Slashdot Mirror
Pro-Active Furniture Assembly
Gudlyf writes "Stavros Antifakos, of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich, has designed "clever" furniture pieces with built-in microprocessors that could relieve the confusion, anger and frustration of putting them together. The idea includes a flat-pack furniture kit whose parts are fitted with cheap microprocessors that monitor what you are doing during assembly and will warn you if you are doing something wrong or dangerous."
This sounds like a pain in the ass to me. But that's me.
Boobies never hurt anyone. - Sherry Glaser.
Just my 2 cents
Maybe I'm getting crochety in my old age, but does this seem like a monumental waste of time/technology? Hell, how difficult is furniture to put together anyway? This sounds a lot like the blinking "12:00" thing. Why not just make improvements to the design itself so it's not so complex to put together. Are we talking about putting together space shuttle command chairs here or something? I assume the next version will have blue tooth and will send you pictures of the proper installation as well as play mp3's. It will obviously have to have a change detector for the couch version that automatically updates a website with the current total, as well as a volume/mass summary of lint and crumbs.
The cost of bookshelves will go up because people can't (or won't) RTFM.
Am I the only one who sees a certain irony in this?
In any case, you can't make anything foolproof - as soon as you do, someone breeds a dumber fool.
Specialization is for insects. - R.A.H.
How long before we see the /. article about someone getting the Linux kernel to boot in his futon?
This has, of course, already been prefigured in sci fi; someone at that company has been reading Bruce Sterling.
- undoware.ca
What about chairs that scream alerts when we've been sitting in them for too long?
...etc, etc. =P
"GO OUT AND DO SOMETHING USEFUL INSTEAD OF SITTING IN AND READING SLASHDOT!"
"HOW WOULD YOU LIKE IT IF A 300 POUND GUY SAT ON YOU ALL DAY."
The other option is to stop manufacturing these things in other countries, although you'd be trading the cheapness of labour for the clarity of the manuals ... which do you prefer?
"Old man yells at systemd"
...miserably translated confusing manuals.
Think hard. Is that what you *really* want? Instead of reading things like "tire now to be inserted where forks make vee-shape" do you want the bike saying it to you? I think I'd be laughing too hard to build a bicycle that kept telling me "All your training wheel are belong to back tire. For great justice, insert all handle-bar tassle." Maybe it's just me though...
do not read this line twice.
with the missus giving helpful advice. Now I have to listen to the actual piece of furniture I'm assembiling?
>
Instead of inflating the price of the products, how about the companies spend that excess money on making the product easier to assemble?
Most of the time, its just improving the instruction manual. Instead of hiring a tech company to put all this technology in, how about you just hire a few good writers to make a nice and easy to understand manual?
Sheesh
Good quote, too many chars. Seriously, the slashdot 120 char limit sucks!
"HOW ARE YOU GENTLEMEN."
"Uhh...fine?"
"ALL YOUR BASE ARE BELONG TO US."
"Lesse...um...base...base...Ah! Here it is. OK, do I attach the Main Column (E) to the Base (A)?"
"YOU KNOW WHAT YOU DOING."
"Great...OK...now I put the Main Screen (F) here...and the Zigs (M) go...here?"
"MOVE ZIG."
"Oh...here?"
"MOVE ZIG."
"Umm...er...here?"
"TAKE OFF EVERY ZIG."
"No, wait! It goes here, right? Or here?"
"SOMEONE SET UP US THE BOMB."
"Oh, c'mon, It's not that screwed up. Just lemme get my drill...and a hot glue gun..."
"HA HA HA HA."
Obliteracy: Words with explosions
If you can't figure out how to assemble IKEA furniture, I mean.... ugh! You should not have made it to adulthood, you should clearly have already died in some horrific Lego set assembly accident as a youth.
Idiots of the world: Here's a plan. If you're too fucking dumb to insert Tab A into Slot B yourself, then YOU hire someone to do it, and YOU incur the extra cost. Don't complain until they have to start making furniture that coaxes you through assembling it, thus jacking the price up for everyone including the intelligent people like me who can and will read and follow instructions.
This is further evidence that all that time I spent in search of knowledge in my younger days was wasted. I should have just spent it drinking beer, eating pork rinds, watching pro wrestling, NASCAR, and tractor pulls on TV like everyone else, and waiting for society to mold itself to my needs as a complete buffoon.
Hmm... maybe I can fix things myself....
/me looks around for a crayon and a mallet.
~Philly
Come on. Furniture that comes flat-packed is almost always so easy to install the instructions rarely even contain WORDS, just pictures. How much work are these microprocessors going to save me if the full installation instructuions consist of 4 or 5 pictures, and the only tool I need is a hex-driver ?
before the marketing department realizes that they can sell AD space on the things... Just think...
"While you are assembling subassembly B.... wouldn't this be more fun with a Pepsi? Or better yet Dominoes Pizza is great during furniture assembly"
or
"Warning: the structure is unstable this way... Band-Aid brand medical bandages will help protect those wounds"
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Coming soon: rolls of sod with embedded chips that keep chirping "green side up!".
-- Alastair