Category: Humanity

Donuts and Dyson Spheres

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Part 1

No Miracles Necessary in the Chobani Cinematic Universe

I realise I’ve had a set of beliefs.

Some which are (unfortunately, probably) somewhere on the spectrum toward the extreme techno-optimist views espoused since by those with various dubious political views. 

That is – despite the patient explanations of various far-cleverer friends of mine – I find I cannot become comfortable with even the most cosy narratives of what has become called “degrowth“.

Perhaps it is easier for me to imagine the end of the world rather than the end of capitalism, but it does rather seem that we missed that already.

We have gone beyond the end of capitalism into techno-feudalism and the beginning era of the Klepts – and are very much in the foothills of The Jackpot – so maybe Mark Fisher’s phrase gets updated with an “and” instead of the “rather than”…

I’m no PPE grad, and my discomfort with degrowth is not all that articulate (and subsequently it will be deconstructed articulately by those who hold it as a TINA of the left) but simply put, the root of my ill-ease with the term is “who does it hurt”.

It just doesn’t feel like the pursuit of degrowth would be any more equitable globally than untrammelled hyper-capitalist growth. 

Maybe I’m very wrong – but globally-managed, distributed, equitable degrowth just doesn’t seem plausible.

And the more likely ‘degrowth for me, no growth for thee’ also doesn’t seem like it will fly (or take the train). I guess most of all when I hear the term degrowth I flinch from the point of view of the privilege (including mine) it requires to imagine it.

Why am I putting this lengthy and awkward disclaimer here? 

I guess because I am a shamefaced technoptimist – the name of the blog gives that away – but of the fully-automated luxury communism variety (actually I’d plump for semi-automated convivial social democracy, but then I’m also a bit of a centrist dad to add to my sins) and also that I’m not in the DAC/micronukes/fusion camp of extreme VC-led technoptimism around climate.

To be clear before you start an intervention, I’m certainly not in Marc Andreesen’s camp – I think / hope I’m sat at the bar somewhere in between Dave Karpf and Noah Smith.

If anything – I’m in the “No Miracles Needed” camp – by which I refer to Mark Jacobson’s exhaustive book proposing we have everything we need in solar, wind and storage technology to get us through the great filter.

Don’t get me wrong – I’d love fusion to happen – but I’ve been thinking that for about 40 years or more.

Was I the only one to rip the press cuttings of Fleischman and Pons from my teenage bedroom wall with a tear in my eye?

I recently read Arthur Turrell’s “The Star Builders” – and though it protests we are closer than we have ever been – it still seems asymptotically out of reach.

I’m also not waving away the extractive toll off the ‘no miracles necessary’ on the planet, or the regimes and injustices that can be supported by it – though it’s always worth posting this as a reminder.

The recent work by Superflux for the WEF underlines the importance of addressing the many other planetary boundaries and negative impacts on the Earth’s systems that our current Standard Operating Procedures are causing.

And this recent piece in Vice debunking superficial “green growth” (via Dan Hill) is worth a read too

Adam recently reminded me over lunch – even the “No Miracles Necessary” future depends on the not-insubstantial miracle of having a complex world economy and industrial base to manufacture the PV panels, batteries, and turbines.

Again – the first minutes of James Burke’s “Connections” springs to mind in terms of the vertiginous tangle of systems we rely on.

Climate/Earth-System breakdown could put paid to that too.

But ultimately – I am is a designer in the technology sector, latterly for the past two years in the energy tech sector – and my view of the designer in that world is to help imagine, illustrate, conceive and communicate the ‘protopia’ or anti-anti-utopia that the ‘no miracles needed’ prescription could lead to (more on this later).

As I said in Oslo, and before/since – my measure of state of that art is not from Hollywood or Cupertino – but a yoghurt company based in New York State.

AHEM.

Yep.

Ultimately, I’m a middle-aged, middle-class white man in the global north clinging on to the fictional technologically-advanced long term futures for humanity that he grew up with – whether they are The Federation, The Culture, The various KSR Mondragonian world-lines or Fully Automated Luxury Communism.

So maybe read the rest of this with that and a pinch of sustainably-sourced salt in mind…

Part 2: I can’t see the other side of the donut from Earth.

I’m sure many of you reading this will have read Kate Raworth’s excellent “Donut Economics” – or at least have a passing acquaintance with the central idea.

That is – we should look to inhabit a zone between resource use to support a social floor of equity and fairness and the planetary boundaries that provide those resources – which describes the diagrammatic donut.

But – what if one of those planetary boundaries is not like the others?

What if one of those planetary boundaries is not quite the same?

If one of those planetary boundaries is not like the others…

Now it’s time to play our game…

The potential renewable energy we could harness as a civilisation is vast.

The solar potential alone is 104 more than we currently need.

That’s before we go beyond “no miracles” tech into fusion.

A Kardashev Type-1 energy system. Capturing the all the energy incident on our planet from our home star.

What happens if we extend one edge of the donut by four orders of magnitude?

What does a Type-1 Donut Economics look like? 

(Admission: I cheated a little in the title of this post – a Dyson Sphere would be a Type-2 Civilisation, capturing the entire energy output of The Sun.)

Well – it was 2023, so of course I asked a LLM.

Me: How might one reconcile donut economics and planetary boundaries to economic activity with the notion of Kardashev type one civilisation?

ChatGPT: Reconciling “donut economics” (which focuses on balancing the needs of the environment with the needs of society) and “planetary boundaries” (which identifies the environmental limits within which humanity can safely operate) with the idea of a Kardashev Type I civilization (a civilization that can harness and use all available energy resources on its home planet) is a challenge but not impossible. Here’s a brief reconciliation approach:

  • Shared Goal:
    • Recognize that both the concepts of donut economics and the Kardashev scale aim for a sustainable, thriving civilization. Donut economics seeks to meet humanity’s basic needs without overshooting our ecological ceiling, and a Type I civilization seeks to maximize energy use in a sustainable manner.
  • Redefine Energy Mastery:
    • A true Kardashev Type I civilization would not just be about harnessing all energy but doing so sustainably. This means developing energy sources that do not breach our planetary boundaries.
  • Technological Advancement:
    • Invest in technologies that allow for increased energy utilization without environmental degradation. Examples include highly efficient renewable energy, energy storage solutions, and perhaps even fusion power.
  • Circular Economy:
    • Align the principles of donut economics with the growth of civilization. This includes designing products for longevity, easy repair, and recycling; minimizing waste; and creating closed-loop systems that mimic natural processes.
  • Education & Values:
    • Cultivate societal values that prioritize sustainability and the well-being of all its members. By educating the population about the importance of planetary boundaries and sustainable growth, a Type I civilization can emerge that respects these boundaries.
  • Integrate Economic and Ecological Thinking:
    • Traditional economic models often treat environmental factors as externalities. In moving towards a Kardashev Type I civilization, it’s essential to integrate ecological factors into the very heart of economic models and decision-making processes.
  • Global Collaboration:
    • A Type I civilization implies global cooperation. This can be seen as an extension of the social foundation in donut economics, where global cooperation helps ensure everyone’s basic needs are met while respecting planetary limits.
  • Continuous Monitoring and Feedback:
    • Develop and maintain a global monitoring system to ensure that as we approach a Type I civilization status, we do not exceed planetary boundaries. Implement corrective measures when needed.

In essence, becoming a Kardashev Type I civilization while adhering to the principles of donut economics and respecting planetary boundaries means merging advanced technological capacities with deep ecological and social responsibility. It’s a future where we harness the full potential of our planet without harming it, ensuring prosperity and well-being for all.

Me: One of my questions is whether using more energy (so long as it is sustainable, renewable and zero carbon eg solar) is incompatible with donut economics

ChatGPT: Using more energy is not inherently incompatible with donut economics, as long as that energy use aligns with the principles of sustainability and social equity inherent in the donut model. 

Let’s break this down:

  • Ecological Ceiling:
    • The outer ring of the “donut” represents the ecological limits we should not surpass to avoid environmental degradation. Using sustainable, renewable, and zero-carbon energy sources like solar helps ensure we do not exceed this ecological ceiling.
  • Social Foundation:
    • The inner ring of the “donut” signifies the social basics that every individual should have access to, such as food, water, health, education, etc. Using more renewable energy can support these goals if it’s done in a way that ensures equitable distribution and accessibility. For instance, renewable energy can power schools in off-grid areas, provide clean cooking solutions, or pump clean water, thereby aiding in achieving the social foundation.
  • Growth vs. Development:
    • It’s essential to differentiate between growth for the sake of growth (which can be detrimental) and genuine development that meets human needs without compromising the environment. Using more energy is acceptable if it’s channelled towards genuine development and not just consumption for consumption’s sake.
  • Efficiency and Resilience:
    • While using more renewable energy, it’s crucial to prioritize efficiency. This means optimizing energy consumption to get the most benefit out of every unit of energy and designing systems that are resilient to potential shocks.
  • Holistic Well-being:
    • A significant point in donut economics is that endless economic growth (usually measured as GDP growth) is not the ultimate goal. Instead, the objective is holistic well-being. If using more energy contributes to holistic well-being without causing ecological harm, it aligns with the principles of donut economics.

In summary, using more energy in and of itself is not contrary to the principles of donut economics. However, it’s the how and why of that energy use that matters. If the energy is sourced sustainably, used efficiently, directed towards genuine development, and contributes to holistic well-being without overshooting ecological limits or leaving anyone behind, then it aligns with the philosophy of donut economics.

Me: But could you see a route to growth or new capabilities for a global civilisation due to energy use that is orders of magnitude higher than now, so long as it is zero carbon (eg solar, fusion) – would that be an enlarged donut?

ChatGPT: Certainly, there’s a potential route to growth and new capabilities for a global civilization through a significant increase in energy use, as long as it’s sustainable and zero-carbon. 

This could, metaphorically speaking, result in an “enlarged donut,” where the scale and capabilities of civilization expand while still maintaining the balance between ecological limits and social needs.

  • Technological Advancement:
    • A significant increase in energy availability, especially from sustainable sources like solar or fusion, can fuel technological advancements in various sectors, from transportation and infrastructure to research and space exploration. This could lead to breakthroughs we haven’t yet imagined.
  • Space Exploration and Colonization:
    • With energy availability orders of magnitude higher than now, humanity could potentially undertake large-scale space missions, colonizing other celestial bodies, mining asteroids, or even reaching for interstellar travel.
  • Global Infrastructure Projects:
    • Massive energy availability could facilitate projects that benefit humanity globally, like global transportation networks, large-scale desalination plants for potable water, or projects that counteract climate change effects.
  • Elevated Living Standards Globally:
    • A tremendous amount of sustainable energy could enable the global provision of high living standards, including universal access to healthcare, education, and other public goods, leading to an expanded social foundation in the donut.
  • New Economic Models:
    • Such energy abundance could challenge traditional economic models and give rise to new ways of value creation, distribution, and consumption, leading to more equitable and sustainable economic systems.
  • Ecological Restoration:
    • Excess energy can be employed in large-scale ecological restoration projects, actively reversing some of the damage done to the planet, from reforestation to ocean cleanup.

However, there are considerations:

  • Physical Limits:
    • Even if the energy is zero-carbon, there are still physical limits to consider, such as land use, resource extraction for technology, and potential waste from energy infrastructure.
  • Equity and Governance:
    • An abundance of energy could exacerbate inequality if not distributed equitably. Robust governance and frameworks would be necessary to ensure that the benefits of such energy abundance are shared widely.
  • Cultural and Social Adaptation:
    • Rapid technological and infrastructure changes fueled by energy abundance would require cultural and social adaptations, making it essential to consider the well-being and adaptability of communities.
  • Holistic Well-being:
    • As mentioned before, the end goal shouldn’t be growth for growth’s sake but holistic well-being. An enlarged donut should still maintain this perspective.

In essence, an “enlarged donut” resulting from significant energy growth can be envisioned, where the scale of human capabilities and infrastructure grows but remains within a sustainable and equitable framework. The key is to ensure that this growth enhances the well-being of all without compromising the planet’s ecological integrity.

I mean, that’s pretty good, right? It turns out GPT stands for “Green Plenty Technologies”?

Of course all the caveats around GenAI apply – including the confirmation bias that is baked in to such a dialog.

But!

It’s interesting to me as a starting point for some good old-fashioned human thinking around this stuff. I’m curious if the various bodies that have taken up the mantle of Donut Economics are looking at “Radically Expanded Donuts”… R.E.D. = Green???

One thing that I caught from the dialog was the idea I think I first encountered from Deb Chachra’s newsletter – that we are encouraged to think about energy efficiency over material efficiency, when in fact energy is practically infinite in supply and matter is not.

We find it very hard to think in these terms – if you’re my age, we’ve been encouraged to turn off lights, turn down the heating since our childhoods… 

Posters from Russell Davies’ collection

And it’s not that energy efficiency is a bad thing, far from it – pursuing technologies of energy efficiency in a Type-1 world will just extend the headroom of the donut – but much of it comes from a place of considering energy as something produced by the combustion of finite matter. 

We should add to that the externalities of energy use, particularly heat – and moving to a NMN world of full electrification would not remove that exhaust heat production but would hugely mitigate against it. 

I’ll also hope that acts as a bulwark against wasteful crypto bullshit… Abhorring waste and scams are not the same as imagining beyond energy penury.

Our “imaginaries” are constrained by what we imagine the planetary boundaries are – which I think partly leads to my dissatisfaction with degrowth narratives – and so, perhaps, designers can step in to help construct new ones.

I’m not sure what they might be.

I have thoughts of course (see later *)

Genres such as Solarpunk are not yet mainstream – even within the discourse of those familiar with or exploring how to enact Donut Economics (please correct me if I’m wrong here!!!). 

But –  I’m also not sure it’s for me to create those imaginaries.

Which leads me nicely to the brief I put this spring of 2024 to the students at Goldsmiths Design.

Part 3: Can you tell me how to get, how to get to Kardashev Street?

I was very pleased to be asked by Goldsmiths Design to help set an “industry brief” for the second year students in their spring term.

When I got together with the team there at the end of 2023, this obsession with the “Radically Expanded Donut” was in full flight and so it was somewhat unloaded on them at an evening at The New Cross House.

The conversation led from the notion of a Kardashev Type-1 planet, to what it would mean anchored in place and routine of daily life.

We started to flesh that out.

What would a Kardashev Type-1 Street be like to live in?

To move into? To move out of? To live in the next street along, that had not yet realised it’s Type-1 potential for whatever reason?

How do you start that process, or encourage others to do so?

What interconnections, relationships and tensions might arise?

What institutions (financial or otherwise) and services would need to be invited and sustained to support it? What might be the equivalent of the mutual institutions born out of the Industrial Revolution for an equally revolutionary equitable NMN transition?

How does it connect to the transition design thinking pursued by Cameron Tonkinwise et al. The “Planetary Civics” of Indy Johar et al?

And of course – Kate Raworth’s “Donut Economics” itself.

My mind went to the imagery of Clifford Harper in 1974’s Radical Technology – and the writing decades later of Adam Greenfield in his book “Radical technologies” and also his thoughts on the “convivial stack”.

How might the NMN technologies be procured, shared and maintained by a community in place – say the terraced houses typical in the UK?

My mind went to the story of the street in Walthamstow, London trying to create it’s own shared solar energy infrastructure– and the barriers to that created by the commercial/regulatory status quo.

In Oslo back in May 2023, we’d been made familiar with the custom of “dugnad“, where the occupants of a apartment block work together to maintain their common infrastructure and spaces. 

What rituals and expectations might be born on a Kardashev Type-1 street. How would they be transmitted both across communities, cultures and generations?

The students wrestled with the brief admirably – and I’ll post some of the outcomes here soon if I can.

* Part 4 / KardaCoda or Willfully-generative human with no undo vs GenAI

Finally – when asking ChatGPT about all this back in the autumn of 2023, it declined to create a diagram of the Radically Expanded Donut for me. 

What it did (kinda) produce was a brief:

I’m sorry, I cannot create drawings directly. However, I can describe how to visualize or design such a diagram based on the concept:

  1. Inner Circle – Social Foundation:
  • This remains as the core of the donut, representing essential human needs.
  • You might want to expand this circle to show a broader range of social amenities, reflecting the increased capabilities of a civilization with massive energy resources. This could include advanced education, universal healthcare, enhanced connectivity, etc.
  1. Outer Circle – Ecological Ceiling:
  • This circle might be farther out than in the traditional donut, reflecting the greater capabilities and infrastructure of an advanced civilization.
  • Despite the enlargement, it would still emphasize sustainability and the need to avoid overshooting ecological limits. This means not surpassing boundaries like land use change, freshwater use, or other ecological parameters.
  1. Space Between The Circles – The Safe and Just Space:
  • This area, which represents the space in which humanity can thrive sustainably, would be considerably broader.
  • You can divide this space into segments, each representing different sectors fueled by the energy abundance: technological advancements, space exploration, global infrastructure, etc.
  1. Additional Elements:
  • Consider adding visuals that represent the vast energy sources (solar arrays, fusion reactors, etc.) around the donut.
  • Depict global collaboration symbols, equity symbols, and other elements that emphasize the importance of shared benefits and governance.

To create this diagram, you could use graphic design software like Adobe Illustrator, Canva, or even simpler tools like PowerPoint. Once you have a clear mental image or sketch, you can work on refining it digitally. If you’re not comfortable creating it yourself, you might want to share the concept with a graphic designer who can bring it to life.

This set me off on the quixotic path of being the slow human illustrator of the GenAI’s “imagination”. 

I started sketching. I ordered and awaited the delivery of art materials – including the first airbrush and frisk film I’d possessed since the early 1990s.

I waited for coats of ink and acrylic to dry.

I messed things up and tried to fix them/flip them into analog, material ‘beautiful oopses’ in the absence of the undo function. 

It took time.

I got ink under my fingernails.

I had fun.

I didn’t annotate with the things I thought I might.

A technoptimist litany – fusion, air mining, atmospheric carbon removal, desalination, detoxicifcation, open source spime-like fabrication of tools and shelter, universal healthcare, universal basic income, another green food revolution via precision fermentation, soil renewal etc. 

Instead, more of an obscure mandala to magic forth the Kardashev Type 1 future. 

Instead, Kirby dots, glow-in-the dark and gold metallic acrylic detailing – and two scrawled ink numbers: 104 for the energy potential of the Radically Expanded Donut – and 107 for the 10 Billion people it would hopefully support within the equitable, convivial zone it describes.

I also kind-of ended up making a cosmic goatse, but hey.

Acknowledgments

I’m grateful for the conversations I’ve had with Carolyn and Arjun – the tutors and of course Matt Ward for inviting me in.

This post has also been greatly influenced by conversations with Adam Greenfield, Deb Chachra, Dan Hill, Celia Romaniuk and of course, Matt Webb.

The talk and workshop I was invited to give last year by Mosse Sjaastad of AHO, Fredrik Matheson and IxDA Oslo were also a big starting point.

Station Identification

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“We now use about eighty percent of the net primary product of land-based photosynthesis,” he said. “One hundred percent is probably impossible to reach, and our long range carrying capacity has been estimated to be thirty percent, so we are massively overshot, as they say.

We have been liquidating our natural capital as if it were disposable income, and are nearing depletion of certain capital stocks, like oil, wood, soil, metals, fresh water, fish, and animals. This makes continued economic expansion difficult.”

“Difficult!” Art wrote. “Continued?”

“We have to continue,” Fort said, with a piercing glance at Art, who unobtrusively sheltered his lectern with his arm.

“Continuous expansion is a fundamental tenet of economics. Therefore one of the fundamentals of the universe itself. Because everything is economics. Physics is cosmic economics, biology is cellular economics, the humanities are social economics, psychology is mental economics, and so on.”

His listeners nodded unhappily.

“So everything is expanding. But it can’t happen in contradiction to the law of conservation of matter-energy. No matter how efficient your throughput is, you can’t get an output larger than the input.”

…

“…manmade capital and natural capital are not substitutable. This is obvious, but since most economists still say they are substitutable, it has to be insisted on. Put simply, you can’t substitute more sawmills for fewer forests. If you’re building a house you can juggle the number of power saws and carpenters, which means they’re substitutable, but you can’t build it with half the amount of lumber, no matter how many saws or carpenters you have. Try it and you have a house of air. And that’s where we live now.”

…

No matter how efficient capital is, it can’t make something out of nothing.” “New energy sources…” Max suggested. “But we can’t make soil out of electricity. Fusion power and self-replicating machinery have given us enormous amounts of power, but we have to have basic stocks to apply that power to. And that’s where we run into a limit for which there are no substitutions possible.”

Green Mars, Kim Stanley Robinson

Electrosheds workshop at AHO, May 2023

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It was wonderful to be invited back to AHO after such a long time to give a talk (see separate post) and a workshop for the interaction design students.

I decided to try a “walkshop” following in the footsteps (ahem) of James Bridle, Adam Greenfield, Deb Chachra (and many others I’m sure) to investigate how the invisible networks of electricity in our everyday lives, and the environment around us.

I based it loosely on Kevin Kelly’s “Big Here” quiz – that aims to ask (tough) questions that locate you in the technical, logistical and natural ecologies we are embedded in.

If I’d thought of it i should have shown the first 30 minutes of the first episode of James Burke’s “Connections”too.

We started the day with a short talk from me (the slides of which are below) introducing the topic and how we’d examine it in the walkshop.

After that we went on a ‘local energy safari’ and then for a few hours the students prepared responses and communication pieces based on what they’d found. I’ll post some of those separately.

It was a beautiful spring day – which was perfect for a ‘walkshop’ – and the students were enthusiastic participants in what I think was a *partially* successful experiment.

I’ll write a bit about that in another post on their responses.

Huge thanks to Mosse for the invitation and all the AHO students for their energy and patience!

I’d love to try this again – or have others try it! Please do get in touch if you’d like to do it somewhere else in Europe, or better yet invite me to do it with you!

Update [September 28th 2023]: Before I did this I was sadly not aware of Jenny Odell’s fantastic 2013 project “Power Trip”, which explores this territory beautifully.

I found the project coincidentally while sending a friend Odell’s site, based on his discovery of some google maps derived artworks, which I’d associated for years with the artist.

Back at Google Creative Lab, we’d worked with her on creating giant murals on the sides of data centres – themselves places of infrastructural fascination and critique by many of the artists referenced in this workshop…

Electrosheds Intro talk

One of my favourite pieces by Kevin Kelly is this – the ‘watershed quiz’.

In this he asks a set of questions which locate you in your ‘Big Here’.

You start where you are, and begin to pull the thread out to larger and larger scales…

“You live in the big here. Wherever you live, your tiny spot is deeply intertwined within a larger place, imbedded fractal-like into a whole system called a watershed, which is itself integrated with other watersheds into a tightly interdependent biome. At the ultimate level, your home is a cell in an organism called a planet. All these levels interconnect. What do you know about the dynamics of this larger system around you? Most of us are ignorant of this matrix. But it is the biggest interactive game there is. Hacking it is both fun and vital.”

The Big Here Quiz, Kevin Kelly https://kk.org/cooltools/the-big-here-qu/
Questions from The Big Here Quiz, Kevin Kelly https://kk.org/cooltools/the-big-here-qu/
Tubes by Andrew Blum

Andrew’s book is a striking piece of “Big Here” writing – pulling on the thread of his squirrel-sabotaged internet cabling and ending up half way around the world watching divers swim ashore carrying backbone-fibre over their shoulders.

I want us to do something similar with our energy, leaving this room and following where our energy is coming from, and noting how others are embedded similarly.

My ‘energy safari’ images from walking to AHO on the morning of the workshop/walkshop

We’re going to leave AHO and ‘pull on the thread of your electrons’, like Andrew Blum did with his connectivity bits…

• From the power you touch & use out to the distribution, then transmission

• Look for hints of new topologies, local production and new forms – what might be taking hold, hybrids, commercial, official, unofficial, municipal, local, improvised…

Then

• Create a journal / map / notes to record your impressions

• A piece of communication to yourself

• To others

Please remember!

• It doesn’t have to be “correct” – think like an amateur naturalist… record observations, things you see and interpret.

Think about spotting phenomena: behaviour, difference and context from observation – not worrying if you have the correct names or specialist knowledge to understand the system in abstract.

This morning I tried pulling on the thread from the apartment I’m staying at…

Electrical touch points in the apartment block I stayed in Oslo.

I looked up the names I found on the various (old) bits of electrical infrastructure in the apartment. This gave me some threads to pull on.

To pull on those threads I consulted the wonderful Open Infrastructure Map.

The area around AHO on Open Infrastructure Map

Do you recognise this building?

Akersberget Substation, across the street from AHO

Yep – it’s right across the street from AHO. And it’s the first link in a big chain from this area out to where the electrons we’re using right now probably originate.

Let’s pull the thread!

Zooooooming out – we can see some next links in the chain

Zooming out from Grunerløkka on Open Infrastructure Map
Zooming out to see the electrical infrastructure of Central Oslo

Looking at this, we can make a decision to follow the thread through the Sogn Substation back to the generating sources.

Sogn Substation, Oslo
Zooming out to the area surrounding Oslo to view possible generation sources

Again, we can decide to follow the thread of our electrons to one of the nearest hydroelectric generators – Nore II around 180km away.

Nore II Hydroelectric station, ~180km NW of Oslo

We could drive there in about 3hrs – or take a very long but scenic cycle there in the extended Norwegian (summer) day…

I mean, it looks lovely there!

Nore II Power Station, image by Amit Rathore

So – just from your desktop you can explore pulling on your energy thread. But today, we’re going to go outside and walk around our area to see what we can find.

We’re going to explore the Grunerløkka area in groups

Preparing to leave for the walkshop

[We then left AHO in groups and explored the area in our “Local Energy Safari”]

We had lunch!

[After returning from the energy safari walkshop component, we attempted ‘design responses’ to what was found for about 90mins – this was in hindsight too short, but there were still some great outputs]

Now we’re going to make some designed responses to what we saw, recorded, found.

Again – these could be communications or mappings, or more generative/speculative responses. Here are some prompts from me, let’s see what we get!

Some prompts to get the students started

You might have spotted interesting new hybrids emerging – what could those lead to?

Think about new hybrid forms that are emerging as “energy on the street”

You could think about social structures that could emerge around adversity or abundance – for instance some of the energy-sharing practices that emerged around Occupy Sandy in NYC.

And for inspiration only, the work of Clifford Harper in 1970s on ‘radical technology’ reprogramming and using appropriate technology to share resources in a town

Clifford Harper, Radical Technology
Clifford Harper, Radical Technology

Again for inspiration – perhaps make a page from a future whole earth catalog documenting technology, practices, methods around your energy safari ideas.

The Whole Earth Catalog as a genre/format inspiration

Playing with the Grid (and cocktails)

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In the introduction to Malcolm McCullough’s #breezepunk classic “Downtime on the Microgrid” he says…

This past week we (Lunar Energy) sponsored a social event for an energy industry conference in Amsterdam.

There were the usual opportunities offered to ‘dress’ the space, put up posters, screens etc etc.

We even got to name a cocktail (“lunar lift-off” i think they called it! I guess moonshots would have been a different kind of party…) – but what we landed on was… coasters…

Paulina Plizga, who joined us earlier this year came up with some lovely playful recycled cardboard coasters – featuring interconnected designs of pieces of a near-future electrical grid (enabled by our Gridshare software, natch) and stats from our experience in running digital, responsive grids so far.

Lunar Gridshare drinks coasters by Paulina Plizga

The inspiration for these partly reference Ken Garland’s seminal “Connect” game for Galt toys – could we make a little ‘infinite game’ with coasters as play pieces for the attendees.

Image by Ben Terrett

If you’ve ever been to something like this – and you’re anything like me – then you might want something to fidget with, help start a conversation… or just be distracted by for a moment! We thought these could also serve a social role in helping the event along, not just keep your drink from marking the furniture!

I was delighted when our colleagues who were attending said Paulina’s designs were a hit – and that they had actually used them to give impromptu presentations on Gridshare to attendees!

So a little bit more playful grid awareness over drinks! What could be better?

Thank you Ken Garland!

There’s a lovely site here with more of Ken’s wonderful work on games and toys for Galt. And here’s Ben’s post about it from a while back where I stole the picture from, as I’m writing this in a cafe and can’t take a picture of my set!

🐙 Octopii, Very fast, very heavy toddlers made of steel and self-driving tests

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Jason points to a great piece on Large Language Models, ChatGPT etc

“Say that A and B, both fluent speakers of English, are independently stranded on two uninhabited islands. They soon discover that previous visitors to these islands have left behind telegraphs and that they can communicate with each other via an underwater cable. A and B start happily typing messages to each other.

Meanwhile, O, a hyperintelligent deep-sea octopus who is unable to visit or observe the two islands, discovers a way to tap into the underwater cable and listen in on A and B’s conversations. O knows nothing about English initially but is very good at detecting statistical patterns. Over time, O learns to predict with great accuracy how B will respond to each of A’s utterances.

Soon, the octopus enters the conversation and starts impersonating B and replying to A. This ruse works for a while, and A believes that O communicates as both she and B do — with meaning and intent. Then one day A calls out: “I’m being attacked by an angry bear. Help me figure out how to defend myself. I’ve got some sticks.” The octopus, impersonating B, fails to help. How could it succeed? The octopus has no referents, no idea what bears or sticks are. No way to give relevant instructions, like to go grab some coconuts and rope and build a catapult. A is in trouble and feels duped. The octopus is exposed as a fraud.”

https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/ai-artificial-intelligence-chatbots-emily-m-bender.html via Kottke.org

He goes onto talk about his experiences ‘managing’ a semi-self driving car (I think it might be a Volvo, like I used to own?) where you have to be aware that the thing is an incredible heavy, very fast toddler made of steel, with dunning-kruger-ish marketing promises pasted all over the top of it.

“You can’t ever forget the self-driver is like a 4-year-old kid mimicking the act of driving and isn’t capable of thinking like a human when it needs to. You forget that and you can die.”

That was absolutely my experience of my previous car too.

It was great for long stretches of motorway (freeway) driving in normal conditions, but if it was raining or things got more twisty/rural (which they do in most of the UK quite quickly), you switched it off sharpish.

I’m renting a tesla (I know, I know) for the first time on my next trip to the states. It was a cheap deal, and it’s an EV, and it’s California so I figure why not. I however will not use autopilot I don’t think, having used semi (level 2? 3?) autonomous driving before.

Perhaps there needs to be a ‘self-driving test’ for the humans about to go into partnership with very fast, very heavy semi-autonomous non-human toddlers before they are allowed on the roads with them…

“Smaller, cuter, weirder, fluttery”: Filtered for the #Breezepunk Future

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I’m stealing Matt Webb’s “filtered for” format here – for a bunch of more or less loosely connected items that I want to post, associate and log as much for myself as to share.

And – I’ll admit – to remove the friction from posting something without having a strong thread or thesis to connect them.

I’ve pre-ordered “No miracles needed” by Mark Jacobson – which I’m looking forward to reading in February. Found out about it through this Guardian post a week or so ago.

The good news below from Simon Evans seems to support Prof Jacobson’s hypothesis…

Breezepunk has been knocking around in my head since Tobias mentioned it on this podcast…

Here’s the transcript of the video (transcribed by machine, of course) of Tobias describing the invention by scientists/engineers at Nanyang Polytechnic in Singapore – of a very small scale, low power way of harnessing wind energy:

“I found this sort of approach really interesting but mostly I like the small scale of it yes I like the fact that it’s you know it’s something that you could imagine just proliferating as a standard component that’s attached to sort of Street Furniture or things around the house or whatever it is you might put them on your windowsill because they’re quite small and they just generate like enough power to make a sensor work or a light or something and yeah it’s this this alternative future to the big powerful set piece green Energy Future that’s obviously being pushed and should continue to be pushed because that’s competing against the big Power and the fossil fuel future but I like this idea of like the smaller cuter weirder fluttery imagine it’s quite fluttery yeah so yeah so this is this is Breeze Punk everybody…”

I like the idea of it being a standard component – a lego. A breezeblock?

Breezepunk breezeblock?

My sketching went from something initially much more like a bug hotel or one of those bricks that bees are meant to nest in, there’s something like a fractal Unite D’Habitation happening in the final sketch.

I also like #Breezepunk a lot – very Chobani Cinematic Universe.

I would like it to become… a thing. I suppose that’s why I’m writing this.

Used to be how you made things become things.

It’s probably not how you do it now, you need a much larger coordinated cultural footprint across various short-form streaming formats to make a dent in the embedding space of the LLMs.

Mind you, that’s not the same as making it ‘real’ or even ‘realish’ now is it.

A bit vogue-ish perhaps, to prove a point I asked ChatGPT what it knew about Breezepunk.

It took a while, but… it tried to turn into the altogether less satisfying “windpunk”…

I like making the cursor blink on ChatGPT.

The longer the better. I think it means you’re onto something.

Or maybe that’s just my Bartle-type showing again.

The production design of the recent adaptation of William Gibson’s The Peripheral seemed “fluttery” – particularly in it’s depiction of the post-jackpot London timeline.

Or perhaps the aesthetic is much more one of ‘filigree‘.

There’s heaviness and lightness being expressed as power by the various factions in their architecture, fashion, gadgets.

It’s an overt expression of that power being wielded via nanotechnology – assemblers, disassemblers constructing and deconstructing huge edifices at will.

From Vincenzo Natali’s concept art for The Peripheral series

Solid melting into air.

Into the breeze.

Punk.

Optometrists, Octopii, Rubber Ducks & Centaurs: my talk at Design for AI, TU Delft, October 2022

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I was fortunate to be invited to the wonderful (huge) campus of TU Delft earlier this year to give a talk on “Designing for AI.”

I felt a little bit more of an imposter than usual – as I’d left my role in the field nearly a year ago – but it felt like a nice opportunity to wrap up what I thought I’d learned in the last 6 years at Google Research.

Below is the recording of the talk – and my slides with speaker notes.

I’m very grateful to Phil Van Allen and Wing Man for the invitation and support. Thank you Elisa Giaccardi, Alessandro Bozzon, Dave Murray-Rust and everyone the faculty of industrial design engineering at TU Delft for organising a wonderful event.

The excellent talks of my estimable fellow speakers – Elizabeth Churchill, Caroline Sinders and John can be found on the event site here.

Video of Matt Jones “Designing for AI” talk at TU Delft, October 2022
Slide 1

Hello!

Slide 2

This talk is mainly a bunch of work from my recent past – the last 5/6 years at Google Research. There may be some themes connecting the dots I hope! I’ve tried to frame them in relation to a series of metaphors that have helped me engage with the engineering and computer science at play.

Slide 3

I won’t labour the definition of metaphor or why it’s so important in opening up the space of designing AI, especially as there is a great, whole paper about that by Dave Murray-Rust and colleagues! But I thought I would race through some of the metaphors I’ve encountered and used in my work in the past.

The term AI itself is best seen as a metaphor to be translated. John Giannandrea was my “grand boss” at Google and headed up Google Research when I joined. JG’s advice to me years ago still stands me in good stead for most projects in the space…

But the first metaphor I really want to address is that of the Optometrist.

This image of my friend Phil Gyford (thanks Phil!) shows him experiencing something many of us have done – taking an eye test in one of those wonderful steampunk contraptions where the optometrist asks you to stare through different lenses at a chart, while asking “Is it better like this? Or like this?”

This comes from the ‘optometrist’ algorithm work by colleagues in Google Research working with nuclear fusion researchers. The AI system optimising the fusion experiments presents experimental parameter options to a human scientist, in the mode of a eye testing optometrist ‘better like this, or like this?’

For me to calls to mind this famous scene of human-computer interaction: the photo enhancer in Blade Runner.

It makes the human the ineffable intuitive hero, but perhaps masking some of the uncanny superhuman properties of what the machine is doing.

The AIs are magic black boxes, but so are the humans!

Which has lead me in the past to consider such AI-systems as ‘magic boxes’ in larger service design patterns.

How does the human operator ‘call in’ or address the magic box?

How do teams agree it’s ‘magic box’ time?

I think this work is as important as de-mystifying the boxes!

Lais de Almeida – a past colleague at Google Health and before that Deepmind – has looked at just this in terms of the complex interactions in clinical healthcare settings through the lens of service design.

How does an AI system that can outperform human diagnosis (Ie the retinopathy AI from deep mind shown here) work within the expert human dynamics of the team?

My next metaphor might already be familiar to you – the centaur.

[Certainly I’ve talked about it before…!]

If you haven’t come across it:

Gary Kasparov famously took on chess-AI Deep Blue and was defeated (narrowly)

He came away from that encounter with an idea for a new form of chess where teams of humans and AIs played against other teams of humans and AIs… dubbed ‘centaur chess’ or ‘advanced chess’

I first started investigating this metaphorical interaction about 2016 – and around those times it manifested in things like Google’s autocomplete in gmail etc – but of course the LLM revolution has taken centaurs into new territory.

This very recent paper for instance looks at the use of LLMs not only in generating text but then coupling that to other models that can “operate other machines” – ie act based on what is generated in the world, and on the world (on your behalf, hopefully)

And notion of a Human/AI agent team is something I looked into with colleagues in Google Research’s AIUX team for a while – in numerous projects we did under the banner of “Project Lyra”.

Rather than AI systems that a human interacts with e.g. a cloud based assistant as a service – this would be pairing truly-personal AI agents with human owners to work in tandem with tools/surfaces that they both use/interact with.

And I think there is something here to engage with in terms of ‘designing the AI we need’ – being conscious of when we make things that feel like ‘pedal-assist’ bikes, amplifying our abilities and reach vs when we give power over to what political scientist David Runciman has described as the real worry. Rather than AI, “AA” – Artificial Agency.

[nb this is interesting on that idea, also]

We worked with london-based design studio Special Projects on how we might ‘unbox’ and train a personal AI, allowing safe, playful practice space for the human and agent where it could learn preferences and boundaries in ‘co-piloting’ experiences.

For this we looked to techniques of teaching and developing ‘mastery’ to adapt into training kits that would come with your personal AI .

On the ‘pedal-assist’ side of the metaphor, the space of ‘amplification’ I think there is also a question of embodiment in the interaction design and a tool’s “ready-to-hand”-ness. Related to ‘where the action is’ is “where the intelligence is”

In 2016 I was at Google Research, working with a group that was pioneering techniques for on-device AI.

Moving the machine learning models and operations to a device gives great advantages in privacy and performance – but perhaps most notably in energy use.

If you process things ‘where the action is’ rather than firing up a radio to send information back and forth from the cloud, then you save a bunch of battery power…

Clips was a little autonomous camera that has no viewfinder but is trained out of the box to recognise what humans generally like to take pictures of so you can be in the action. The ‘shutter’ button is just that – but also a ‘voting’ button – training the device on what YOU want pictures of.

There is a neural network onboard the Clips initially trained to look for what we think of as ‘great moments’ and capture them.

It had about 3 hours battery life, 120º field of view and can be held, put down on picnic tables, clipped onto backpacks or clothing and is designed so you don’t have to decide to be in the moment or capture it. Crucially – all the photography and processing stays on the device until you decide what to do with it.

This sort of edge AI is important for performance and privacy – but also energy efficiency.

A mesh of situated “Small models loosely joined” is also a very interesting counter narrative to the current massive-model-in-the-cloud orthodoxy.

This from Pete Warden’s blog highlights the ‘difference that makes a difference’ in the physics of this approach!

And I hope you agree addressing the energy usage/GHG-production performance of our work should be part of the design approach.

Another example from around 2016-2017 – the on-device “now playing” functionality that was built into Pixel phones to quickly identify music using recognisers running purely on the phone. Subsequent pixel releases have since leaned on these approaches with dedicated TPUs for on-device AI becoming selling points (as they have for iOS devices too!)

And as we know ourselves we are not just brains – we are bodies… we have cognition all over our body.

Our first shipping AI on-device felt almost akin to these outposts of ‘thinking’ – small, simple, useful reflexes that we can distribute around our cyborg self.

And I think this approach again is a useful counter narrative that can reveal new opportunities – rather than the centralised cloud AI model, we look to intelligence distributed about ourselves and our environment.

A related technique pioneered by the group I worked in at Google is Federated Learning – allowing distributed devices to train privately to their context, but then aggregating that learning to share and improve the models for all while preserving privacy.

This once-semiheretical approach has become widespread practice in the industry since, not just at Google.

My next metaphor builds further on this thought of distributed intelligence – the wonderful octopus!

I have always found this quote from ETH’s Bertrand Meyer inspiring… what if it’s all just knees! No ‘brains’ as such!!!

In Peter Godfrey-Smith’s recent book he explores different models of cognition and consciousness through the lens of the octopus.

What I find fascinating is the distributed, embodied (rather than centralized) model of cognition they appear to have – with most of their ‘brains’ being in their tentacles…

And moving to fiction, specifically SF – this wonderful book by Adrian Tchaikovsky depicts an advanced-race of spacefaring octopi that have three minds that work in concert in each individual. “Three semi-autonomous but interdependent components, an “arm-driven undermind (their Reach, as opposed to the Crown of their central brain or the Guise of their skin)”

I want to focus on the that idea of ‘guise’ from Tchaikovsky’s book – how we might show what a learned system is ‘thinking’ on the surface of interaction.

We worked with Been Kim and Emily Reif in Google research who were investigating interpretability in modest using a technique called Tensor concept activation vectors or TCAVs – allowing subjectivities like ‘adventurousness’ to be trained into a personalised model and then drawn onto a dynamic control surface for search – a constantly reacting ‘guise’ skin that allows a kind of ‘2-player’ game between the human and their agent searching a space together.

We built this prototype in 2018 with Nord Projects.

This is CavCam and CavStudio – more work using TCAVS by Nord Projects again, with Alison Lentz, Alice Moloney and others in Google Research examining how these personalised trained models could become reactive ‘lenses’ for creative photography.

There are some lovely UI touches in this from Nord Projects also: for instance the outline of the shutter button glowing with differing intensity based on the AI confidence.

Finally – the Rubber Duck metaphor!

You may have heard the term ‘rubber duck debugging’? Whereby your solve your problems or escape creative blocks by explaining out-loud to a rubber duck – or in our case in this work from 2020 and my then team in Google Research (AIUX) an AI agent.

We did this through the early stages of covid where we felt keenly the lack of informal dialog in the studio leading to breakthroughs. Could we have LLM-powered agents on hand to help make up for that?

And I think that ‘social’ context for agents in assisting creative work is what’s being highlighted here by the founder of MidJourney, David Holz. They deliberated placed their generative system in the social context of discord to avoid the ‘blank canvas’ problem (as well as supercharge their adoption) [reads quote]

But this latest much-discussed revolution in LLMs and generative AI is still very text based.

What happens if we take the interactions from magic words to magic canvases?

Or better yet multiplayer magic canvases?

There’s lots of exciting work here – and I’d point you (with some bias) towards an old intern colleague of ours – Gerard Serra – working at a startup in Barcelona called “Fermat”

So finally – as I said I don’t work at this as my day job any more!

I work for a company called Lunar Energy that has a mission of electrifying homes, and moving us from dependency on fossil fuels to renewable energy.

We make solar battery systems but also AI software that controls and connects battery systems – to optimise them based on what is happening in context.

For example this recent (September 2022) typhoon warning in Japan where we have a large fleet of batteries controlled by our Gridshare platform.

You can perhaps see in the time-series plot the battery sites ‘anticipating’ the approach of the typhoon and making sure they are charged to provide effective backup to the grid.

And I’m biased of course – but think most of all this is the AI we need to be designing, that helps us at planetary scale – which is why I’m very interested by the recent announcement of the https://antikythera.xyz/ program and where that might also lead institutions like TU Delft for this next crucial decade toward the goals of 2030.

Driving an EV from London to Porto

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Tl,dr;

It’s fine. You could probably do it in three days, we took it easy with four. Stopping along the way to charge and sleep is wonderful. Driving is insanely boring, no matter what the advertising industry tries to tell you, even in a shiny new EV. The eurotunnel is an engineering miracle. France’s charging infrastructure is great, Spain a little less so, and Portugal less so again – but improving. Charge point mapping/route apps are your friend.

I’ve been meaning to write this up for a while – well, since this summer of 2022.

Told the tale to a number of folks who are thinking of moving from away from cars that use fossils fuels to make tiny explosions inside them, but are feeling uneasy about long journeys (that they probably undertake once a year if that).

I was lucky to get our family EV (an ID4) late last year before supplies got very constrained – and even then it was a a six month wait from having made the down payment in the summer of 2021.

This summer we decided to drive instead of fly to Arouca, Portugal – a lovely small town in the mountains / river valleys about an hour to the east of Porto.

It’s a beautiful place – with loads of great nature / hikes to be had including the epic Arouca suspension bridge and ‘Passadiços do Paiva’ riverside walk along wooden platforms. If you’re near Porto, go visit!

Our Route

We started out from London early for the Eurotunnel.

It was my first time so I was a little trepidatious.

I needn’t of worried – it was all very smooth and simple. 30 or so minutes after driving our car onto the train we were rolling off in France.

From there to our first charge, which was one of the Ionity network.

Quick and painless for us – but the person in the next bay (with a very shiny Porsche Taycan EV) was struggling.

The flummoxed face of a stranger looking at a cellphone or frantically trying to tap a multitude of RFID cards against a charging station would be a familiar sight this trip.

We gave them our VW WeCharge card which allowed us to use Ionity, and they were able to make their return ride on the eurotunnel back to the UK.

A brief diversion stating the obvious on RFID cards, charging networks and apps etc.

There are too many.

If I have a combustion engine, I can roll up anywhere and pay cash or use a debit/credit card to get refuelled. Not so with electrons. You have to give companies data, and membership as well as money. A few EV charging networks now will accept money alone, but that’s the minority it seems.

A good alternative is to join something that allows you to tap into different networks. It seemed though that not one of these would work across everything on our route. ChargeMap is a great app – and certainly was our mainstay – as well as the “ChargeMap Pass” RFID card you can get from them that allowed us to use a number of different networks on the way. Our VW “WeCharge” card also helped – but in Portugal – Miio came into its own.

Mostly I found navigating between Ionity stations. Ionity is expensive for sure – but fast – and fairly ubiquitous. Also – there tend to be 6-8 of them at a location instead of 1 or 2. Driving to a way point only to find that the one working EV charger is occupied is very dispiriting.

Night One: Saumur

After traveling through Normandy and North-east of Paris we got to our first stop Saumur in late-afternoon. Settled into the cheapish-but-nice hotel we’d booked (which had an EV charger… most of the big hotel booking sites now let you filter for locations that have EV charge points) and walked the short distance into the town centre (not a hardship after driving all day).

Quickly the pattern of the journey was established – this was all about driving through the morning and early afternoon, arriving somewhere to eat, sleep and recharge ourselves as well as the car. It also reinforced that the journey was going to be part of the experience rather than the thing merely facilitating it. I’d had that mindset going into this, and planning it – but it had been theoretical until the cold beer and charcuterie arrived…

We were also travelling through a Europe that was experiencing a heatwave – and tangible reminders of the climate emergency were everywhere. It was sobering to see the levels of the Loire for instance

Night Two: San Sebastián

The next morning we departed pretty early as we had a long leg ahead of us – through south western France, past Bordeaux – ending up in San Sebastián in the Basque region.

Despite traffic jams all around Bordeaux scuppering our plans to have lunch there we made ok time and did two full charges on the way. French service stations continued to impress – with one offering a model for the future: more or less an outdoor festival site with beanbags and hammocks in the shade while you let your EV recharge!

Again – thinking about charging as being something you enjoy rather than an annoying hindrance is made a lot easier to embrace when you have a motorway stop like this – reading your kindle for an hour in a beanbag with a cold diet coke, while the electrons flow…

We passed over the border around 5pm and got to San Sebastian not much after that.

We had a pretty posh hotel booked in the centre of the city which had been listed as having an EV charge point, but the logistics of plugging in our car defeated the staff on duty… So, it was into town for a sunset pintxos crawl…

Night Three: Salamanca

From the Basque region through Spain, the charging situation started to get a little more vexing. Chargers were on many different networks, some were faster than others – many only being 50kW, and maintenance became a little bit of an issue. Again Ionity was the saviour – but we managed to scrape through to our next stop – a vineyard/hotel outside Salamanca.

This, being more of a ‘destination’ had a Tesla ‘destination charger’ – which in Europe are all CCS standard rather than the proprietary Tesla connector. They’re low powered – 7kW – but again leaving it overnight to charge while we slept was no hassle.

In the morning we drove the remainder of the way to Arouca in Portugal.

Arouca is a pretty small town but has a 50kw charger in it’s centre which we used every couple of days we were staying there. We found the Miio app invaluable for using the chargers in Portugal – which was a bit sparser in its coverage again from Spain. We’d also bought a EU-outlet compatible trickle charger with us to plug into socket where we were staying in the countryside outside the town, and allowed us to leave a few weeks later on 100% for the route back… which was tackled with considerably less trepidation after the success of our journey there.

Conclusion

Long road trips in EVs are fine, entirely doable with a bit of casual planning – and maybe more pleasant than the equivalent in a fossil-fuel car, once we adjust your mindset a little… Stopping and recharging your car and yourself for a while on the journey can be a very positive thing – especially in France where they already seem to have it down.

There’s an interesting new typology of rest stop yet to emerge around EV charging and longer road trips, but you can kind of see the beginnings of it – if you squint.

EV charging networks though really need to improve. Ionity is the best in class for sure – but hopefully others will follow their lead. But – spare us the memberships, apps and terms of service… just let us pay like the people buying the dinosaur juice!!!

I hope – if you have an EV or have been considering changing over to one – this post is useful in someway.

Until the next one…

The right to longevity

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After the EU “right to repair” should there perhaps be a “right to longevity” for connected objects, to enable them to be reanimated by open-source code and platforms once they have had their motivating spirit of software removed by the shuttering of whatever service they were originally the avatar of?

I reanimated my Little Printer last year with the help of the good folks at Nord, who in turn were able to do that because Matt Webb had open-sourced the code when BERG’s Little Printer / Bergcloud shut down.

Google just announced that they are to shutter Stadia. I was an early adopter – and have one of the quite handsome Stadia controllers. It’s a really nice games controller! Look – it even got a mini documentary about it’s design engineering presented by Baratunde Thurston!

So – as Stuart Horton says:

Indeed!

And let’s not stop there – let’s mandate that anything that is manufactured with atoms, but animated by software and services *must* have it’s firmware at minimum open-sourced if the service is shutting down.

Feels like a good bit of ‘endineering‘

Allow old phones, aibos, connected juicers, jibos, Nabaztags to rise like polycarbonate phoenixes from their slumbers.

An EU right-to-longevity might keep more atoms out of landfill by letting the bits be free.

Update 2023-01-17: Stadia team are working on making the controller work with other devices / Bluetooth https://9to5google.com/2023/01/15/stadia-controller-bluetooth-certification/

Station Identification

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Some of us know what we want: private sufficiency, public luxury, doughnut economics, participatory democracy and an ecological civilisation. None of these are bigger asks than those the billionaire press has made and largely achieved: the neoliberal revolution that has swept away effective governance, effective taxation of the rich, effective restraints on the power of business and oligarchs and, increasingly, effective democracy.

So let’s break our own silence. Let’s stop lying to ourselves and others by pretending that small measures deliver major change. Let’s abandon the timidity and tokenism. Let’s stop bringing buckets of water when only fire engines will do.

George Monbiot, The Guardian, 18th July 2022

“Private sufficiency, public luxury” – I can get behind that. A dream of equitable abundance. Wales recorded it’s hottest ever temperature yesterday. 37.1ºC. Fire engines are needed, indeed.