Design in and of itself is nothing, it’s an empty vessel, yesterday’s newspaper. But put a current though it and it can go one of two ways. Good or evil. Positive and negative. Design, in either of its forms, represents an energetic exchange of matter. If the design is good the energy flows from designer to consumer if evil then the tables turn.

A good example:
Acme Tin Openers spends years researching, creating and honing the perfect tin opener. They make prototype after prototype, constantly refining the grip and blade so that even a left-handed, arthritic amputee can get a bully beef tin open with out breaking a sweat. The next phase involves manufacture. They work with the factory, tooling dies and testing how they can adhere a mouldable recycled thermo-plastic polymer to a surgical steel blade while keeping the cost down. Now all it needs is an identity. Something that will convey to the consumer why this is the one they should buy over anything else. Fortunately the design agency has been privy to the process from the very beginning and has a great handle (sorry) on what they need. The product is manufactured, packaged, shipped and goes on sale. It’s endorsed by all the safety bureaus. Some celebrity chef gets one and goes on national TV saying it’s the best thing since sliced bread. It wins a design award and soon becomes another ubiquitous household object. It sells for R129.99

An evil example:
Shin Jen Manuflacturing Crompany see glate sales for opener of tins in Amelika. Send number one son to evil capitalist country to bling back opener of tins. Make cheap prastic mould from opener of tins. Plint prackaging on loo paper. Melt old filing crabinets for to make steel blade. Sell cheap, cheap to nice coporlation in West. You buy for onry R14.99.

You don’t consciously think about this when shopping for a can opener, chances are you’re sucking air through your teeth at the thought of paying that kind of money for something that’s just usually there when you open the kitchen drawer. But you buy it anyway. You use it, it’s nice, nothing extra-terrestrial but just right, like you expected. You don’t give it another moment’s thought. Later that year you go on holiday, a nice little self-catering spot up the coast. You whip open the drawer for the tin opener but the sods haven’t left you one. No sweat. Whistle up to the 7-11 and there it is but bugger me it’s almost a tenth of the price. You were clearly taken buy that nice German lady in the exclusive kitchen shop. You get it home and plunge it into the lid of your chakalaka. No dice. The blade bends. And as it bends the chrome flakes off it. That’s odd. You hammer it straight and try again only this time your hands slips of the grip and it bends the other way snapping off an embedding itself into the palm of your hand. Nice.

So do you see?

Acme worked positively to create a product that would endure and they wouldn’t rest until it was right. They spent the energy creating it so that you wouldn’t have to when using it.
Shin Jen worked negatively at ripping off an existing design and traded on visual association and consumer ignorance. They spent no energy in creating it and now you have to employ all your energy in using it.

For every 100 guys that loses a buck there’s always one who scoops up a sack full of the stuff. An investment guru once told me to make sure that I was always on the positive side of financial imbalance. “If the petrol price skyrockets, make sure you’re selling the stuff. Not buying it,” he said moments before I slapped him with the flap of my empty wallet. It’s a crap example, I know. But he is right, in theory, of course. His type always is - even when their banks go belly up. Take a look at the oil men. Their can of the best is always in demand. Sure global gluttony of their product has declined. But who cares? They’re simply producing a little less. They stuck a bung in the old oil well and are resting their resource after mopping up the highest oil revenues in history. While the West is cutting back, shutting down and shitting themselves the oil men are happily snuggled under king-sized duvets stuffed with dollars waiting for it all to turn… the right side of economic imbalance. When angst is everywhere opportunity is easily missed. We’ve just got to dance around the ring for bit. Stay lose, flexible, ready to strike. So who is ready to rumble? One in a hundred. That’s all.