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The age of average

alexmurrell.co.uk

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Re: The age of average

#151

Post by nradov »

bluetomcat wrote: post #145
crazygringo wrote: post #123

What the article describes is correct, but I don't think the words "average" or "homogeneity" or "conformity" are the right terms, as they seem to carry negative connotations here. Rather, the right word is "convergence". The point is, people like certain things aesthetically. It used to be that artists and designers were still trying to figure out what looks good, and trying all the things. But now we've tried so ma…

> They've converged because we think they're nice. Here is the trap. We think they are nice because globalisation works on a more profound level. The "visible" level of globalisation are the consumer products. What's also transmitted are certain intellectual ideas and schools of thought, certain aesthetics and forms of art. For example, the attempts to explain the economy on an individual behavioural and psychologica…

How is that a trap? Would people be better off if they wanted different things than "the West"?

Are Japan and South Korea part of "the West"? Looking around my home I see a lot of stuff designed in those countries.

Re: The age of average

#154

Post by WorldPeas »

I fear LLMS/Image generation will only make this worse. I imagine many people now type in "please list for me 10 ideas for a mint gum tagline" for a spark of inspiration, or will generate mocks of art using sketches fed into an image transformer. The thing they don't think about when doing this however, is that it's just operating on what it's been fed, while if people from another brand do the same, they'll also get a similar result. I guess we've outsourced inspiration and now have to deal with the consequences.

Re: The age of average

#155

Post by epups »

bluetomcat wrote: post #145
crazygringo wrote: post #123

What the article describes is correct, but I don't think the words "average" or "homogeneity" or "conformity" are the right terms, as they seem to carry negative connotations here. Rather, the right word is "convergence". The point is, people like certain things aesthetically. It used to be that artists and designers were still trying to figure out what looks good, and trying all the things. But now we've tried so ma…

> They've converged because we think they're nice. Here is the trap. We think they are nice because globalisation works on a more profound level. The "visible" level of globalisation are the consumer products. What's also transmitted are certain intellectual ideas and schools of thought, certain aesthetics and forms of art. For example, the attempts to explain the economy on an individual behavioural and psychologica…

How would you differentiate "true" convergence, where everyone agrees a certain idea is superior, vs what you seem to describe here, a sort of imposition of ideas?

Re: The age of average

#156

Post by hgsgm »

ryandrake wrote: post #148
bumby wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've tried making this same point when it comes to auto designs (at least in the competitive, cost-sensitive ones). A lot of mid-sized cars look the same because the design constraints generally converge on the same handful of principles. They've converged not in the aesthetic sense as much as the engineering sense: because they work at a relatively low cost. (I'm speaking mainly about things like aerodynamics here,…

Even if they had to ultra-optimize the aerodynamics so all the cars look like the same bar of soap (they don't have to), they could still at least paint the damn soap a different color. But, no. All you see coming out of the factory are white, silver, gray, black, the occasional red and the occasional blue. What's driving this? That's what the article is about. Is it actually pull from customers, or is it push from t…

Companies like selling cars, so I think they pick colors most people prefer. "Exciting" "Unique" colors look a bit silly or non-unique when your neighbors have the same color. If what you are asking for is 1000 color choices instead of 10, that's obviously more expensive to mass produce or customize.

Re: The age of average

#157

Post by indymike »

crazygringo wrote: post #123

What the article describes is correct, but I don't think the words "average" or "homogeneity" or "conformity" are the right terms, as they seem to carry negative connotations here. Rather, the right word is "convergence". The point is, people like certain things aesthetically. It used to be that artists and designers were still trying to figure out what looks good, and trying all the things. But now we've tried so ma…

> Rather, the right word is "convergence".

I think the word "fashion" seems to fit this, too.

Re: The age of average

#158

Post by hgsgm »

dclowd9901 wrote: post #150
bumby wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've tried making this same point when it comes to auto designs (at least in the competitive, cost-sensitive ones). A lot of mid-sized cars look the same because the design constraints generally converge on the same handful of principles. They've converged not in the aesthetic sense as much as the engineering sense: because they work at a relatively low cost. (I'm speaking mainly about things like aerodynamics here,…

I’d argue that convergence _is_ soulless-ness and cars present a great example of the point. The “soul” of something that is inanimate is the qualities that make it memorable or stick it in our mind with some manner of tactility. Not literal tactility but the nature of how you can visualize something so clearly it’s almost like you can touch it in your mind. I’m getting a bit spacey here but let’s get concrete: Jerem…

We have troubles at work dealing with more than ~50 souls in our monkeysphere. Do we really benefit from 100 or more souls in our homes, one for every appliance and piece of furniture?

Re: The age of average

#159

Post by epups »

Last5Digits wrote: post #135

I'm always wary of articles like this. The feeling of things becoming mediocre strongly resonates with me, but I am aware that there could be a great many different biases at play. When I was younger, entertainment media felt magical. The complexity and depth of experiences I could get from even a second-rate story was immense. I remember staying up late at night to process the last movie I watched, or feeling that r…

Yeah I agree. Part of growing up is recognising patterns everywhere, including art. I don't doubt the process of making everything more average is there, but it's hard to ascertain that when every observer is biased.

Re: The age of average

#160

Post by sangnoir »

mdorazio wrote: post #143
crazygringo wrote: post #123

What the article describes is correct, but I don't think the words "average" or "homogeneity" or "conformity" are the right terms, as they seem to carry negative connotations here. Rather, the right word is "convergence". The point is, people like certain things aesthetically. It used to be that artists and designers were still trying to figure out what looks good, and trying all the things. But now we've tried so ma…

You make a good point, but I think there's a qualifier that convergence in this case is convergence to mass-market appeal. Everything looks the same because that's the aesthetic that most appeals to ~75% of the population. What's missing is that there seems to be an increasing lack of alternative designs to appeal to the other ~25%.

The link between sameness and mass-market capitalism is obvious to me. I was surprised by its absence in the article and comments here.

Alternative designs that cater to a fraction (25%) of the population will not have the full benefit of economies of scale, so emd up having higher prices and forced to position as up-market/luxury products - which imposes another set of constraints that also impose sameness (see optional packages for luxury SUVs.)

It's really hard for "quirky" products to succeed in the world we made as those products will be strangled by the free hand of the market.

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