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Shaping Things (Mediaworks Pamphlets)
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Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 745.2
EAN: 9780262693264
ISBN: 0262693267
Label: The MIT Press
Manufacturer: The MIT Press
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 152
Publication Date: September 01, 2005
Publisher: The MIT Press
Studio: The MIT Press
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Editorial Review:
"Shaping Things is about created objects and the environment, which is to say, it's about everything," writes Bruce Sterling in this addition to the Mediawork Pamphlet series. He adds, "Seen from sufficient distance, this is a small topic."
Sterling offers a brilliant, often hilarious history of shaped things. We have moved from an age of artifacts, made by hand, through complex machines, to the current era of "gizmos." New forms of design and manufacture are appearing that lack historical precedent, he writes; but the production methods, using archaic forms of energy and materials that are finite and toxic, are not sustainable. The future will see a new kind of object—we have the primitive forms of them now in our pockets and briefcases: user-alterable, baroquely multi-featured, and programmable—that will be sustainable, enhanceable, and uniquely identifiable. Sterling coins the term "spime" for them, these future manufactured objects with informational support so extensive and rich that they are regarded as material instantiations of an immaterial system. Spimes are designed on screens, fabricated by digital means, and precisely tracked through space and time. They are made of substances that can be folded back into the production stream of future spimes, challenging all of us to become involved in their production. Spimes are coming, says Sterling. We will need these objects in order to live; we won't be able to surrender their advantages without awful consequences.
The vision of Shaping Things is given material form by the intricate design of Lorraine Wild. Shaping Things is for designers and thinkers, engineers and scientists, entrepreneurs and financiers—and anyone who wants to understand and be part of the process of technosocial transformation.
Customer Reviews
Average Rating: 
Rating:  - good idea, poor book
i had high hopes but was vey dissapointed, fortunatley it is a very short book so i stuck it out, (to be fair there are one or two worthwhile parts) i really did not like the writing style a lot of waffel to make pritty staight forward points. the general idea is quite valid and interesting but poorly extrapolated and supported. just watch the ted talk from bruce.
Rating:  - Techno-futuristic ruminations on "spimes" and sustainability
Type a few words into Google and you can find a sushi restaurant, a movie theater, concert tickets or a new car. But if you misplace your car keys in your house, you still have to search the old-fashioned way: room by room, cushion by cushion, coat pocket by coat pocket. If Bruce Sterling is correct, though, one day you'll Google your keys. And your shoes. And your dog. This is the nascent "Internet of things" made possible by technology, including such items as radio frequency ID tags and traceable ... Read More
Rating: - This book is a little too short.
This book is 'wafer thin', I would recommend John ThakorsIn the Bubble: Designing in a Complex World instead, it is goes into a lot more depth, but is still a sci-fi.
Rating: - A tool, in a way...
This is such a short read, and such a good read - it really is a tool, more of a reminder. The way some people put a model of their dream car on their desk, to remind them their goal, this book should be kept around, read once or twice a year to remind oneself to put purpose, intelligence, and diligence into what you create. I think I'll start giving copies of this to new employees...
Rating: - Setting the agenda..
If you're looking for a book on sustainable design, the intertwining of the informational and the material, and RFID, look no further.
Sterling's account is more than a book for designers. Though some angles tend to originate from design-related topics, the implications and responsibilities pertaining to design cannot belong to a community of designers per se.
That's a pretty self-evident idea of course, but allow me to elucidate.
When Sterling argues that "we need ... Read More
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