James L Adams—People and Products

The Internet and Quality

In my last post I talked a bit about Evgeny Morozov’s book To Save Everything Click Here: The Folly of Technological Solutionism.  His concern is with the interaction of what he calls solutionism and what he calls internet-centrism.  He is worried that our present love affair with the internet will cause our solutionist tendencies (solve all problems) to decrease the quality of our life through our attempts to  increase efficiency through the use of the internet .  The last sentence of the postscript of his book finishes with “it would be deeply ironic if humanity were to die in the crossfire as its problem solvers attempted to transport that very humanity to a trouble-free world”.  His book is a macro-look at the internet

 One can also take more of a micro-look, and question whether the internet is a high quality product or not.  It is, of course, a work in progress, but in my opinion it faces a number of problems.  There is little if any quality control of much of the material being placed on the internet, and no apparent mechanism to exert any (internet freedom?).  Nor is there any mechanism to delete material over time.  The result is an ever-expanding quantity of material that is outrunning the ability of browsers, and perhaps the human mind.  Some locations (Wikipedia) depend on high information quality, although as time passes, one questions the value of some of the information included.  And how about the increasing number of blogs, web pages, and other material on the internet that are the property of people not keeping the material up to date, or even perhaps dead, to say nothing of poorly done videos that will never go away.

Of course businesses operating over the internet must be careful with the usual financial, ethical, and regulatory constraints that limit them.  But how about promotion?  The book business is a good example.  It is now estimated that there are over one half million self published books appearing in the U.S. each year.  Many (most?) of these are promoted by the author, and sold over the internet.  Most sell very few copies (see article). The amount and quality of the promotion is a function of the author, and not especially the book’s contents. I am not about to sort through this amount of material without guidance from established publishers and critics.  I believe in expertise. And I know enough about books not to epecially trust the comments on Amazon's pages, especially if they are concerned with self-published books.

 And my experience with social networking shows me more quantity than quality.  Maybe if I were truly dedicated I would somehow figure out how to communicate in more depth with more people I would really like to, but I just do not want to spend the time combing through huge numbers of tweets and posts to figure out who they are and how to do so.  I am also not supremely motivated, because many people I like to communicate with either no longer or never have played the game.

Finally there is the apparent attempt to support this ever-growing internet activity through advertising and selling “big-data”.  Looking at past experience with everything from road signs through college sports to present advertising on the internet, I conclude that advertising must make money, but taken to extremes, decreases the aesthetic quality of life. I reached the point many years ago of going out of my way not to buy products whose advertisements pollute the visual or aural environment or annoy me in other ways.  Certainly some ads on the internet have already reached that point and are becoming increasingly sophisticated in resisting removal so that one can see the desired page. Anybody worrying about that? 

 And as we know, there is increasing questioning of “big data”.

Evgeny Morozov "To Save Everything Click Here" book

I mentioned this book in a post a bit ago, and announced that I had ordered it and would report on it.  The book was  deeper and more thought provoking than I expected, so I have just finished it.  I thoroughly agree with the first comment on the back, by Bruce Sterling, which reads “For the brilliant dissident Evgeny Morozov, computers are like broken beach-toys on the dark, historic tides of power  politics.  His new book should be bound in sandpaper and used to abrade the works of other Internet pundits”. Clicking on the appropriate image in the recommended readings to the right will give more information on the book.

 But the book is far from a rant.  Morozov has an interesting viewpoint, since he grew up in Belarus as the Soviet Union was unraveling, and has gone from a born-again believer in the power of the Internet to being a critic.  His understanding of the internet is obvious, as are his hopes that it will better aid the cause of liberal democracy.

 The book is beautifully written and argued, and in my mind overdue. His last book, entitled “The Net Delusion”, concerned the use of the Internet initially as a tool to overthrow dictators and support democracy, but later as a tool by these various dictators to strengthen their grip by such things as enhancing their propaganda ability and identifying and destroying opposition.  This, of course, was an unwelcome message to those who believe that the internet will cause all seven billion of us to understand each other, agree on important issues, and, to borrow a word that is losing its very meaning because of the Internet, be friends.

 In this new book, he first of all takes a swing at what he calls Solutionism — the belief that everything can (and should) be made “better” (often defined by the solutionist).  He singles out engineers as being staunch believers in this, and being one, I think we are guilty.  He does an excellent job of demonstrating that some things. such as politics, have been criticized for as long as recorded history, but they don’t seem to have been replaced by any of the  communication “miracles” or other technological “breakthroughs” of the past.  In fact, he argues in favor of the very human and messy character of much large-scale human interaction, and although he believes that the Internet is an important tool in aiding these interactions, he obviously does not believe in its ability to replace such things.   

 His next argument is against changing our societies to match the present structure and goals of the Internet .  It is, after all, a work in progress, and our activities should not be structured and simplified to fit its present abilities. I very much resonate to his argument.  At one point in my Stanford career I became chair of the then struggling program in Science, Technology, and Society.  I learned, to my surprise and pleasure, that even though I had practiced and taught engineering for 30 years, I knew very little about the history and character of technology, or about the unsuccessful history of movements often described as technocracy.

 One rule of thumb often used by historians of technology is that it takes at least 50 years for a new technology to mature.  I am a believer.  My first brush with computers was about 50 years ago, and it consisted of giving structures problems to a programmer who in turn would feed my problems to a large mainframe, which resulted in an answer after several days.  Look at where we are now.  But yet we are just scratching the surface of how to use them in a way that is more consistent with society. The internet has been under construction for over 50 years, but the World Wide Web, which made the Internet accessible to most of us, dates from 1989. That was only 25 years ago.  Such things as social networking and attempting to combine unbiased information with marketing are in their infancy.  The internet will continue to develop, and must do so in a direction that better serves humans, or it will become a more complex version of network TV. 

 The majority of the book is full of cases, stories, and predictions of problems that have and will result from too much belief in what Morozov calls cyber-utopianism.  I am going to talk more about this book and the internet in my next post, but anyone making use of the Internet, and especially people designing and manufacturing the software and hardware involved in it, should read the book, not rely on me to interpret it.  I found it a very impressive work, whether one agrees with the author or not (many in Silicon Valley will not), and am jealous that I cannot write books like it. 

 

 

 

 

Stanford Good Products Bad Products course final presentations

During the final class meeting, there were four presentations on companies that made products that the students found noteworthy in the context of my book.  One of these was on cultural fit, one on aesthetics, and two on the topic of global fit.

 The product having to do with cultural fit was Pabst Blue Ribbon beer. It was once a very popular U.S. beer, went into decline, and has come back as a counter-cultural beer, being “discovered” by urban hipsters.  It does not do conventional beer promotion, rather having become visible in its counter-culture role through alternate and sometimes outrageous means (such as being included in "South Park").  A good blurb on it is on Wikipedia here.

 The aesthetic topic was Coolbeams spectracles glasses (here), yet another Kickstarter start-up.  I have to give Kickstarter (here) credit for having a major influence on at-least Stanford students. It does seem to fill the gap for many people between reasonably thought-out ideas and market feasibility test.

 One of the the global fit products was Blue Bottle Coffee, a high-end coffee company that stresses dealing directly with the producers and stressing sustainable and organic farming and paying reasonable wages. Again we learned to taste in a different way.  We prepared the coffee provided by the group in the proper way, and tasted it by slurping it from a spoon, apparently a process making one more sensitive to the odor.  Newly sophisticated, I drank my morning coffee at home by slurping it from the cup, acquiring worried looks from my wife—perhaps there is a social factor involved.

 The other had to do with the tremendous (and unsustainable?) use of resources by agriculture, and featured a substitute egg powder for cooking use named Beyond Eggs,  made entirely from chemicals (no chickens).  Apparently 30% of all eggs go into cooking, and as you are undoubtedly aware, there is some controversy about commercial chicken farming. We were given chocolate chip cookies to compare baked by the group with regulare eggs and Beyond Eggs, and the class generally could not tell the difference. Beyond Eggs is due to hit the market about now.

The course ended with an open ended discussion between the instructors and the students.  The instructors were highly pleased with the course, as was I, since my Good Products Bad Products book does its intended job very well.  For the final time, I encourage you, if you have not done so, to check out the individual student "good products bad products" choices here (click on the title to get the complete essay on any one). 

And if you have any questions about this  splendid course contact Professor Dave Beach, ([email protected]).  

More Stanford Good Products Bad Products course presentations

This post covers four more presentations in the course on companies/products that students consider to produce good products, or at least provocative ones.  They were on the Symbolism and Cultural fit, Aesthetics, Elegance, and Sophistication, and Global Fit chapters of my book.  Once again the presentations were excellent.  I never cease to be impressed by Stanford students.

 The first presentation was on the cultural significance of the “fixie”, or fixed gear bike – light weight, one speed, no free wheel (pedals cannot be stopped while bike is moving), often only one or no brakes. (see the Wikipedia page here).  The pure form is used in track racing, less exotic ones (originally hand assembled from available parts) became symbolic of New York messengers, then hipsters, and now of a more widely spread culture, including quite a few Stanford students. “Fixies”can now be purchased in all formats from “pure” to including brakes, and even gears concealed in the rear hub (if you are in the culture, you may hiss).

 The second was on a startup named Radian (description here), which produces a nifty camera addition that allows time-lapse and scanned photography.  The culture is of course people who like photography. Each year this course costs me money since I discover a product I need, and this is my 2013 investment.

 The third was Cloud Nine olive oil (Elegance and Sophistication).  This is a small family owned and run business in Monterey county California, that produces very high grade olive oil. The presentation included not only samples to taste, but detailed instructions on how to properly taste olive oil. Website here.

 The fourth was on the Brompton folding bicycle (here) and concerned with the environmental advantages of such transportation.  This is an expensive, but extremely high grade machine that easily folds and unfolds to an amazingly small and easily carried package.  It was demonstrated by a person from a bicycle store, who claims that at one time he felt a bit uncomfortable riding it in public (small wheels and frame, etc), but now loves it so much he doesn’t care what other bikers think about him—he feels sorry for them because they don’t have one.

 

Another good day!

 

Needs, Emotions, Aesthetics, and Electricity

  I’m a bit late on this post because of a power outage during  the late afternoon and evening, which caught me with an uncharged portable and a dead desktop.  But it gave me a chance to think about our increasing dependency upon electricity, and the aging state of much U.S. infrastructure.  As to dependency, I can remember  power outages when I was a kid, and we would ignore them during the daytime, and light a few candles if at night.  But my normally fast moving wife is slowed down due to some recent surgery, and has been entertaining herself watching movies on the TV and working on her computer.  And I, of course, have become computer dependent.  Throw in our major dependency on such things as the microwave, the coffee maker, and other such modern marvels, and without electricity, we are much less impressive animals, and perhaps are less amused sitting around in the dark talking to each other.

 As to infrastructure, our power outages probably have something to do with a large construction project going on close to our house. A couple of years ago there was a gas main explosion in San Bruno, a town fairly close to where we live.  Eight people were killed and a number of homes burned.  As a result Pacific Gas and Electric (our supplier) has been doing a survey of gas pipelines, and guess what, a fairly main street close to our house has been ripped up for several months to replace  a large gas pipeline (looks like 18 inches in diameter or so), which of course is buried close to other utilities. the job is requiring massive amounts of huge equipment and numbers of people.  As I wait to be waved through the often one-way traffic, I cannot help but think about the many other elements of U.S. infrastructure that need upgrading, and the cost of doing so.

 Back to the Stanford Good Products Bad Products course.  The quarter is coming to an end and the student groups continue to report on businesses that produce products that they feel demonstrate the elements of quality in my book.  On March 7, reports were delivered on three products that have high emotional impact and fulfill various needs.  The first was Gatorade (website here), which has evolved over time from being seen as a functional replacement of electrolytes, to being a symbol of heroic accomplishment (often consumed in victorious glee and sometimes thrown on coaches).   The second was Klutz (here), a company that produces products that are both educational and fun and show a profitable use of humor.  The third was perfume, the presentation focusing on the making of perfume, but mentioning several companies that have become famous for a particular scent (Chanel #5?)

 The fourth presentation focused on aesthetics and on a Kickstart funded startup that makes a pillow entitled the Ostrich Pillow, which is intended for better nap-taking during normally awake times.  This resulted in some excellent class discussion ranging from the advantages of better support and comfort to take such naps (in class?) to the rather strange appearance of the pillow.  You can see the reasons by looking at the website here.  I guarantee you will have a reaction!. All in all another excellent day of presentations – lots of products to pass around, good use of media, etc. 

  I will write a couple more posts on presentations and then a final wrap up of the class, and then go on to other product quality comments.  I once again recommend the blog site here containing a large number of individual student nominations of good and bad products for an insight to present university student values,  some interesting and provocative products, and the range of quality in our industrial output. 

Go Ford!

There is an Interesting article in the March 10 Automobiles section of the Sunday New York Times describing the one liter three cylinder engine that will power the Fiesta and be available for the Mondeo. It is here.   The engine is capable of producing 123 horsepower and 148 foot pounds of torque, with 90% of the maximum torque available at only 1500 rpm.  I realize this is far from the most powerful engine in town, but my 1956 Austin Healey engine produced only 90 horsepower, and the car was a delight to drive, could break 100 mph, and garnered me a number of speeding tickets and the right to compete in amateur road races. Think of 132 horses pulling on your car.  It should move just fine. And think of the weight saved in the car. The article mentions that the weight of the cast-iron block is only 52 pounds, and that one was taken to a show as regular luggage in a suitcase (see photo in article.}

 It is wonderful to see U.S. auto companies expanding  the envelope of their products.  When motorcycles began to radically improve their engine performance a number of years ago (many are now in the 200 hp range) I wondered why so  little was going on with U.S.automobiles.  We seemed happy to be driving around with moderately modified  V-8’s and straight sixes for many years. 

 Whether you like small cars or not, (there is an article on coming Toyota Yari in the same issue which claims the new model is great fun to drive, calling it a “grippy little monster on curving roads”) it is exciting to be able to choose from a greater selection, and find that 40 mpg is obtainable from gasoline power after all. 

 What is driving this increased diversity?  Certainly competition. Probably boredom with SUV’s and cumbersome sedans.  Also re-discovery of the fun of driving and ease of parking small, responsive cars.  A Ford person I know told me that the gasoline engine people are feeling neglected in light of all the attention being  paid to electrified automobiles and showing off their capabilities.   But finally, increased federal mileage requirements play a role, as they have before.

 It is interesting that industry seems almost automatically to fight government regulations, and then often makes money complying with them.  The automobile mileage regulations are typical.  After resisting them strongly, U.S. automohile companies seem to rapidly comply with them, with improved results for all.  It does not seem to be technical ability that stands in the way, but rather inertia and complacency—and the desire to put money into profit, rather than investing on the development of new and improved products.

Stanford Good Product Bad Products course final presentations

The last few sessions of the Course ME 314 are dedicated to the final presentations by student groups on the topics in Chapters 4 through 9 of my Good Products Bad Products book.  The class is divided into groups of four, and each group is given ten minutes for their presentation followed by ten minutes of question and comments from the other students and faculty.  Professor Dave Beach, the teacher of the class, is a hawk on memorable, media intensive, and entertaining talks.  He also encourages the teams to bring examples to class to be passed around, and so far the teams have been on target on all of these.  I have listened to innumerable presentations in schools, businesses, professional groups, and many other environments, and would that they all had been as memorable, media intensive, and entertaining as these.

 The students are asked to find a company that delivers a product in their area of very high quality, and report on the company and product.  So far eight groups have given presentations.  I obviously cannot go into detail on each presentation in a post to a blog, but I will list the topics and give you a link to a web page if one exists.

Four of the first eight presentations were on the topic of human fit – physical, sensory, and cognitive compatibility between the product and the humans using it.  The products were the Boosted Board electrically powered skateboard  with a range of 6 miles on a charge and a top speed of 20 mph, the off-road version of  the Segway vehicle, the Boobypack, a bra somewhat between a sports bar and a bikini top with two pockets to carry such things as a cell phone and credit cards, and a toy under development that allows the user to construct three dimensional structures using various plastic pieces and rubber bands.  The latter is not far enough along to be a company with a web site, but although meant for a younger age group (3 to 7), the students in the class seemed quite fascinated with sample structures they were given to play with. The first three products are well documented in the linked websites.  As a sign of the present age, one of the products (the skateboard) has been developed by Stanford alumni, another (the toy) is being developed by a Stanford graduate student.

 The next three presentations were on the topic of craftsmanship, and focused on Tcho chocolate, Yogitoes yoga towel , and Riddell football helmets.  Chocolate was furnished to everyone for the first, and yoga and helmet demonstrations accompanied the next two.  I gained personally from the chocolate presentation.  I like chocolate so much that I chew it up rapidly and swallowed it.  I learned that if you just leave it in your mouth on your tongue, you can taste it for a very long time before it all melts.  I am trying to learn to do this, in spite of the fact that it is so satisfying to just gulp it down. The demonstrations were very noteworthy  because they involved large and rapid movements in a very small space.

 The eighth presentation was on the topic of emotion and products, and focused on the Kaeng Raeng detox drink.  This is a drink that comes as  a box of powder containing vitamins, proteins, and other “natural” products, and is mixed with water and drunk in lieu of food for a period (3 days? 6 days?).  It is alleged to make you feel better, lose weight, and be healthier.  Upon tasting it, the students in the class were somewhat unconvinced, but the group giving the presentation were quite positive about the product, and the product is obviously loved (emotion) by many people, Products such as this often have a positive emotional affect on people above and beyond nutritional effects – think of spas and meditation.  And positive emotions do seem to correspond to health.

 But I have noticed one bad product in all of this — the adapters needed to connect portable computers to the projection system in the room. The projection system is equipped with a VGA plug —somewhat standard.  It would be nice if no adapters were needed.  But computers (especially Apple’s portables) have smaller plugs, and they seem to become smaller with each version.  If there is one  thing I learned in my aerospace days, it is that larger connectors are more reliable over time.  The adapters to the smaller plugs seem to become intermittent over time, and of course get lost, confused (which one is mine?), and sometimes simply don’t work. 

I used to think Kodak Carousel projects tripped up presentations.  But my experience at giving talks and lectures via digital equipment is that we are gaining in being able to make, organize, and store slides , but losing in system simplicity, especially in places we have not used before—I  have mentioned the "smart" panels in some of the new  buildings at Stanford before. Woe be unto the person unaquainted with these  panels who walks for the first time into a room containing one of them naively expecting to figure out how to show slides without help from a native.  

Problem solving, the internet, and Evgeny Morozov

This post is a bit late because I lost my wallet for the first time in my life this weekend, and have been spending my time ever since communicating with banks, AAA, the Department of Motor Vehicles, and various other agencies which I need to cancel things and send me new ones.  DO NOT EVER LOSE  YOUR WALLET.  In fact, take it out now and remove everything that you don’t regularly use and that you would have to replace if you lost the damn thing—especially if you would have to deal with the DMV.   It turns out that lots of people have lost theirs or had it stolen at some time or another—they just don’t admit it until you let them know you are a member of the club.

 In my next post I will bring you up on the final student presentations in the Stanford Good Products Bad Products course.  The first four were very good indeed.  But in this post I would like to say a few words about an article in the March 3 New York Times that I found both provocative, and enjoyable.  The title of the article was “The Perils of Perfection”, by Evgeny Morozov, and it is here.

 I enjoyed it because living in the midst of the Stanford /Silicon Valley success story, I am surrounded by people and companies extremely enthusiastic and optimistic about the long-term wonderful effects upon humankind of computers and internet and their ability to handle important and difficult social problems. This article is drawn on a book entitled “To Save Everything, Click Here:  The Folly of Technological Solutionism”. (Morozov also wrote “The Net Delusion: The Dark Side of the Internet”.)  I find his critical attitude toward the wonders of the internet to be a wonderful counterpoint to the general values of my environment.

 I like the description of engineers as “solutionists”.   It is to some extent true.  I have a good  friend who is an eminent historian (Pulitzer Prize, etc.).  He refers to engineers as “meddlers” rather than “solutionists”.  He and his fellow historians feel that they are trying to understand societies, and engineers are knowingly or unknowingly trying to change them. I am an engineer and have worked all of my professional life finding solutions to problems. To  the extent that I have succeeded I have been a meddler.  But these problems have been relatively straight-forward, and solutions could be found that pleased most people involved.  I do not believe that all problems have solutions of this sort, and certainly not solutions that please everyone {the "perfect" solution}.  Congress is finding that out with regard to problems having to do with medical care, employment, balancing the budget, etc.etc.etc.  What improves the situation for some, makes it worse for others.  Complicated situations involving manyp eople can be improved, but perfect “right” answers are unlikely.

 There is much hope among some of the digerati that ever increasing communication (social networking) and new software allowing the formation of independent political groups and poll-taking (Morozov mentions a software program named Seesaw) will allow answers to be found that will result in solutions to such complicated and critical problems that will please all. I don’t, because different human values and interests are involved and if some people are pleased, others won’t be. Taxes are a good example.

 Morozov goes further and quotes from an essay named “In Praise of Inconsistency” written by the philosopher Leszek Kolakowski,  The  author of this feels that disagreement among  people as to the proper course to take is “the only hope for the human race”.  I won’t go further.  Read and think about Morizov’s essay in the  link above.  I have ordered the book.  I will use it to pick on students and my friends who have been born again by the internet.