VIRTUAL REALITY

Imagine a world, sometime in the not so distant future, where 3D printing has become the primary form of manufacturing. Not only this, but manufacturing is no long happening in a factory, but on location, in your living room, at your school or in a local product printing shop.

How might this impact the way we design things?

What will the digitisation of things do to the value of products, when they can be downloaded and printed on demand?

The truth is that we’re already well and truly on our way towards this.

The global Fab Lab Network has been actively exploring this space for the past decade with a distributed manufacturing network spanning over 600 locations around the world. Turning bits into atoms and back again.

They are not alone.

Additive manufacturing is exploding at a rapid rate.

The US Air Force has recently contracted Aerojet Rocketdyme 3D print complex rocket parts that can withstand extreme heat and cold. Preliminary test have proven 3D printing to be far more accurate, faster and cheaper to produce than traditional methods of manufacturing.

Nasa has announced, with their Mission to Mars project, that additive manufacturing will be a primary focus of research and development for building habitats in extreme environments.

With $103 Million in public funding, the Singapore Centre for 3D Printing is investigating ways to use 3D printing to solve their increasing need for public housing.

Local Motors is working towards bringing the first 3D printed electric car to market – the ‘Swim’. These will be produced in scaled down, local micro-factories. Earlier prototype cars have proven that 3D printing means less parts and less reliance on fluctuating external supply chains.

What would a cocktail of Local Motors, pilotless vehicles and Uber look like?

The world’s largest toy manufacturer, Mattel has recently announced it’s sub $300 toy printer, with hints that their brands Barbie and Hotwheels will be next to hit the build plate.

Will we see Lego move towards a distributed manufacturing model anytime soon? Or, like Kodak, will they leave their run too late?

But let’s rewind 9 years when a local, and little known New Zealand 3D printing pioneer, Vik Olliver (with Adrian Bowyer from Bath University) helped spark a global movement, a self-replicating 3D printer, the RepRap. At a time when 3D printers were over $15,000, the RepRap could be printed and assembled for little more than $500.00.

That was 2007.

In 2008, Zach Smith from New York’s Brooklyn Makerspace also got his RepRap working. In 2009, they had formed Makerbot Industries and started shipping self-assembled 3D printers - the Thing-o-matic. In 2011, Makerbot got venture capital investment of $10 Million and quickly became a best selling consumer level 3D printer. In 2014, Makerbot was acquired by Stratasys for $400 Million.

It’s incredible to think that the work by an open source movement could fuel a small, marketing savvy US company towards a $400 Million buyout, and what has since become a personal fabrication revolution.

Which brings us back to Fab Labs.

What are the value of Fab Labs to local innovation? What’s the value of open access to experiment with tools such as additive manufacturing and open-source electronics?

Like Singapore, we need to develop a centre of excellence that is exploring new applications of additive manufacturing. We need to fund an open repository of knowledge that could benefit businesses to accelerate their design and manufacturing processes for the 3rd Industrial Revolution. We need to pool the often hidden tech talent that Fab Labs attract and look towards ideas that will reshape the way we do things.

Without the depth of investment in New Zealand, we need to devise our own approach. A partnership between research institutes, prototyping labs and industry could be the way forward. Using Fab Labs as an open knowledge base and showcase of advances in additive manufacturing. And a testing ground for the new business models needed to support them.

Being a tenant of Christchurch's planned 'innovation precinct', I had the opportunity to sit in on a presentation by MBIE and Architectus outlining some precursory thinking on a framework for development.

On the whole, their approach was great. It took into account the need for small innovative start-ups. It considered a growth plan that expanded from small beginnings at the core of the precinct growing out to larger commercial entities on the perimeter. 

MBIE also commissioned some strategic advice from BizDojo, a co-working space with bases both in Wellington and Auckland. They highlighted the need to ensure a good balance between the small innovative energy of start-ups and reliable cornerstone corporates.

Unfortunately, there's always an elephant in the room. Stratospheric. Unaffordable. Leases.

Being a tenant in Christchurch's CBD is not going to be cheap, unless you're lucky enough to be a state subsidised tenant of EPIC. In fact Christchurch is going to be comparable to Auckland's CBD.

Here's a basic comparison:

High Street Auckland: 140m2, ground floor, split level in the bustling centre of Auckland's fashion precinct. $460.00/m2

High Street Christchurch: 132m2, ground floor. Brand new premises in the slowly regenerating retail precinct. $425.00/m2

The above is based on a very unscientific search of two similar offerings currently on Trademe. Auckland's High St is a well tenanted and well patronised piece of prime real estate. Christchurch's High St currently has no retail at all.

The Christchurch development pictured above has between 3 and 5 spaces to lease on the ground floor. Across the road another developer will have the same. In fact right across the city, there will eventually be an oversupply of A grade ground floor, $400.00/m2 real estate.

Even my rudimentary high school economics training senses an eventual problem – supply outstripping demand. It sounds absurd when you observe the glacial pace of redevelopment in the CBD, but at some stage the gold rush will happen, and when it does, we'll have an incredible selection of premium property at +$400.00/m2. 

So where's the profit of small to medium business going?

We need to seriously reframe our approach. Instead of thinking of the rebuild as a 'commercial development' problem, we should instead think of it as a 'business development' problem. We need to rapidly get small, innovative business back on it's feet.

The innovative tech industry have developed lean methodologies to bootstrap accelerated growth. They use agile as an organic approach to tackling big unknown projects. They rapid prototype and release Minimum Viable Products (MVPs). And they use Design Thinking to validate if the concept is going to meet the customers needs.

The Institution of Architecture could serve to benefit from these approaches or perhaps MBIE should be commissioning the innovative industry to develop it's own framework for an innovative renewal?

'What if Christchurch was a virtual city?' was the topic of conversation at our 2nd Designworks Social Roast. 

Smart cities promise a world where data is ubiquitous. In the same way the internet has become an integral part of how we function in the modern world, information feed to us from our immediate local environment will help inform our actions almost instinctively, like a sixth sense.

But what are the benefits of providing city dwellers access to a deeper layer of contextual information? How would we engage with all this data and more importantly, how could we, as living sensing human beings, be an integral part of a network of sensors?

Roger Dennis has made huge inroads pioneering the concept of the sensing city (http://sensingcity.org/) Christchurch 2.0. As our city renews, we should take full advantage of new technology and open data protocols. 

But to get full buy-in and understanding on a public level, the benefits will need to be grounded at a human level. This is where the concept of a virtual world could help bridge the gap – whether it be virtual, augmented and alternative reality, there's a need to connect people with data more intimately and with minimal complexity.

Virtual worlds and massively multi-player online games are successful in  engaging players on quests of self-improvement. Game designers understand the science of engagement like no other industry. This is mainly due to the level of game play information they have at their finger tips at any one time. If a new challenge isn't working they can make the adjustments necessary to improve engagement based on player data.

This is effectively how a smart city should work, but we should have the ability to be both the player and the game designer. 

Take a standard drive to work as an example. Right now Christchurch is awash with detours and roadworks. They change by the day. Data of road works could inform us in advance the best possible route. Sensors at intersections could let us know of any hazards. Built in GPS in our phones could triangulate speed of travel from other drivers ahead of us to determine realtime congestion.

Data from multiple sources can add a layer of contextual information to standard navigation systems that traditionally only tell you how to get from point A to B but nothing else in between.

The data gathered from our trips can also help model better road systems, which is an incentive for people to participate. This information could also be layered over with fuel consumption and compare the cost of operating a personal vehicle over public transport. Both travel scenarios could be compared on a level of comfort by monitoring stress level of different types of travelers. The possibilities are endless.

As designers of our own world we can begin to make informed choices over cost, time and health benefits. This data has the potential to transform human behaviour much more effectively than public awareness campaigns or protracted consultation processes.

An example where hard factual data could help the public decision making processes is in the suggestion of removing cars from the CBD. In theory this may well be a good idea. But what are the consequences for retail? How is retail affected by traffic volumes in and out of the city? How far are pedestrians willing to walk to get to their destination? What level of uptake in cycling would be needed to make this proposition a success?

The overhead to collate and translate all this information is beyond most people, therefore we become dependent on qualified experts to give us balanced and sound advice (or sometimes the people with the strongest opinions). But as populations increase and technology shifts, we can no longer rely on single sources of advice or wait for research papers and reports to be written. 

In one session alone it was clear that the main benefit was certainty in decision making and how this has the ability to transform human behaviour. 

I'd like to thank Julian Carver, Jonathan Ewing, Laura Griffiths and Nick Hughes in participating on this session, I think we only scratched the surface.

Potential areas of innovation through a virtual city project:

There's some serious provocation in this funding promo. Fund us and fund the revolution! A very well armed revolution.

Not sure what the obsession is with 3D printing firearms, but I can fully understand the need to create a searchable repository of 3D models. 

This is a progressive build home design I was involved in a few years back. By only building the space you need, home owners can minimise bank debt and other overheads such as heating and maintenance.

Using screw piles, home owners also have the option of transporting their home to a new, more desirable section when they're ready. If homes were more modular, we'd have the ability to build up and down, upgrade parts and reuse parts on other sites.

While it sounds idealistic, it is very achievable with today's computer aided technology. It just needs a shift in thinking towards semi-permanent dwellings.

Wikihouse

I like the concept of building for the social economy. Property development for decades has focused solely on capital gain and the benefit of a single generation.

Once built, homes are costly to extend, reduce or even remove. As a result, the housing stock gets caught in a time warp. Instead of retrofitting and renovating homes, it's easier to rebuild, leaving a supply of substandard houses, often used to service the rental market.

The perfect circle of reciprocale enterprise

Independent makers dreaming up new open source hardware projects are not only raising the funds on Kickstarter to keep on innovating, but also releasing new open technologies back into the movement.

Here are some recent successes on Kickstarter:

PrintrBot http://printrbot.com/

Open source 3D printer kit raised over $800,000 of funding. Three kit variations are now available based on the original design. The Printrbot has since been rated the best entry level 3D printer by Make Magazine.

OpenROV http://openrov.com/

OpenROV is a DIY community centered around underwater robots for exploration & adventure. Over 484 backers raised enough money for OpenROV to go into serious production. Over 130 of the backers got their hands on kits from the first shipment.

Filabot http://filabot.com/

Filabot is a spin-off product from the open 3D printer movement. It allows makers to recycle plastic to make new filament for their printers. Since the seed funding from Kickstarter, Filabot has refined their product and has since been mentioned in Popular Science and the recent issue of Make magazine.

oneTesla http://onetesla.com/

A kit that combines music and lightning!? What more could you asks! OneTesla is already eight times over their pledge goal and still climbing.

DigiSpark

Hobbyist Erik Kettenburg wanted a smaller, low cost Arduino board to allow him to bring all his projects to life, so he developed Digispark. Turns out that almost 6,000 backers thought it was a good idea too.

Conclusion

Crowd Source funding is unlike venture capital funding. Each pledge represents a person either with a very similar need or mutual interest. The goal of each backer is to see a project come to life for the benefit of everyone involved – and, best of all, the creator retains ownership over the project. It's even a bigger win-win when the end product is open source.

However, it doesn't come without it's risks. Kickstarter is not a pre-ordering system. Projects that even pass their goals can later fail for many different reasons. Backers need to take a look at the pledge goals and ask themselves whether they're realistic.

At the most basic level, water, food and shelter are all we need to survive. For thousands of years the human race has had autonomous control over these needs, albeit at the whim of mother nature.

Population growth and mass urbanisation has resulted in a social framework that has passed the control of these basic needs over to governing and corporate bodies that manage them on behalf of the people, en mass. 

With money being the default determiner of freewill, people are flocking into cities in the hope to improve their standard of living and relinquish independence by attaining more choice through financial solvency.

However, our household debt to banks have ramped up over the past decade, due to the rising costs of land and the consumers hunger to privately own and invest in property.

The net result is an ever increasing gap between the rich and the poor. We have to ask, do the 'bottom 80%' choose to live in sub-standard housing because they're poor? or are they kept poor due to sub-standard building practices?

While cost of food, health, education and transport need the be referenced in the Inequality Eco-system, housing consumes the largest component of income which has a direct impact on quality of life.

While the cost of housing has increased astronomically, market rents have peaked only slightly. The sharp increase in land costs as a consequence of population intensity and land scarcities has resulted a net loss in terms social equity. These trends alone, which don't take into account environmental impacts or human health and wellbeing, present a path that is unsustainable into future and paints a picture of a system that's clearly imbalanced.

We need to collectively look at the way we build shelter in the modern age of urbanisation that addresses debt slavery and the regulations that prohibit people from building more affordable and sustainable homes. 

These regulations must address the market monopolies large building supply companies have over the market, lending criteria of banks and the stigma of social housing.

The next curve of disruptive trends look to counter balance a lot of what's wrong with the current system. They include:

Open Fabrication:  With the cost of industrial fabrication machines coming within reach of average individuals, we'll see the rise in mass customisation – from homes, to cars, bikes and furniture. Consumers become manufacturer, inventors and innovators. A great example of this is the wikihouse project.

Co-operative business models: The western world currently operates under the right of private ownership, putting individual gain ahead of collective need. Being part of frameworks that operate for the greater good provides a higher sense of purpose and meaning to the individual. These include land co-ops, food co-ops and credit unions.

De-schooling Traditional institutional models have become havens for mediocrity which has stifled their agility and their ability to adapt to change. Bottom-up, open organisational frameworks are providing education, community services and governance on demand, anytime, anywhere, to those who would not normally have access. 

The correction process that is taking place is due to the universal forces of a collective need. As we enter an age of free knowledge and open accessibility, the concepts of institution, intellectual property and private property are being challenged.

Crowd sourcing has its advantages when solving complex problems. The majority of organisations work within a top-down paradigm where senior management and middle management set the strategic vision based on their own personal agenda.

In many instances this works fine. The top-down approach appears as the most expedient way to progress an organisation. But where it begins to fail is when the complexity of situations become too much for a senior management to understand. 

As we become more connected and the evolution cycles of technology and innovation become tighter, it's almost impossible to be 'all knowing'.

As individuals, we rely on making informed decisions based on many inputs and opinions. This happens every time we enter a search into google or wikipedia, or take advice from a friend.

Grand Design's Kevin McCloud has sent an open letter to Christchurch highlighting the latent opportunity in engaging the community to develop a sustainable, community centric city.

“Except in relation to urban design matters in the Core, the Christchurch City Council will continue as central Christchurch's principal planning authority..”

This suggests an over-arching hidden hand controlling design and development in the Core. So it also suggests emasculation of any local say or community involvement at a time when community consultation and empowerment in the implementation of the Plan could produce a truly rounded and properly sustainable outcome. 

CERA / CCDU will find it challenging to respond to Kevin's letter with such an huge investment into the blueprint, however there is an opportunity to include the people in how the plan is implemented over the next decade.

As we've seen from the recent request for investment in the convention centre, the international hunger to invest in property is low to non-existent. It not inconceivable that over time, central government will recognise that local innovation is what is truly valuable in investment terms. They need to consider why, seven years on from Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans is now America's most entrepreneurial city.

Adam Curtis offers us a lesson in recent history in 'All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace'. It echos themes from his pre-GFC work The Trap, by illustrating how free-market economies have failed to deliver on their promise of personal freedom. 

We are now in an era of uncertainty, where, in the last three decades we've experienced significant increases in wealth inequality, even during strong periods of economic growth (or bubbles).

Financial crisis, or any crisis for that matter, will inevitably benefit the wealthy. This was evident in the US bank bailouts and bonuses in 1998. 

The Roosevelt Campus Network is a bottom-up initiative that provides a channel for Millennials (aka Generation Y) to publish ideas that have the potential to change public policy.

Programmes like the '10 Ideas Series' has proven successful in converting ideas into reforms across a range of sectors, from energy to justice.

The education reforms announce for Christchurch has shown a major detachment between Central Government and community. Cost cutting, staff reductions and closures may help balance the books short term, but again, we haven't addressed issues of governance. Instead, the power has been taken away from school leaders and communities to resolve their own issues.

Christchurch has reached a unique crisis point, where, on one hand, we need the direct powers of Central Government to act as the enabler, but on the other, the citizens have the democratic right to shape their city.

The internet has the power to play a major role in organizing and informing both citizens and policy makers. We have an opportunity to utilise an E-democracy model, as a bottom-up policy making approach, to ensure the citizens, who play a major part in upholding government policy, are an integral to the policy making process.

No one can deny that Local Government in the form of Christchurch City Council and Environment Canterbury lacked credible leadership and ability to govern. The motions of democracy resulted in an ineffective governing class that were not listening to their people.

Central Government's purpose is to develop national policy, Local Government's role is to ensure that national policy is relevant to the local economy and community. Little wonder bodies like Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority (CERA) are ill-equipped to engage at a community level.

The problem isn't CERA or Central Government, the problem is the democratic process. The wheels of democracy don't spin fast enough to satisfy the needs of a community in crisis. The less the public feel they are heard the less empowered they become. 

It's time for Government to start adapting as the private sector does and pick up on the successes of large corporates that have implemented extremely effective bottom-up strategies to empower their staff.

One such company is HCL Systems, a large IT provider originating from India. In 2009 they established My Blueprint, an initiative to engage front line staff in the development of corporate strategy. CEO, Vineet Nayar, recognised that true innovation happened in the space between frontline staff and their customer. This was where ideas and product improvements most relevant to their customers were discussed. To be successful, HCL needed to capture this valuable market intelligence and integrated it into company strategy.

In 2009, 300 of HCL's managers submitted their strategic plans to the My Blueprint platform. The platform allowed over 8000 staff to review and contribute to the strategies of individual divisions. The insights garnered from My Blueprint helped reframe business in a way that lead to new value propositions and better service offerings for their customers and gave HCL a much needed competitive edge in a contracting economy.

A McKinsey report reviews a number techniques corporations have used ICT to empower employees to contribute to the strategic direction of the company.

Central Government in New Zealand has an opportunity to adapt and establish similar approaches to corporates such HCL, 3M and AEGON.