JUST 3.007 THINGS
Brainstorming, Brainstorming and Brainstorming. That is what design is all about… right?
Before this week we were focused broadly on two target audiences: those with sleep onset insomnia and the elderly. But through rounds and rounds of discussion we end up going in with three broad categories during our weekly meeting with our Prof. They were( briefly) : optimising nap quality for workers/students, providing lighting systems for room-sharing people and solving the issue that elderly do not have sufficient exposure to natural light. You must be thinking how did we create several new monsters to work with. The can be simplified to : #justDesignThings.
#justDesignThings
In a desperate search for a new function or interaction that light can provide our potential users, we used a new way of brainstorming which involves us writing what we want to see in our product on post its and subsequently categorising them into two categories: function and interaction. From my perspective, I think this process was how we open another dimension in the realm of sleeping – napping.
On the topic of napping, we scour the internet for any information about napping. Pssh what more can we know about napping right? I do it, you do it, everyone does it. Turns out, there are PLENTY of research done on napping and here are just few fun facts I feel obliged to share just because I am such a nap enthusiast:
- There are 2 types of nappers – non-habitual and habitual nappers
- It is a CONSTITUTIONAL RIGHT in China that workers are given time for an afternoon nap!!
- The stigma against napping is disappearing ( yay to all nappers around the world )
We consulted our TA, Hanbo several times this week ( despite his busy schedule ) and he gave us so much inspiration when we faced a road block in our brainstorming process. I will leave you with this quote he said with regards to how our product should aspire to be :
“Simple, elegant,effective”
Sometimes we need to be market smart
As much as this reminds us of 3.007, there is one very big difference when it comes to designing a product for a company . When a company becomes one of the stakeholders of our project, we as students, also have to account for marketability of the product we design. This whole idea of marketability was clearly thrown out of the window during our 3.007 days where we just prototype without much concern if it is unique and truly needed in the market.
Speaking about the market, the light market is saturated especially when it comes to bedside lamps. How now brown cow? I guess you just have to tune in to see what product we eventually settle for.
JUST GENZ THINGS
So I am guessing the previous few design fiction lessons on how to make a toast has led up to this moment where we are given the final assignment which requires us to document the lifestyle of Generation Z.
We decided on a style similar to VOGUE’s 73 Questions with ____ to capture the daily habits of GenZ. What better way to capture the very essence of GenZ than to record an actual GenZ in this video? So we got my sister to be the actress in the video.
DESIGN THINKING & EXPRESSION
JUST FAM THINGS
Just so happened that my family visited me in Hang Zhou.Like my entire family. Here are just some photos to make this post slightly more lively:
NANJING
I am just so lucky that my parents made the decision to visit Nanjing for a day trip. If you hear Nanjing, I hope what came to your mind was the Nanjing Massacre also known as the Rape of Nanking. Because Nanjing really offers so much history when it comes to the relationship between Japan and China.
Before this trip, I did my research on the Nanjing Massacre and made it a point that my siblings knew a bit of background as well. On the net, this whole atrocity seem like a very stale historical event that happened in China. It was as if history was dead, it was as if you were merely reading your secondary school history textbook. All i knew was this event left a scar on the political relationship between China and Japan which is still somewhat present today.
I am just going to fast forward to the part where we visited the Nanjing Massacre Memorial Exhibition because that left the biggest impression on me. As a person who really have no patience for exhibitions and museums, I have to say this exhibition is worth going. I actually spent 1 hour fully engaged in the exhibition and occasionally being appalled by the extensiveness of atrocities. I am not just talking about how Nanjing fell and was replaced as China’s capital. I am talking about: how the Japanese soldiers rape women about 50 times, how Japanese soldiers hold competitions on who can kill the most people in a stipulated time ( one killed 104 the other 105 and because they were unable to identify who made 100 kills first, they raise the winning criteria to “ who can kill 150 people first “ , how the soldiers stand on a pile of dead bodies in a victorious stance. I can say more but my words are dead so just visit the place.
As someone who last studied history in secondary two , I finally understand why we learn history in the first place and why it is so important. At the end of the exhibition we were given a “disclaimer” on how we should remember history but not with vengeance which is clearly apt. On that note, it also made me understand what really stood between China and Japan. There is so much the exhibitions has that information online cannot convey so seriously make your way to Nanjing.
