#Just because you have some idea of urban settlements being inherently well connected

[drumlincountry]

The other day at work someone looked me in the face and said "I love visiting places this isolated. It's so untouched. You can see how people lived like 50 years ago."

Like !!!!!!!! Believe it or not, this is what this place looks like IN THE PRESENT DAY. If you want to ask how the the charming peasants live, here's one! Right in front of you! Hitting you with my clipboard!

[siobhandesignstorytelling]

Week 2 | Reflections

Observation

Reflect on today’s workshop: What were the key activities and concepts?

Key Activities List

Wrote 10 things about what we immediately observed in the classroom that we hadn't noticed when we sat down.

Time + Place. Discussed Ka Mua, Ka Muri: Walking backwards into the future.

Watched 'Waihorotiu'

Reflected on the history of Auckland CBD

Went on a 'Photo Safari' - explain AUT to aliens using only

Group Formation

Observation as a Design Thinking Method

Photo Safari (observation activity) + Blogging and Reflective Writing

Design Thinking Method: Service Safari

Design Thinking Methods: Photo Journal and PhotoVoice

Waihorotiu Notes

This was such a creative and artistic way to share the history of Auckland. It took us through the changing landscape of Auckland CBD from pre-colonisation to the present day through the viewpoint of the taniwha.

Camera shots:

Sky as water

The glass looks watery as it reflects

cuts out to a completely concrete urban landscape - no sky or water in the shot makes it feel dense and almost claustrophobic

Old building nestled amongst newer ones

Waterfall amongst buildings & cityscape

Te Waihorotiu is the legedary lair of the taniwha Horotiu

The river flowed through the valley where Queen Street now lies

Boats could go up to a waterfall on Victoria Street.

Pakeha settlement turned the river into a fettered canal and entombed it within a brick sewer. The river is now out of sight and lies beneath the pavement.

There’s a shot of the brick canal beneath queen street - it has an eerie feel to it

The shot shows the old canal polluted with rubbish as the sound of rain play over it.

Entombed was the right word to use in my opinion - it feels like a catacomb for the Taniwha.

Time + Place | Ka Mua Ka Muri

Time and location in the Maori Worldview differ from western notions. The concept of Past and Future or Mua, Muri is a fundamentally different way of perceiving time.

Mua is used when describing a physical location. It means 'in front of, ahead'. but when describing time, it means ' the past, the time before.

Muri is also used to describe a physical location, it means 'behind, at the back of. But when describing time, it means 'the future, after.'

I think the Māori worldview of Mua and Muri is very appropriate for this assignment. What it suggests in relation to time and the past and the future, it's like you are moving into the future with your eyes fixed on the past - almost like you are walking backwards. I think this is very appropriate when thinking about how the past has shaped our present and then projecting those trends to try and imagine the future.

Observation Activities

At first, I started to notice things in my immediate vicinity. I noticed my teammate's pencil case and how it had highly stylised eyes decorating it.

I noticed that in the first half of the classroom the walls were cluttered with student work and different types of educational posters - the second half of the classroom was barren - nothing on the walls. From this observation, I was able to piece together a story about this classroom: the first half of the classroom was used a lot more frequently than the second. It taught me that by simply observing my surroundings I could begin to piece together a larger narrative at play.

From here we went on a Photo Safari, where we left the class to use photographs to put together a visual narrative that tells aliens, who have just landed on earth, everything they need to know about AUT as a place and the people who attend.

The first observation activity we did ended up being an extremely useful pre-exercise for the Photo Safari. We took the mindset of being mindful of our surroundings from the classroom to the campus. It primed us to look around for things that we otherwise wouldn't usually notice, to better illustrate our narrative.

We found that most of the pictures turned out dull, mainly because of the day's overcast weather and our concrete surroundings.

After the activity itself, we shared our pictures with the entire class. As a group, we saw what we could have done better. We realised that we could have considered "what would this mean to the aliens?" more thoroughly. We also didn't take a lot of photos of people in action, and it would have been a lot more useful to show people interacting with their surroundings to give more context clues to the aliens, illustrating how certain areas/things are utilised.

In the readings, the concept of service safari was explored. My understanding of this was that a service safari is another term for a mystery shopper. I have done mystery shopping as a job in the past and thinking about our activity from this point of view, through the lens of mystery shopping was interesting. As a mystery shopper, you're trying to understand the customer experience, what it is like for the person to experience the service you are providing them. This was important for the aliens to understand AUT, what it would be like to experience it. And thinking further down along those lines, for our project - what would it be like to experience our fictional future - how will we show our idea of 2051 with people - how will they connect with it? How will they interact with it? In a similar way - we will have to think of our audience as the 'aliens' so to speak, as the future we are communicating doesn't exist to them - only in our minds - so it's important to flesh that out and communicate it.

Start doing some more focused research: what do experts think are the issues that will shape our future?

Like I mentioned in last week's reflection. The biggest issues facing the future in my POV is Climate Change, Artificial Intelligence and Automation.

Climate Change

https://time.com/5824295/climate-change-future-possibilities/

This article tells a story of air that is difficult to breathe, of political unrest, militarised borders, countries that have historically been more temperate climates now glued to weather forecast predictions, as in this future not even they are safe. Severe tornadoes, flash floods, wildfires, mudslides, and blizzards are often in the back of your mind.

"Disasters and wars rage, choking off trade routes. The tyranny of supply and demand is now unforgiving; because of its increasing scarcity, food can now be wildly expensive. Income inequality has never been this stark or this dangerous."

Artificial Intelligence

https://www.archdaily.com/937523/how-artificial-intelligence-will-shape-design-by-2050

This article has quite an optimistic outlook on the future of AI although still list some issues that will challenge our problem-solving abilities: The article reports that 47% of the work done by humans will have been replaced by robots by 2037, even those traditionally associated with university education.

Specifically, regarding workplaces, the article looks at the construction industry, and how in 2050 it may be possible to have completely human-free construction environments. With the exception of perhaps those doing overseer roles or those using exoskeletons, to perform heavy lifting tasks.

The article talks about how AI will affect how we live, especially since human populations are predicted to more and more move into urban areas. Microsensors and urban technology will record air quality, noise pollution and soundscapes, as well as urban infrastructure at large. How people move, where emissions are worst, and how efficient city processes are represented are just a few of these ideas.

Transit is being reimagined on the street and in the air, from public transit transforming to more user-centric mobility services. Some companies are looking to the sky to design and develop the world's first vertiport and air taxi hubs around the world.

The article also touches on the possibility of the 'singularity', a moment in the development of AI that is defined as the point at which machines possess a broad intelligence that exceed human levels. This could also go hand in hand with a merge of AI and human intelligence.

Automation

https://futurism.com/new-study-predicts-nearly-half-of-all-work-will-be-automated

Researching the future of Automation - there is quite a lot of overlap between it and Artificial Intelligence. The biggest overlap seems to be how we work.

The article reports that nearly half of all the work we do will be able to be automated by the year 2055. Automation may create some new roles for some highly skilled workers, but others, especially low-skill workers, will be left without any inherent positions.