIAL
Two of the most striking images from New Orleans featured
helicopters. In one shot, a helicopter is dropping 15,000 bags of
sand onto rushing waters that will obviously wash them away. In the
second, the president projects a concerned gaze onto the diaster from
a similar height. Engineering to control nature needs a social base
and political consensus to be effective - and those were missing in
New Orleans. Read more at:
http://www.doorsofperception.com/archives/2005/09/_water_wizards.php

WHERE IT'S AT: THE POLITICS OF MAPS
Massive floods in Mumbai and Maharashtra have drawn attention to a
crisis of civic infrastructure and public health in India, too. The
right of citizens to information about their environments has emerged
as an issue of public importance. Very few citizens of India enjoy
open access to maps, satellite imagery, and other geographic
information. Collected and brokered by national mapping and space
imaging agencies, these geo-data are nonetheless essential for
understanding civic issues such as planning, housing, infrastructure.
The Open Knowledge Foundation is hosting a forum at about Open Access
to State-Collected Geo-Spatial Data.
http://www.crit.org.in
http://www.freemap.in
http://www.mappinghacks.com
http://www.okfn.org/geo/

LIFELINE DESIGN
Many designers in the North want to use their skills to help people
affected by such disasters. In Project Lifeline, for example, a
multi-disciplinary team has developed a sustainable medical
assistance module designed to provid water and help in cases of
natural tragedy, war and extreme poverty. Based on a shipping
container, the system incorporates solar energy, wind generators,
water purification system, water distribution and grey water
irrigation. A prototype of the system will be presented at Next2005
in Copenhagen, Nov. 25-26
http://www.next2005.dk/
http://www.project-lifeline.org/

MEASURING WHAT MATTERS
Some papers say that rebuilding after Katrina will cost the same as
the war in Iraq. In the unlikely event that this much money is
forthcoming, what will it be spent on? Before Halliburton starts
pouring concrete for new freeways and malls, a moment's pause is in
order. A global boom in new indicators is providing us with new
criteria against which to make decisions about what we innovate, and
how we invest. An International Conference on Gross National
Happiness took place in Canada, in June; and in the UK, new ways to
measure well-being and life satisfaction - and the support systems
needed to nurture them - are being discussed in policy circles.
http://www.doorsofperception.com/archives/2005/08/modernising_wit.php
http://www.neweconomics.org/gen/z_sys_publicationdetail.aspx?pid=193

TOYS FOR THE BOYS?
After a few years in which social issues were at least visible on the
agenda, tech-push dinosaurs are regaining control of European
research policy. For example, a mesmerising shopping list of new
'research infrastructures' has been sent to the the European
Commission by a committee of top scientists. These new toys - sorry,
'tools' - range from an Extremely Large Telescope (ELT) for optical
astronomy, to a research icebreaker called Aurora Borealis, and a
facility for antiproton and ion research called FAIR. The price tags
are fair, too: they range from 'less than 100 million' euros, to one
billion-plus. It looks as if the next Information Society
Technologies (IST) programme will contain a lot of tech - but not
much soc. More at:
http://www.doorsofperception.com/archives/2005/08/toys_for_the_bo_1.php

MULTIPLATFORM WARFARE
What exactly is an 'information society' and do we want to live in
one? The European Commission proposes an 80% increase in funding for
ICT research focused on areas where Europe has recognised strengths.
These apparently include 'cooperative multiplatform warfare', a
condition that will feature 'the human control of multiple unmanned
aerial vehicles in collaborative missions'. Read more at:
http://www.doorsofperception.com/archives/2005/08/cooperative_mul.php

THE INTERNET OF OZ
For another view of what might the Internet be like in 2010, Darren
Sharp, who some of you met at Doors 8 in Delhi, co-authored of a
hefty new Australian report called Smart Internet 2010. The report
draws on sound advice from wise souls such as Cory Doctorow and
Howard Rheingold. http://www.smartinternet.com.au

PRIVACY AND HUMAN NATURE
In a review of "dark scenarios for Ambient Intelligence" (AmI). five
threats are identified in a report from a powerful European
consortium: Surveillance of users; Spamming; Identity theft;
Malicious attacks (on AmI systems); and a cultural condition they
describe as 'digital divide'. Tucked away in the references is an
impressive and, I think, important text by a philosopher, Ira Singer,
called Privacy and Human Nature. Singer writes: 'Increasing
manipulativeness, decreasing intimacy, and self-revelation in a
dehumanizing context, all sound like substantial harms. But do these
apparently trivial intrusions really do such damage?'. His
conclusion: yes, they do. Read more at:
http://www.doorsofperception.com/archives/2005/08/xray_ayes.php

SOCKS THAT SAW IT ALL
An American designer, Natalia Allen, reckons there's an emerging
'fashion tech industry'; and a Canadian artist, Joanna Berzowska, is
excited by the potential of what she calls 'soft computation':
electronic textiles, responsive clothing as wearable technology,
reactive materials and squishy interfaces. Berzowska's talk at next
month's Wearable Technologies conference, in Wales, includes a
description of 'memory rich garments'. These sound like a mixed
blessing: some of my clothes were present at occasions I'd rather
they forgot.
http://artschool.newport.ac.uk/smartclothes/wearablefutures.html

NOKIA DESIGN CHIEF: TIME TO DISCONNECT?
Next year there will be more than two billion mobile phone users in
the world. Indeed, the World Bank reckons that 77 percent of the
world's population already lives within range of a mobile network.
One access accelerator is the way service providers often sell us
handsets cheaply because we'll pay far more, later, for the
intangible service they enable us to use. Marko Ahtisaari, Nokia's
design supremo, thinks now is a good moment to reflect on where we
want to go next. "In the rush to connect we have not designed what it
means to disconnect, to tune out. How do we design to be sometimes
off in a world that is itself always on?"
http://ahtisaari.typepad.com/moia/2005/09/blogging_over_l_10.html

DESIGNING HYBRID OBJECTS
As we're seeing with mobile phones, objects play new roles in an
economy of product-service systems. Designers need new types of
knowledge, processes and tools to grapple with such novel product
genres. Researchers in product and interaction design, semantics, and
human computer interaction will discuss the design and semantics of
form and movement at an event in Newcastle, in November. Their focus:
how to exploit the combined usage of form, colour and behaviour as a
design language.
http://www.semantics.id.tue.nl/

IVREA MORPHS
I was critical of the recent decision by Telecom Italia to reduce its
support for Interaction Design Institute Ivrea, and to merge the
organisation with Domus Academy in Milan. Ivrea was just getting
intro its stride - as its end-of-year show confirmed. Ivrea's
director, Gillian Crampton Smith, has now left, but Heather Martin
and Neil Churcher have taken over the programme and will guide the
last group of students in their final year in Milan.
http://www.interaction-ivrea.it/en/news/press/photos/2005/exit/index.asp

CYCLING 'OSCARS' IN CAPE TOWN
Velo Mondial (French for 'Cycle Worldwide') is an international
organisation that promotes the use of the bicycle in all aspects of
life. The bicycle is the world's cleanest, healthiest, most
economical and most efficient form of transport, and Velo Mondial
seeks to increase its integration into the economies and lifestyles
of countries across the world. Backed by the European Commission,
Velo Mondial advises cities on ways to improve their support of
cycling, integrate cycling plans into their transport policies, and
to implement and monitor action programs. Cycling 'Oscars' will be
awarded to cities around the world with the best cycling policies at
its Cape Town event in 2006.
http://www.velomondial2006.com/

NEW MEDIA ARE HISTORY
Looking for an excuse to head for mountains that are out of reach of
floods? A conference at the Banff New Media Institute could be your
answer. Refresh! is an international conference on the histories of
media art, science and technology - from nineteenth century magic
lanterns to early experiments with sound, to nanotechnology and
biotech today. Keynote speakers include Paris-based theoretician
Edmond Couchot; São Paulo-based semiotics professor Lucia Santaella;
and Sarat Maharaj from Goldsmiths College, London. The conference is
directed by Oliver Grau, director of Immersive Art & Database of
Virtual Art, Humboldt University Berlin.September 28 to October 1,
The Banff Centre, Banff, Alberta, Canada
http://www.banffcentre.ca/bnmi/events/refresh/

HOW COOLNESS CORRUPTS
Have cultural producers become stooges of property development? A
Barcelona- based group, Yproductions, organised the Sant Andreu Free
University (SAFU) to discuss the the crisis of a Barcelona that has
become "over-branded and over-gentrified". Prices are rising so fast
that locals find it hard to continue living there, and "labour
precariousness has now become mainstream situation". Coolness, say
these critics, is not innocent, when cultural projects act as
camouflage for rampant redevelopment.
http://www.metamute.com/look/article.tpl?IdLanguage=1&IdPublication=1&NrIssue=24\
&NrSection=5&
NrArticle=1521

TRANS-SIBERIAN MOBICAST
If mobility is a new place, then this event is the place to be.
Capturing the Moving Mind is a conference on board the Trans-Siberian
train. It's about "new forms of movement and control, war and
economy, in the current situation". M-cult and Kiasma have organised
web documentation of the event as it moves from Helsinki via Moscow
and Novosibirsk to Beijing.There is also be a moving radio station on
the train.
http://www.kiasma.fi/transsiberia/
http://trans-siberianradio.org/

URBAN PLANNERS IN FUSED SPACE
Can new technology improve the quality of public space? On 21
September city and regional policymakers meet in The Hague to discuss
whether the ideas raised in last year's Fused Space design
competition might be used in real-world planning and development.
http://www.stroom.nl/engels/index.html
http://www.doorsofperception.com/archives/2005/08/wearable_techno.php

2-D CITIES
A fast-growing acreage of large digital displays pervades public
space. Can the mainly commercial use of these screens be broadened to
include cultural agendas? Come to think of it, do cultural people
have any more right than commercial types to fill up the visual
landscape with push media? Urban Screens, organised by Mirjam
Struppek, addresses these issues. Struppek has collected an
interesting array of images and project profiles at the website; if
we all add to the collection, it will become a very useful resource.
23, 24 September, Amsterdam.
http://culturebase.org/home/struppek/Homepage/urbanscreens.html

BUS TOUR OF A WIFI NETWORK
Among the speakers lined up by organiser Esme Vos for the first
Municipal Wireless Conference are Jonathan Baltuch, founder of a firm
which creates economic development blueprints for municipalities;
James Farstad, consultant to the city of Minneapolis' citywide
wireless project; Greg Richardson, who helps municipalities develop
digital communities; and Sascha Meinrath, an expert on Community
Wireless Networks (CWNs). I particularly like the offer of a
pre-conference "reality bus tour of a wifi network". San Francisco,
September 28-29.
http://www.doorsofperception.com/archives/2005/08/only_a_month_to.php
https://muniwireless.microcast.biz/conference_overview.html

HEALTH INFORMATION: BLACK HOLE, OR BRIGHT PROSPECT?
Billions of euros (the published figure is two, the likely total is
15) are being spent by the UK's National Health Service in a new
attempt to digitise and integrate patient medical records. Insiders
tell me the latest project is doomed to fail, as did previous
attempts, because turf-wars between professionals and managers, in
different parts of the country, remain unresolved. In the US, the
management of personal health information is perceived to be a better
business opportunity. Esther Dyson, who is organising a seminar on
the subject, says "health information liquidity is the ability of
that information to move around, relatively friction-free, to where
it is most useful and relevant: Many of those records can be
aggregated (with proper privacy protection) for use in public health,
epidemiology and evidence-based medicine of all kinds".
http://www.release1-0.com/events/phiindex.cfm

HEALTHY PROFITS
A forthcoming Healthcare Communications Forum in the US steers clear
of patient records to concentrate on essentials: invoices for
payment. 'Healthcare providers are spending fortunes producing bills
and statements that baffle and frustrate most consumers' says the
blurb for the seminar. The motto of the Forum's main sponsor, Art
Plus Technology, is: 'Financial Documents Are Fun. Financial
Documents Are Exciting'.
http://home.insightforums.com/insight/HCF2005/session_descr.htm

INFRA FOR FOOD
If we are to re-localise food, a new generation of information
systems will be needed as support. Many of today's food systems rely
on closed networks in which access to information is controlled by
entities (such as supermarkets) that are not keen on cooperatives and
localisation. The good news is that open source software for food
systems are already emerging. Read more at:
http://www.doorsofperception.com/archives/2005/08/infra_for_food.php

HOW TOOTHS POLLUTE
If you are worried about the cost of living, try the cost of dying.
The cost of the average cremation in Britain is expected to rise by
up to £100 (160 euros) after a government announcement that it wants
to halve the amount of mercury released into the atmosphere by
crematoria. Read more at:
http://www.doorsofperception.com/archives/2005/08/how_tooths_poll.php

ONLY LOSERS WEAR STRIPED SHIRTS
A gift from Brenda Laurel has cost me dear. The eminent design
professor at Art Center, in California, sent me a copy of a new
report called 'Tweens: Technology, Personal Agency, Engagement'. The
book is an intriguing portrait of Californian tweens (ages 11-14):
How they think, feel. act, and relate to each other and the world. A
knowing 12-year-old is quoted saying that 'only losers wear striped
shirts'. So I now have to find a loser to give about seven of mine to.
http://www.doorsofperception.com/archives/2005/08/only_losers_wea.php

EMUDE IN EINDHOVEN
An exhibition about social innovation among creative communities in Europe
takes place at the Technical University during Dutch Design Week in
Eindhoven (October 17 - 21). On October 18 Philips Design will host
a seminar that will include Ezio Manzini, Stefano Marzano and John
Thackara, facilitated by Josephine Green. Details:
ange.dunselman@...
http://www.weekvanhetontwerp.nl/

PLEASE DON'T DELUGE DEAL
A plaintive request arrives from London: Diana Deal, conferences
administrator at the Victoria and Albert Museum, has been 'deluged
with emails' about the Critical Debate between Rem Koolhaas and
myself on 14 October - but it's not Diana's job to sell tickets. For
that, please email: bookings.office@...


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