Two effective designs, two wildly divergent outcomes. BioLite went on to generate more than $25 million in revenue in 2020 and invest proceeds from CampStove and other consumer products into green energy solutions for families living without access to the grid. To date, BioLite has supplied 2.9 million people in Asia and Africa with clean stoves and lighting.
Uber went on to IPO in 2019 with an eye-popping $82.4 billion valuation, but in the process “disrupted” taxi drivers almost out of existence, clogged streets in cities, exacerbated pollution and helped create a gig economy that frequently exploits workers.
<aside> 🤔 This is what happens when a design ignores the larger ecosystem in which it operates. Effective design isn’t always good design. Good design is always responsible—to users, society, and the planet.
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Just look at BioLite.
We must all do better. If it is design that got us here, design can get us out.
Christiaan Maats is a designer and entrepreneur who challenges the way we look at product design. Going beyond form and function he shows us how products carry deeper layers of meaning and how those layers can connect us to a bigger reality. In this Talk, Christiaan Maats explains how meaningful products can embody the change we want to see in the world and sheds light on his own vision of a circular society that integrates industrial society with its natural roots.
Global Warming by Glenn Thomas
Climate designer Sarah Harrison points us in the right direction by asking the right question:
How can we design systems that give back more than what they take?