A guide to the next great wave of technology-an era of objects so
programmable that they can be regarded as material instantiations
of an immaterial system. "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.
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