Thinking with Yosuke Ushigome about Mass Products that Encourage User Involvement [Part 2]

Breaking free from stereotypes into diverse values and pluralistic values. How to design open-ended products that embrace diverse values │ Thinking with Yosuke Ushigome about Mass Products that Encourage User Involvement [Part 2]

Thinking with Yosuke Ushigome about Mass Products that Encourage User Involvement [Part1]

Breaking down stereotypes with “pattern language”

Nozue: In this research project, we set two processes for thinking about open-ended product ideas.

The first is the process of resetting the relationships between products and people that have been developed up to now. The second is the process of first breaking down, and then rebuilding, the relationships between products and people. For the second process, we compiled a pattern language* as a guide to the thinking processes.

* Pattern language: A tool assisting with creative endeavors by collecting patterns that describe the values, practical knowledge and other expertise shared in a given community. For this research, we made a pattern language collection on cards with oncise textual guides paired with real-world examples, to assist with the thought processes.

Ushigome-san, you worked with us on making the pattern language collection. What kinds of things left an impression on you?

Ushigome: As you will recall, when putting together the pattern language collection, we gathered many different case studies. Of these, an example that I thought was especially good was a product that is a table, but provided only as table legs. The actors use things around them as the tabletop. If there are legs, a door lying around that was going to be thrown out can become a table. What I found highly interesting was how the way of framing products, or how the landscape is seen, undergo change. The key feature of a pattern language, I believe, is how new relationships are formed by means of such changes in meanings or points of view.

Nozue: So in other words, experiencing changes in viewpoint can impact also how products are accepted. In the case of Chiiil, a refrigerator being small is not a matter of holding only a small amount of food, but of giving the user greater flexibility for the user. Chiiil is sold as a set, consisting of a small refrigerator and a new point of view. Rather than one-sidedly imposing new preconditions, it may be necessary through the use of a product to gradually develop new viewpoints together with the actors.

We also have to ask, “What is the core?”

Nozue: In 2023, when I and Ushigome-san held an outside workshop on thinking about open-ended product ideas, focused on vending machines, we tried actually using this pattern language collection. Many manufacturers of mass products took part in the workshop, and I feel a common awareness was reached of the limits to how far we can continue refining product performance while assuming the same values as up to now. I think the concept was also shared that by providing some margin, through involvement with actors, value can be discovered that is different from that of conventional products.

Ushigome: Both we and the participants struggled, however, when attempting to come up with ideas freely, separated from conventional values. Perhaps it would have been better to take a simple approach, as with the half-house or Chiiil, like “Let’s cut it in half,” or “Let’s make it small.”

Nozue: I agree. We wanted the thinking of participants to be guided by the approach in the half-house, where the core parts that can only be made by mass production, such as plumbing and electricity, are included with the product and the question is how to go about opening up the remaining portions; but this proved difficult in practice. Maybe before proceeding with the discussions, it would have been better to clarify a bit more what the core parts are. One thing we learned is the importance from now on, when thinking about open-ended products, of the process of discussing and agreeing on the core.

Trying our hand at making open-ended products

Nozue: Following the outside workshop on making vending machines open-ended, we are now making prototypes and conducting thought experiments, which I would like to introduce next.

The first is a vending machine with its own public space. The vending machine has a hole in which people can place items of their choice freely. For example, you can put a favorite book in it, which users of the vending machine can borrow. Think of it as coming with a mini library.

The idea is, how about borrowing the function of a vending machine as a place people gather, creating a public space that creates loose connections between people?

Second is a vending machine that lets anyone become a seller. Part of the vending machine is left open for people to sell their wares. Sell what you want to sell, alongside the other merchandise. The point of this is to allow people in local communities to decide both what to sell and what to buy.

The third is products that can turn things or spaces around you into a vending machine. An actor looks for a box that seems suitable for the item to be sold, or the place, and sends 3D data to Hitachi. Based on the data, Hitachi sends back a lid for the box, with a key and payment function. The actor then attaches the lid on the box, completing the vending machine. The idea here is that the potential of an item or space is discovered and exploited on the actor side.

What are your feelings about these three ideas?

Ushigome: I see it as trying out various approaches for making a vending machine an open-ended product. Personally, I like the idea of a vending machine with its own public space. Even though a vending machine was supposed to be a public thing, it is treated as something private where we go to buy drinks when we are thirsty. I believe this is a wonderful idea, trying to bring back the original nature of a vending machine as belonging to everyone.

Sato: When people think about a vending machine, they have in mind a number of elements, some of which can be seen as the essence of what it means to be a vending machine. We then added plus alpha value at the open portion.

The coming role of product designers

Nozue: When “being open-ended” becomes a new axis for products, I believe in-house product designers in particular will have more ways of putting their skills to use and be able to make more contributions to society. Product designers in the future, going beyond meeting the demands of society, I see as continuing through trial and error to guide the transition toward a society they aspire to create. In depicting a society that may become a possibility someday, they could be getting close also to speculative design,* questioning what is usually taken for granted. Through product-making technology, I would like us to close the gap between society’s various global-scale issues and everyday life. I feel all the more strongly that this is what I want to do through this research.

* Speculative design: Differing from ordinary design aimed at solving problems, design that raises issues, giving rise to questions that are opportunities for thinking about the future.

Ushigome: It is extremely positive that this kind of research is being carried out by a company like Hitachi that makes mass products. Dr. Cameron Tonkinwise, one of the proponents of transition design, at the time when speculative design became popular in some companies as a methodology, stressed that it was only natural that all design should be reflective, critical, and speculative about the future. When thinking about design as speculation about the future, rather than simply going along with the mainstream, we need to think about what kinds of activities are to be given the most weight. I believe this kind of critical thinking is required in corporate design, and is conveyed by this project as well. Since this project has value in exerting some kind of impact on the mainstream, I am looking forward to future developments.

Sato: I think “open-ended products,” besides the value they have for users, also provide incentive to us on the creative end, reminding us not simply to make things that fit the usual mold. Those of us who make open-ended products maybe need to adopt as our attitude, “not closing.”

Nozue: “Open-ended products” that enable human beings to demonstrate their intrinsic initiative are only the result. That’s why I agree that first of all “designing products that do not become closed-ended” is such an important attitude. I hope our discussion today is the occasion for further pursuit of these matters.

Part1: A refrigerator does not need to be in the kitchen. Open-ended products that inspire freedom in use

Thinking with Yosuke Ushigome about Mass Products that Encourage User Involvement [Part 1] - Research & Development : Hitachi

A refrigerator does not need to be in the kitchen. Open-ended products that inspire freedom in use
Greater convenience, at a readily affordable price. In the manufacturing of mass products (products and other items made in a mass production system...

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Profile

Yosuke Ushigome
Takram (at the time of the discussion in February 2024)

Specializing in futures research, digital prototyping, and interaction design, he designs for better-informed decision-making about our future. He has been involved in many projects that focus on the interplay among people, technology, and the planet. He received the 2018 Swarovski Designers of the Future Award. He has also written for design publications such as Core77 and ICON magazine.

SATO Tomohiko
Chief Designer, UX Design Department, Design Center
Research & Development Group
Hitachi, Ltd.

After working in London on design and development of furniture and interior, he joined Hitachi, Ltd. in 2015.
In his current position, he designs and develops home appliances, with a focus on refrigerator development.

NOZUE Sho
Design Lead, UX Design Department, Design Center
Research & Development Group
Hitachi, Ltd.

An industrial designer. After working on development of professional projectors, TVs and other information devices, as well as home appliances, he took up his current work developing railway cars. While stationed in the UK office for two years from fiscal 2022, he was engaged in railway car development along with this project. He assumed his present position in fiscal 2024.