case study

As readers of this blog (and of the other content on this website) will know, the advent of DiDIY is set to have a transformative impact on society, by allowing people to create their own tailor-made artifacts, either on their own (using devices like 3D printers) or with the help of other members of the “Maker” community.

We just discovered a very interesting project, which is also one more great proof that the DiDIY project is indeed researching a hot topic, one that will force society to rethink and update laws and norms in many fields, from "intellectual property" to product liability: how does life change, when practically everybody can manufacture copies of ANY PHYSICAL OBJECT?

Musings on Makerspaces as Jazz

These are the people that proudly call themselves ‘Hackers’ not as the term is now abused by journalists to mean a computer criminal, but in its true and original sense of an enthusiast, an artist, a tinkerer, a problem solver, an expert.

Raymond (1999:12)

I am curious about Makerspaces, what they are and why they are. As I understand a Makerspace, it is a physical place where people engage with digital technologies and computing hardware in spontaneous experimentation, tinkering and idea prototyping.

In this blog post, we’d like to show our preliminary reflections on the opportunity provided by the analysis of the current trend of digital fabrication-based DIY – or simply of digital DIY – for a better understanding of the acquisition and development of key competences for the next century citizens and workers.

In April I wrote a blog post on ‘making meaningful connections’, which seemed to summarise and boil down some of the central ideas that have emerged from my research about creativity and making today. The points made there have turned out to be applicable in a number of spheres – for instance, only last week I used that frame for considering the future of universities.

Many believe that participating in a European project is a dull and tiresome experience. To the contrary, a European project such as DiDIY is a very rare and stimulating occasion to see a revolution unfolding before the eyes of researchers, who have the opportunity to witness, and share with you, how DiDIY is reshaping education in real life, involving teachers, students, parents, and school principals, their needs, hopes, failures and aspirations.

35 years ago I bought a BBC micro computer. It was big and clunky and did not have many games, but it had a structured programming language (BBC Basic), and lots of ports and I knew I wanted it.  Although I had dabbled with programming before it was then that my programming ability really took off.

The current trend of self-production activities is reshaping the role of professional designers in a society where everyone does design. Manzini – one  of the most acknowledged researcher in the design field – investigated this topic in his recent book (2015). At the presentation of the book, the author stressed that designers should improve the capability of people to create their own biographies.

To this end, designers can contribute by designing ‘enabling solutions’, i.e.

I recently came across something which is, I believe, a good starting point to speculate (and, of course, research!) about some very specific impacts of Digital DIY (DiDIY) on "consumer rights", and on the retail and manufacturing industries in general.