Patterns of Transformation

There’s a couple of paragraphs that truly resonate with me while reading the article on Patterns of Transformation by Ida C. Benedetto. Aside from the idea of comparing funerals as a ritual to experience design (my mind was totally blown by this), I was drawn to the part where she broke down issues of isolation, cultural poverty and the missing middle ground amidst a faster, and even in a “OPEN 24 hours convenience store” way of people transacting nowadays. There could be something in momentary connections, ie the adrenaline rush that I got after Anil Dash, founder of Glitch.com, heart-ed my retweet one time.

We live in an age of hyper-accessibility, where nearly anyone is a Skype call away and the whole world can read our tweets. Despite this, we feel increasingly isolated from each other as we hole up in social pockets of people similar to us, surrounded by information that affirms our world view. We are always accessible, and yet we are always isolated.

INCREASED HYPER-ACCESSIBILITY = INCREASED ISOLATION

I have always felt this way about social media platforms with a fervent wish to “bring everyone together” end up becoming constrained by business-motivations and would lean towards convenience which is an oxymoron. We have peaked past this aspiration, as we are comfortable with, hurriedly typed up text messages, sometimes mic-enabled, or autocorrected. The speed and fidelity at which the comments sections barely promote a space to cultivate either togetherness or transformation.

In the context of comment sections, some basic rules of social interaction are being ignored:

1. the cultural context at which each one operates from (tone, voice, hidden meanings)
2. the anonymity of every user ignoring sorts of moral code that humans live by as opposed to conducting conversations in person
3. the lack of the ability to forge strong and solid relationships due to fleeting interactions (another symptom of a convenience-driven product or service)

It was a very interesting topic how “a gathering” was such a simple concept before social media existed. How we are missing the middle ground, where people can gather together in a more intimate context.

In previous eras, social gatherings and ritual experiences were the domain of religious institutions, cultural organizations, or the state. Now, they increasingly fall within the realm of design as it expands to address challenges of human emotion and connection. 

As 90’s kid, I have lived during this time where we didn’t have dinners with phones on our faces. Now it is way easier order takeout, without having to go through the trouble of calling and dealing with another person on the other line.

I think this is what she meant about “cultural poverty”, wherein our constant search for easier, faster and a more productive lifestyle, we are sacrificing our natural craving for social connection, which prevents us from experiencing an intimate gathering and freely immerse and discover each other’s cultural differences.

Designers of the 20th century made huge strides in creating beautiful, comfortable, useful environments for people with the means to access. Lurking in their success is a severe cultural poverty fed by an aversion to risk and uncertainty.