Week Eight : Thoughts on Sustainability

Having become a catchphrase of the last decade "greening" is today inconsequential of its meaning. The word is often used in a rather ad hoc sense more in terms of its marketability rather than to describe tangible outcomes for resilience. Considering that notions of sustainability are particularly poignant in the reality of my future scenario the issues discussed this week have highlighted a need to consider the true sustainability of my own ideas

Investigating open source further; a number of rising initiatives are already at play in the world; ideas are out there being shared and manipulated and coming into reality. There are however associated issues; ideas can be lost in translation or indeed mis-communicated;  if one does not understand another language, whether that be cultural, visual or behavioural the purpose of a good or service may be skewed or even unattainable. Likewise if ideas are not climatically or regionally specific then a new set of design problems or consumption habits may emerge. 

It would seem then that  open-source projects could benefit from a mixture of approaches; a combination of openness and leadership; a balance between inputs and outputs and a consideration of availability, appropriateness and relevance. Using the 'crowd' could be a good way of achieving this as the voice of citizens rather than an individual I would theorise focuses more upon collective goals.

A virtual platform upon via which ideas can be shared and moderated could be a highly relevant and engaging outcome as it would allow for not only uninhibited participation but also accountability and advice. As an example;  the City 2.0 website is a platform created to surface the myriad of stories and collective action being taken by citizens around the world. If this global resource could be applied to a local scale by bringing together regional platforms, initiatives, funding and research then the possibilities for resilience at the level of a community such as Paddington would be unimaginable.

The challenge I face however is to consider this in application to a physical environment, one in which people move and reside. How can people actively participation in a space that contains multiple meanings and activities?