New Worlds to Design
Informatik Umeå Universitet
Something has changed. Design of things and places has always been a process heavily restricted by the material used the available space, resources, etc. One sign of a good designer has always been the skills to handle these restrictions and still come up with something interesting, surprising and adequate. This is how our real world presents itself to us. But, today we are facing a new task. There are new worlds to design.
When we enter a virtual world—a world made possible by computers and telecommunication—we enter a world without or at least with a very different set of restrictions and preconditions. This puts designers in a new situation. When we don't have limitations concerning material and space—how do we approach a design situation? Even in traditional design the first framing of a design task is a very complex act of judgment. When there are no boundaries or restrictions the framing becomes even more complex and open. Design changes to some extent from a process of adding to an existing world and to become the creation of a new world.
This is maybe not completely true since even a designed virtual world will have some relation and interaction with the real world. The design is always the totality, i.e. the virtual world and the parts of the real physical world that interacts.
With the computer we can create new virtual environments almost a copy of our real physical surroundings or we can create something completely different. In the first case the design will be based on our knowledge about how our world works. Design is based on how things "are". We can even talk about that design as being correct or wrong. But if we want something different, we can create a world where no known physical laws exists, except for those we put there by design. These laws can be new, never seen before, and we can create a world radically different from anything we are used to experience. In this case design will not be based on understanding on how things "are". Instead design will be a result of what we "want" or desire.
What is a virtual world? A virtual world can be text-based, but then we have to do a lot of the work in our minds, as we do when we read a book. It can be a two dimensional graphic world, a cartoon like world. Or we can create three-dimensional worlds. When we add dimensions and when we add details, we get closer and closer to a situation where we can replicate the real physical world if we want to.
It is often assumed that richness in the created world is the same as trying to copy the physical world, but this is necessary not true. There is no causal relation between richness of depth, details, structure, and form and the resemblance of the physical world. Neither is there any relation between richness and functionality or any other aspect of the virtual world. Sometimes the best we can design is a very simple and plain world without any richness in details because it fits our needs best. Sometimes we really want to indulge in a world so rich of details that are physical world seem almost simple in comparison. How these worlds will be is a matter of design. Even if we as designers have always been world creators we have never faced it in such a straightforward meaning.
We are as designers today facing another magnificent task. It is not always the case that we can design a true virtual world. Today are more and more of all our artifacts, systems or processes we have to design based on, connected to, or part of a tremendous process of virtualization.
Today these new worlds are a very small problem for designers since only a very small number of designers are involved in this work. But if we expand the notion just a little, we can see that what we are doing when we design web sites, and all kinds of virtual communication tools and techniques is to add to the growing virtual world. And this is not enough. The part of a design that is virtual is rapidly increasing. It starts with a small part or function or structure, such as the case in car design. A few years back a car had just a few parts based on information technology—today more and more of the car becomes virtualized. The digital part of the car is not invisible any more; it is part of the overall design. The car is also connected to the net through different satellite systems for positioning, maintenance, communication, etc. The car today is truly a part of the overall virtual world.
What is happening is a shift that Albert Borgmann describes as the change from "information about reality" to "information for reality" ending with "information as reality". Information about reality is when we use information to describe reality. Information for reality is all the different ways we use information as tools to know how we should change or add to our reality (blueprints, drawings, notes, instructions, methods, etc.). The last stage is when we experience information as reality. When information expose itself to us in such a way that we experience it in a direct way as reality, and we don't think about it as about something else. Borgmann is afraid of this development and warns us against our willingness to get into these new information realities and lose connection with the real reality.
Design today is in many cases about the shaping of a world that is both physical and virtual. And as Borgmann writes we are moving fast in a direction where design is mostly about the design of information. And it is not information about anything, it is information as reality. These new designed realities are becoming more and more natural parts of our everyday lives. It will soon be difficult to talk about industrial design or car design without also being part in the design of the overall virtual world. Are we ready for that challenge? Do we have any ideas on how we want this new world to be like? What kind of design thinking is needed?
This new situation is to me just another argument for the need of a general design approach. There is a need to draw different design disciplines together—not only for the sake of some philosophical reason but also from a very practical perspective. A future designer will move between different fields of design and in the particular design situation there will not be only room for specialized design knowledge. There will also be a need for overarching design knowledge on design of both physical and virtual worlds and especially on the new form of hybrid worlds that will be are most common artifacts.
This article may also be found at: http://www.informatik.umu.se/Eerik/worlds.html