domingo, junho 12, 2016

“We became interested in low-volume manufacturing,”

O futuro já aqui está, embora muito mal distribuído e conhecido.
"“We became interested in low-volume manufacturing,” Venkat said. “What can we make, that could be successful in units of ten?”
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The low-volume idea was to make manufacturing faster and more varied, by dramatically lowering the output level at which a product would pay off. You can think of the analogy in TV programming. When there were only three networks, the only shows that could make it were those that could draw a mass audience. But with cable, and then with online videos and podcasting, much smaller and more specialized audiences were “large enough,” and we went from mass-cult Gidget and Get Smart to the much more varied, niche-sensitive, and more interesting  modern range from Breaking Bad to reality schlock. Another obvious comparison would be the shift from the standardized, bland-ized mega-brewery U.S. beer world of the mid-20th century, to the rapidly diversifying craft-brew renaissance of today.
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What does this mean, in practice? Without going into all the details, essentially the approach is a combination of the well-known, intangible digital tools of the modern era, with some very tangible, less-known-by-the-public maker-era tools that (as I argued before) are transforming production.
That is: the products coming out of this microfactory use cloud-centric digital techniques we’re all aware of including crowdsourcing, online collaboration, crowd-funding, online sales, open-source coding and design. But they also use the new production techniques, from the real world of real hardware, that have become available only in the past few years—and that keep improving thanks to Moore’s Law. These include 3D printers, laser cutters, low-cost but high-sophistication multi-axis machine tools, and a range of other devices. Together these tools allow people in smaller, less formal, much lower-cost workspaces to design, test, refine, and manufacture items that previously would have come required factory production lines—and to find audiences that collaborate in the process of design and, so far, have provided eager markets.
The operation also uses the social and collaborative tools of the era—shared work spaces, partnerships with local schools. The production tools are available for modest cost to local people who want to use them. “It’s like a manufacturing library,” Venkat said, with production equipment open for shared use. “The ‘books’ are available. We’re not going to read them to you, but you can find them here.
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An explicit goal of FirstBuild, like many of the maker sites we’ve seen around the country, is to become a center for local individuals and groups with ideas for innovative hardware that might sell.
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“We are trying to overcome the selection bias of needing to scale up for big-volume production,” Venkat told me. “We don’t have to design to a spec. We are making in small-batches, low volumes. We can make one, then the next one, then the next one. We want to be open to as many ideas as we can.”"
Ao ler "Jeff Bezos thinks we need to build industrial zones in space in order to save Earth" não pude deixar de pensar na possibilidade remota de Bezos ainda pensar no futuro como a "heavy industry" e as "gigantic factories"... o futuro vai ser uma grande salgalhada para as mentes uniformizadas do século XX.
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BTW, este "We don’t have to design to a spec." faz-me crer na importância das marcas pessoais no futuro. E na vantagem tuga da rapidez e do pouco planeamento:
Temos é de melhorar a reflexão.
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Trechos retirados de "Why the Maker Movement Matters: Part 2, Agility"

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