Category Archives: Research

SECURING INFLATABLES

April 6, 2017 Xiu Ming Leave a comment

According to Singapore’s law, an inflatable which is characteristic of the below is considered an amusement park.

An inflatable which a patron may enter upon or within or climb on:
1. which has any enclosed space that is fully or partially roofed over or covered, the base of which enclosed space occupies an area equal to or exceeding 30 square metres;
2. which has any enclosed space that is fully or partially roofed over or covered of any size, within which the maximum vertical displacement of a patron using the inflatable is equal to or exceeds 5 metres; or
3. the base of which occupies an area equal to or exceeding 150 square metres, whether or not the inflatable has any enclosed space

Hence it has to adhere to structural & mechanical and process guidelines and is required to be assessed and certified by a qualified person (QP), who is a specialist professional engineer, registered in the discipline of amusement ride engineering with the Professional Engineers Board.

Quoting the same website,

“For a major amusement ride with a higher risk and safety profile, the qualifed person will be required to engage and consider the advice and opinion of a conformity assessor (CA). A conformity assessor is a person or body of persons whose expertise is or includes the carrying out of procedures (including inspections, tests and certifications) for determining whether the design and specifications, the proposed installation method or programme or the proposed modification method or programme relating to a major amusement ride or the major modification thereof conform to any technical standard or requirement. A conformity assessor could be incorporated or not, and could be local or foreign.

Besides technical support, the conformity assessor will complement the qualified person with expertise in non-technical but critical aspects of ride safety such as ride management (e.g. layout of queue areas) and crowd control (e.g. access routes and barriers).”

https://www.bca.gov.sg/AmusementRideSafety/arsa_rides.html

No rough guideline was provided by the website. But according to UK’s guidelines, any inflatable set up outdoors on hard standing must have 165kg of pressure on each anchor point. An option to that is the drill and bolt system.

UK website, http://www.hse.gov.uk/entertainment/fairgrounds/inflatables.htm. states this:

If you are buying an inflatable for work or renting one for an event, ensure it has been built to the current British Standard (BS EN 14960) and if it has, there will be a label on it saying so. If there is no label you may be taking a risk with the safety of those using it.
The label will tell you when it was made, how many people can use it and what heights they should be.
Every inflatable should have at least 6 anchor points, though bigger ones will need more. The operator manual that should be supplied with the inflatable will tell you how many there should be. BS EN 14960 also provides more information regarding the calculations to be used to work out anchor point requirements.
All the anchor points must be used, preferably with metal ground stakes at least 380mm length and 16mm diameter with a rounded top. Anchor points on the inflatable should have a welded metal ‘0’ or ‘D’ ring fitted to the end. If ground stakes cannot be used then a system of ballast using water or sand barrels or tying down to vehicles that will give at least the same level of protection should be used. Each anchor point should have the equivalent of 163kgs to give this. Beware of tripping hazards if you secure in this way.
Have a good look at the inflatable when it is blown up and before use. You should check:
- the site is suitable;
- all anchorages are secure and in place;
- ancillary equipment is in position (e.g. impact-absorbing mats);
- there are no significant holes or rips in the fabric or seams;
- the correct blower is being used;
- the internal air pressure is sufficient to give a firm and reliable footing;
- there are no exposed electrical parts and no wear on cables;
- plugs, sockets, switches, etc. are not damaged;
- the connection tube and blower are firmly attached to each other;
- the outer edges of the front step are in line with the centre of each of the front uprights. Under no circumstances should the width of the step be less than this. The whole unit should look symmetrical and those bits that should upright, should be upright. If it looks misshapen or deformed there may be internal problems which may make bouncing unpredictable.
If there is an electrical blower with the inflatable this must also be tested at regular intervals. The law requires electrical equipment to be maintained to prevent danger. The type and frequency of user checks, inspections and testing needed will depend on the equipment, the environment in which it is used and the results of previous checks.

British Standard (BS EN 14960) costs 114 pounds to buy, and it will be unnecessarily time-unfriendly. I will adhere to what I can find on the above UK website.

Turnbuckles

The floor panel holding the shackles must be able to withstand harsh outdoor environments.

HDPE Marine Board
High Density Polyethylene Marine Board is specially formulated to withstand the rigors of harsh outdoor marine environments. It is UV-stabilized to resist damage and retain its beauty, even after years of direct sunlight. Increasingly, Marine Board is replacing wood and laminates in boating applications. It does not splinter, crack, delaminate, rot, swell or absorb water like traditional materials. Even under heavy foot traffic on yacht decks, it remains virtually maintenance-free.

Research

About Immersive Experience

February 7, 2017 Xiu Ming Leave a comment

by Seth Porges

Whether you’re throwing a corporate event or building a virtual reality game, creating an experience that truly immerses an audience is no easy feat. I spoke to writers, game designers, immersive theater producers, and others on the forefront of experience design and asked them all the same question: What do you think is the secret to creating an immersive experience or world? Here are their top tips.

Use Details To Make Your World Feel Big And Alive

“Pay attention to the details. The little, transformative things are what bring a setting to life, and if they ring false, they can jar the viewer/player/reader right back into the real world. For example, when I wrote my first Halo novel, I included a passage about how warm and familiar the sun’s radiation felt on the narrator’s skin when he returned to his home planet, compared to all the other worlds on which he’d been fighting aliens. One of the writers at 343 Industries, which now produces the Halo games, called out how he loved that bit because it anchored the character and made the story feel much more real to him.”

— Matt Forbeck, game designer and author of books such as Halo: New Blood, which builds off the game franchise’s expanded fictional universe.

“Create a list of every element within the party and design it to your vision. We make a big list of elements within the party then customize each to suit our theme. How are the waiters dressed? How are the guests dressed? What sort of drinks are you putting in their hands? What is the food and how does it look? To throw a truly fantastic event you have to customize every element to your satisfaction.”

–Adam Aleksander, New York-based experiential event designer.

“When you’re creating an immersive experience you’re inviting someone into another world, you want to be a good host. That means providing a sense of place, and a sense of a world beyond that place. Audiences crave a sense that the portion of the world they get to see and explore is part of something larger, even if they never see it. This is as true for an immersive environment that never leaves a small room, or an epic feature film. If a breeze is coming from somewhere in the virtual space – the human audience knows that there’s a world with wind and gravity out there subconsciously. We all crave these details to understand the world around us, it’s satisfying and exciting to explore these worlds. To make a truly transportive experience, audiences crave the sensory richness we would find in the real world around us–not only visually–but in the care and attention to sound, scale and the imagined world off-stage.”

-Caitlin Burns, COO of Datavized, an immersive design and technology lab specializing in WebVR and data visualization. She currently serves as Vice Chair of the Producers’ Guild of America’s New Media Council and East Coast Co-Chair of the PGA Women’s’ Impact Network.

At this BBQ Films event for “Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles”, audience members were cast as members of the Foot Clan (Photo: Jacob King for BBQ Films)

Be Clear About Your Expectations From The Audience

“We are social animals, so the single best element of a transportive event are the people that are in it with you. We start all of our ideation with a simple call to action. What version of self are we asking our guests to be when they walk into our transportive cinematic world? Are they good, or bad, or both? Are they prom-goers? Are they villainous trainees? Are they just out to save the Empire ? If we get social setting right, then each audience member is part of a bigger whole, and everyone can feel it. And it feels good.”
-Gabriel Rhoads, co-founder of BBQ Films, a New York-based event production company that specializes in immersive cinema.

“The old rule that there’s no such thing as ‘character’ but instead there’s only “action” applies to the role of the audience in an immersive experience. I always give the audience a clear task or work to do. Rather than try to create a complicated backstory for the audience—which usually leads to boring exposition—give them something to do. That action will tell them who they are, and how they should relate to the other characters in the story world.”
-Michael Rau, co-founder of the narrative technology company Wolf 359, and co-creator of “Temping”, an interactive installation performed at the 53rd Lincoln Center Film Festival.

Provide A Sense Of Status

“Provide the audience with a clear sense of status. More so than anything else—immersion, choice, etc.—status helps participants see how you are inviting them into the story world or experience you’re creating for them. That doesn’t mean you have to cast them in a role per se, but you do need to let them know they have a role to fill, however large or small. Transformation, therefore, starts with properly positioning people towards play.”
-Byron Laviolette, Creative Director of The Mission, an experience design agency based in Toronto. He also holds a Ph.D. in Interactivity and Play Theory.

Use Limitations To Your Advantage

“If you’re putting on an event, think about the unusual characteristics surrounding your venue, then devise a way to best utilize these atypical circumstances. Some of the most creative expressions are born from having to circumnavigate a limitation with the venue. here are times when I’ve devised an entire map-point system with actors simply because I didn’t know how else to get people to find the venue. Another time, there was an elevator that we didn’t know what to do with, so we hired an actor to steal people from the party for a 1-on-1 storytelling experience.”

–Adam Aleksander, New York-based experiential event designer.

Let The Audience Make Decisions

“Be generous with the amount of agency you give your audience. Once you’ve created a space that is different from daily life, allow your visitors to engage with it in a meaningful way. Adults carry with them the innate desire we all experienced as children: to play and to pretend. This is not a childish desire, but a human desire. Where do audiences want to be transported? In some ways, we want to go to a place that feels new and exciting, but perhaps what we want more is to be present and experience our true self.”

-Andrew Hoepfner, creator of the immersive theatrical production Houseworld.

“The unparalleled sense of presence that VR provides has lead the audience to question their agency within the worlds they explore. Choice is no longer enough. Let go of traditional narrative and experiment with emergent storytelling. This will become increasingly important as the Maker Generation matures with this new medium.”

-Stefan Grambart, Creative Director of Secret Location, whose past projects include the Sleepy Hollow VR Experience for Fox TV.

Create A Space That People Can Project Themselves Into

“For a world to be truly immersive, you have to leave it unfurnished, and without wallpaper. This flies in the face of the unwavering trajectory towards 360-degree construction. But I’m talking about the invisible stuff. The walls no one else see. The armchair in the corner with the childhood cat that nobody notices. The laughter that shakes free a piece of mental chewing gum that has been stuck in your hairy memory for decades. It doesn’t matter if it is a book where words trigger detailed mind films, or if it is a contraption filling your vision with undulating panoramas, or it is an installation with kettles and faxes and hands to touch. If the player’s self isn’t imported into the world, it’s all paper thin. They have to project themselves into it in some way. They need to hear their breath in order for it to be alive.”

– Christy Dena, writer-designer-director atUniverse Creation 101; Cofounder of Forward Slash Story; Chair of Games, SAE Creative Media Institute.

“For a successful immersive experience, put your audience at the center of the work, and think about it from their user perspective. If the audience is made the protagonist, they will see the most meaning and relevance for themselves. They don’t have to role play, but the work will serve as a Rorschach for them and create layers of meaning in the space that you allow for their agency and interpretations.”

-Tom Pearson, co-artistic director at Third Rail Projects, which puts on immersive theatrical and dance productions that include Then She Fell and The Grand Paradise.

Concept Development, My Work, Research

5 Different Kinds of User Experience by John Falk & Contextualisation to real world needs

January 18, 2017 Xiu Ming Leave a comment

Questions:

How easy is it for people to stay at the outdoor movie area?
How do I balance between the various reasons for coming?

My answer for that is to provide the option for different levels of engagement.

I refer to readings and credit the thought process of John Falk, in his theory of 5 Different Kinds of User Experience. Based on his almost 40 years of research in the field, he has come up with 5 “experience types” which he says are pretty much universal in all people, regardless of demographic. These describe basic human needs. They are:

After research on John Falk’s theory, my answer for the first point is to look at the bigger picture and design for majority of these personality profiles.

What is needed:

Resting seat
Equipment which allows interaction
Shade/shelter
Screen

Newest concept as of now:

Using webbed surfaces as a seating and interactive tilting system for group tv viewing activities. I chose web surfaces because it allows constant movement as a default and fulfils the purpose of my project, which is to encourage physical movements. The use of webbed surfaces are supported by the point that a way of encouraging physical activities is through social interaction. Webs create a sense of awareness of new additions to the seating area and also urges the sitter to move and adapt to new additions. Activities which allows the users to gain credit for shows will take place on a separate hard surface, incorporated with tilt and infrared sensors. (SKETCH)

The comments received are as below:

Some people would not visit the place because they prefer to watch TV shows in their own comfort zone.
Its institutionalising the exercising and moving part of the experience. It becomes as stick approach instead of a carrot approach.
It is ok to institutionalise the business.
Has to be grounded instead of suspended, not ergonomically friendly to sit on or manuveur around especially through the middle of the net.
Take a look at Joe Colombo. (Design philosophy: He believed that “all the objects needed in a house should be integrated with the usable spaces; hence, they no longer ought to be called furnishings but ‘equipment.'” These “dynamic pieces of furniture” were useful because “habits change, the interior of rooms has to change with them.”) Link: http://www.r-and-company.com/biography_detail.cfm?designer_id=51

Rethinking the concept:

The project that I have come to design is speculative, assuming that people will be motivated to make changes to their lifestyle and that the idea will appeal to the general public.

Through this project I hope to help to cultivate an awareness of the negative effects of a sedentary lifestyle and subtlely change the behaviors of long hours of sitting. I embarked onto this project with the assumption that there will be a greater awareness of the effects of sedentatry lifestyle and hoping that people’s aspirations will be sufficient for the project to take off. These are dangerous assumptions taken that design, aimed to be behavioral changing, operates within an intricate web of socio-cultural and economic situations. Hence for the project to take off, it has to be contextualised and meet real needs. It needs a stepping stone for it to be applied into the real world.

Looking at corporate companies which have greater incentive to make such things happen are companies which has a welfare system for its employees. Technology companies and creative offices such as Google and Apple offer flexible and creative work environments.

Quoting Craig Nevill-Manning, on Google’s philosophy and its real physical embodiment in the architecture of Google:

“The philosophy is very simple,” Mr. Nevill-Manning said. “Google’s success depends on innovation and collaboration. Everything we did was geared toward making it easy to talk. Being on one floor here removed psychological barriers to interacting, and we’ve tried to preserve that.” Among innovations that sprang from seemingly chance office encounters are the Google Art Project, which is putting thousands of museum works online, and enhancements to the company’s AdSense and AdWords advertising platforms. Razor scooters make it easy to get around the huge floors (each covers five acres), which offer every conceivable gathering space, from large open spaces to tiny nooks with whimsical furniture.

The experience product I design has to cater to a certain age group. As previously mentioned, the age group is young adults 20-39 years of age, in the initial stage, becuase they are early adopters of technology and are more receptive of new ideas. This has to be further narrowed down, specifically to people who spend majority of their time behind screens in order to be more convincing.

Information taken from journal:

http://slks.dk/fileadmin/user_upload/dokumenter/KS/institutioner/museer/Indsatsomraader/Brugerundersoegelse/Artikler/John_Falk_Understanding_museum_visitors__motivations_and_learning.pdf

My Work, Research

Activity Range

January 10, 2017 Xiu Ming Leave a comment

To broaden the range of activities offered by the space, I researched on the equivalents of 2-3 mins of walking per hour, as recommended by studies.

The article link below shows other activities which have an equivalent Metabolic Equivalent of Task (MET) of MET 3.0-6.0:

The activities can be classified as aerobic, muscle strengthening and bone strengthening activities, described below.

AEROBIC ACTIVITIES

Aerobic activities require moderate physical effort and include, but are not limited to: biking slowly, canoeing, ballroom dancing, general gardening, using your manual wheelchair, arm cycling, walking briskly, and water aerobics. Examples of vigorous activities are basketball, jumping rope, running or bicycling on hills, soccer, m laps, and martial arts.

Not sure whether you are at a moderate or vigorous activity level? Try the talk test. If you can talk while you are active, then you are participating at a moderate level. If you can only say a few words without stopping to catch your breath, then you are engaging in vigorous activity.

MUSCLE-STRENGTHENING ACTIVITIES

Strengthening activities work all the major muscle groups – legs, hips, back, chest, stomach, shoulders, and arms. These activities include, but are not limited to: lifting weights, push-ups, sit-ups, and working with resistance bands. Don’t have weights? Common household items such as bottled water and soup cans can also be used.

BONE-STRENGTHENING ACTIVITIES

Bone-strengthening activities produce a force on the bones that promotes bone growth and strength. This force is commonly produced by impact with the ground. The good news: bone-strengthening activities can also be aerobic and muscle-strengthening like running, jumping rope, basketball, tennis, and hopscotch.

Link:

https://www.fitness.gov/be-active/physical-activity-guidelines-for-americans/

Perhaps the types of activities can be simplified into stretching, walking, lifting, pulling/pushing, hitting, jumping, climbing etc. The space should be able to accomodate a few of these activities.

According to this article walking 2-3 mins per hour is not a panacea to sedentary lifestyle. The mandatory 250 mins of exercise per week is equally important for good health. Perhaps if the space is able to accomodate actual 250 minute worthy work outs, it will be able to capture a wider audience who are seeking to spice up the experience of exercising.

My Work, Research

Sedentary lifestyle as the main issue

December 24, 2016 Xiu Ming Leave a comment

Below is the refinement before the proposal of ideas. My previous proposals tried to please too many aspects – the project might never be satisfactory, because it will never be able to solve all the problems properly. Besides, there is no real problem between the choice of activities of outdoors VS indoors, and there are equally healthy options for indoor activities.

Hence I have streamlined the most important problem of modern forms of recreation – level of physical activity – and split it into two extreme ends. From the survey, most people do not know what is sedentary activity, the negative consequences, the correct ways or turning the effect around, and ultimately, most are not too conscious of the amount of hours they spend sitting/not moving. An active lifestyle stimulates the happy hormones, and reduces health issues and mortality. The common idea of an active lifestyle is 250 mins of exercise a week, as defined by WHO, but this does not cancel the effect of sedentary lifestyle. Hence to really be healthy, we have to look into how we manage during our inactive hours.

The survey results states that most people surf the net/watch TV for recreation. Hence I would like to improve activeness during the TV watching/bingeing hours.

Previously I proposed the concept of “positive addiction”. This still applies to the project as I’m working on turning TV watching – an unhealthy addiction which allows other habits such as binge eating and long inactivity to form – into an activity which makes use of “enjoyment” to help people get used to moving at TV intermissions/intervals to cancel out the negative effect while they TV binge.

2 ideas were proposed previously- (1) Food + Exploration, (2) Pop up Cinema.

With the realignment of the issue identified, I have decided to go with (2).

(1) is a confusing concept, walking to reduce sedentary lifestyle as part of the project is an indirect effect. Most cheap thrills as such (eg. Pokemon Go) does not hold attention well, and passes quickly. It becomes an activity that people engage in out of convenience of being at certain locations, not purposely done because it has lost its novelty.

(2) can be tweaked to give a direct cause and effect between watching TV and light physical activity. The real reward of watching TV nowadays lies in being able to watch TV without ads, skip to any part of the show you desire, instead of “finding a popup cinema” which I previously thought would be interesting.

Research has shown that breaking up long hours of inactivity better cancels out the effect of sedentariness. Hence by combining the desire to skip ads and need to break up long hours of activity, I think it might be more logical to give the audence the choice to skip tv ads – by doing some light physical activity.

Nevertheless the activity has to be enjoyable. Through the survey, I have also collected responses as to what is “enjoyable”, and social interaction, being one of the key to enjoyment, cannot be left out of the equation.

My Work, Research

Survey Results

December 24, 2016 Xiu Ming Leave a comment

Link to survey

Link to spreadsheet

References

1997_ryanfredericklepesrubiosheldon

My Work, Research

Connecting the Dots

October 27, 2016 Xiu Ming Leave a comment

From last week’s consultation:

Singapore’s smart city project
Connecting the Cake (needs) and Icing (wants)
Reward points for different groups of people
Common points for different issues
Connect to create a story and reward system
Pasar Malam Association
JACKSON TAN
Many stakeholders > Similarities > One concept to apply
How to make an impact with the spirit of the environment?
See NFL Youtube and its external activities
Link to other big time issues like sustainability?
Check out how systems designers do sketches

My Work, Research

How does a physical product help me achieve my objective?

October 27, 2016 Xiu Ming Leave a comment

From the previous week

Objective:

To bring adults (age 20-39) outdoors.

The greatest thing that designing a product can do for me to create an attractive experience of being in the outdoors is – the ability to mass produce and customize a product to bring out a sense of novelty.

An incremental design on a product that is already available in the market will entice people who are passionate in the recreation related to the product to try it and use it. But it will merely enhance the experience: 1. for a small, niche group, 2. Until the next best product appears in the market.

Why design a physical product when I know the limitations it has in achieving the goal to bring people outdoors?

A statement piece for a campaign – One product that triggers the desired response and sends a message to the public. eg Coca Cola
The approach of co-creation
- Co creating space/experience – an approach found lacking by traditional event hosts: How to create an attractive experience of going outdoors and participating such that it captures returning crowds? (Physical products will have to be complemented by a channel for communication, likely it will be more than a service.) > Pop-up event design
- Content generation for entertainment, crowdsourcing, fanfiction and storytelling, etc. – this is what netflix is doing.

Products	Services
Physical and tangible	Abstract and intangible
Detached Objects	Complex systems
Customizable (at most)	Obliged to adapt to constant changes
Have immediate value	Have value only when being used
Produced by a specific manufacturer	Created by a set of individual departments

Moving on, will designing a product limit me to customisable products at maximum?

Or will a product be able to meld with on-site and off-site screen based experience to fulfil the other objectives of organisers or boost their portfolio in terms of sustainability, sustainbility etc. ?

Taste and preferences of millennials:

Adventurous, Wanderlusty, Experiential retail, Willingness to encounter danger or risks in pursuit of enjoyment.

What brands are millennials attracted to? (Possible case studies)

Fashion/Apparel brands: Sephora, Nike, Sketchers, Lorna Jane and Underarmour (active-wear brands), ASOS, Shore Projects,
Store concepts: Muji, box shops (consumers are also producers), Ikea (sustainability)
Concept eateries/cafes (gives opportunities to indulge): Themed buffets (durian, chocolate, etc.), PasarBella, Octoberfest, Dinnerama
Other F&B brands: Coca Cola (Creating Happiness),
Blogging: (food) Lady Iron Chef, Miss Tamjiak, (lifestyle articles) The Smart Local, other commercially driven blogs, Information driven ones like HongKiat.
Work: Shared work spaces WeWork (co-working communities) Starbucks
The Mall: Pop-up retail (Suntec City), PasarBella
Lifestyle: Jamming, Art jamming, Partying, After-party supper and breakfast, Themed social activity – trampoline park, Headspace (mindful meditation), Nike Women #betterforit Lily VS Margot, Grubhub and Snapchat, GOPRO (Important: User-generated content and product design),
Pop culture: Netflix, Disney, SuperBowl/NFL (Sports-related), On screen spinoffs for books such as Harry Potter, LOTR, GOT, The Hobbit, Star Trek
Brands that project wealth: Audi
Advertising/entertainment digital media network: Huffington Post, Buzzfeed
Travel: National Geographic, AirBnb
Movements: Movember, Inktober, Purple Parade, gender equality, lgbt rights

REFERENCE ARTICLES

http://www.inc.com/john-rampton/10-snapchat-brands-that-are-doing-it-right.html

http://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/instagram-best-brands#sm.00004er3l515agf9osbvlqch1d33w

http://www.forbes.com/sites/micahsolomon/2014/12/29/5-traits-that-define-the-80-million-millennial-customers-coming-your-way/#783ebe72a81f

Research

How does Nike keep people interested?

October 20, 2016 Xiu Ming Leave a comment

Extracted from Emerald Insight: Co-creating Value through customer’s experiences

By Venkat Ramaswamy

Venkat Ramaswamy, the co-author (with C.K. Prahalad) of The Future of Competition: Co-creating Unique Value with Customers (Harvard Business Press, 2004), is a Hallman Fellow and Professor of Marketing at the Ross School of Business, University of Michigan (venkatr@ umich.edu). His current book project (with Francis Gouillart) has the working title Co-creating Strategy: Building a Co-creative Organization to Generate New Strategic Capital through Valuable Engagement Experiences.

Insight

Customers have learned how to use these new tools to make their opinions and ideas heard and involve themselves in the value creation process. Seeing opportunity in this new environment, leading firms are responding by engaging their customers in the co-creation of value.

Co-creative interactions are an emerging strategy for value creation. By engaging with informed, connected, and networked customers around the globe, the shoe company Nike has found a new source of value. Whether as ‘‘single individuals,’’ or as members of global thematic communities, customers or other stakeholders now can and want to be involved with Nike in shaping outcomes of value. They do this by sharing their interactions and experiences – these range from their ideas about how to improve or customize products to their feelings when they use products.

Lego, Meccano and EverBlock

October 5, 2016 Xiu Ming 2 Comments

“Creativity is just connecting things. When you ask creative people how they did something, they feel a little guilty because they didn’t really do it, they just saw something. It seemed obvious to them after a while. That’s because they were able to connect experiences they’ve had and synthesize new things.”

-Steve Jobs

The gameplay of these toys starts by making questions and attempting to answer those questions.

Lego

Concepts: Modularity, Intuitiveness, Compatibility
Nature: Solids cubes
For children 3 and above
Material: ABS, polycarbonate (PC)
Benefits: Stability
Opportunities: Weight, space constrains the design
Usage: Intuitive – the positive end into the negative end. More predictable outcomes because of its rules of the game.
Limits: Less manipulation allowed compared to Meccano
Usage of similar concepts into life-sized situations at EverBlock
How is interest sustained?
- Collaboration with Future Lab and Hackathons
- Innovating play experience
- Crowdsourcing site for Lego ideas
- Increased reliance on its own IP (Lego Racers, Ninjago, The Lego Movie) which is more effective at targeting Lego Fans, and associating with other merchandises (E.g. Clone Wars, WOW, and Harry Potter) which targets a smaller group
- Failure
  - Incompatible parts such as Karla collection and Duplo
  - Being too focused on small groups’ needs thus designing large bricks for babies when these cannot be expanded into something more flexible
  The Lego Movie
  
  Lego The Knight Bus from Harry Potter

bb763ca6751b4cb39a225ac3706396ef — Lego The Clone Wars

Lego Baby (Out of Production and replaced by Lego Duplo)

667112709853387da356fe25f1e83752 — Lego Duplo For Girls

lego_10801_box1_in_1488 — Lego Duplo Animal Set

Articles

How Lego became the Apple of Toys

EverBlock Systems

Concept: Modularity, Simplicity
EverBlock Systems was formed to make it easy for companies and people everywhere to build large sized objects using a series of universal building blocks. We manufacture, sell, and rent EverBlock® globally and are building a world-wide network of agents, renters, and distributors.
Sustainable green building. Simplicity of Design.
Uses:
- Temporary event structures
- Decor, pillars, entryway’s and stylish objects
- Event furniture such as bars, benches, tables, etc
- Pony walls, backdrops and room dividers
- Hard tent sidewall
- Interior tent walls and tent dividers
- Exhibits and displays
- Risers, platforms, podiums, and steps
- Illuminated objects
Opportunities
- Look and feel, association with children’s toys
- Flexibility
- Transportation

modulareventfurniture — Temporary Furniture, Walls, Deco

disasterreliefhousing — Larger temporary structure with a feeling of permanence

Meccano

Concepts: Modularity, Flexibility, Compatibility
Nature: Planes to be formed into solids in a “wireframe” structure
Material: Metal (Likely steel), coated with paint
Parts: Reusable metal strips, plates, angle girders, wheels, axles and gears, and high-quality plastic parts
Connection: Nuts, bolts, and set screws/grub screws
For children above 10.
Difficulties: Too many types of unique parts
How is interest was lost?
- No linking outfits between the 11 outfits produced, no incentive for buyers to come back for more. Even the colours do not match.
- Upsizing with “A” (Accessories) to move on to the next set without duplicating parts. Eg Buying Outfit 2A after buying Outfit 2.
- General modelling incompetence
- Present day; most parts are made of plastics.
- Marketing centered: Responses by Meccano fans shows that they prefer the basic “normal” sets to the modern outfits

Meccano Outfit 0: One outfit, many possibilities: 1954_manual_outfit_0

Articles

What went wrong with Meccano?

Application of similar concepts in life-sized situations

Meccano Home