It feels like this is something we should talk about
Why setting up a place you can find news on how design and tech, startups and big brands are facing into what happens when we die... is something worth doing.
Welcome to Deathtech & Other Taboo Subjects.
This place is designed to be a regular update on what is going on as new tech, new ideas, and new groups of creative people clash with an old problem. What happens when we die, or the people around us do.
So lets face into this. There’s a taboo around anything to do with the topic of death that can make people uncomfortable. Fair enough of course. Potentially not a great feature of the culture if we all just ignore it in that way, but that mindset is also a dead end for anyone working in design, strategy, branding or product management. Even if we don’t want to think about it ourselves, all our customers are going to be affected by this death thing and yet i’ve hardly ever heard the journeys, issues, product features, communication methods or anything connected to the topic get discussed in companies.
Was that dead end pun in that last paragraph too much? I don’t know yet, I’m learning at the same time as you. We’ll see how this goes.
We should also recognise that we are living through extraordinary times in which to die. From a pure innovation perspective, we should be talking about this area. There are cultural shifts, there are huge new technological possibilities, there are peculiar and mostly unintended consequences of regulatory changes, there is huge corporate resistance to change, all of which is creating an environment in which interesting things will happen. So we can share the picture that is emerging here.
The neutrality of the word ‘interesting’ in the last paragraph is specific in this context. There are people using new tools to make life better at crucial points in a family’s journey. There are people creating incredible new products and companies. There are people reimagining what it is to be a good ancestor, what a legacy looks like, or what the experience of planning for it all can mean. There are also people looking to shift some widgets. Plus more whose inaction and indifference causes people unnecessary pain. The changes that come could be great, but they won’t inevitably.
Anyway, there’s a wee bit of an agenda in here around the idea that some folk reading this thing might go and build some better stuff, and make changes happen. Even if it’s just becoming more comfortable talking about the death thing at work.
Plus when you look at the big issues in the mess of innovation and design after design thinking more generally you see that actually - if we’re talking about creating a circular economy, understanding what insight really is, designing real solutions - then death is actually the straw that might break the camel’s back. If we get more comfortable talking about endings, we can start some serious change.
I’m going to leave the pun in, I didn’t find a way to get the irreverent tone thing into the intro post. We’ll see how people respond.
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In the meantime, tell your friends!