Opinion

The Wiki Philosophy Will Provide You a House!

It all started in the 90s, with the commercialisation of the Internet. To be fair, it started way before, with the hard work of a group of hackers in Princeton in the 50s. In his work “Turing’s Cathedral: The Origins of the Digital Universe”, George Dyson tells us the fascinating story of who we have to thank for the digital era we live in. In my recent work of research on the phenomenon of Flash Mob I realise it was a general new tendency of the Web to involve people, create network and share competences – what someone calls the ‘Wiki Philosophy’ (the original term wiki refers to a collaborative website).

It is possible thou, to trace back this influence from the very first step of the Internet: the ‘Hacker Philosophy’. Even thou, the common meaning of the word ‘hacker’ now may refers to something negative, in fact it is not at all its original meaning. It refers to the creators of the informatics systems who in the very first stages of the research were acting under principles of cooperation, in the name of passion for scientific progress and public good – so before the commercialisation and Bill Gates.

Wikihouse

Wikihouse

As they intended, the recent developments of the World Wide Web let Internet make easier to create multiple and personal networks in which the individual is the portal, the “knot”. Let’s just think to the infinite proliferation of social media – Twitter and Facebook are just the last successful examples. In fact, what is more important is not the development of the technology itself, but the use that people make of that technology in their everyday life.

One of the greatest changes that I have noticed is the tendency to share competences on the Internet and therefore the diffusion of amateur skills. We have to thank, or blame, YouTube for that. YouTube is the perfect explanatory example: its success is built on the fact that ordinary people start to create contents for viral diffusion– the so-called user generated content. Not only you can find the amateur videos of singers, dancers and actors, but you can basically find every tutorial you need and in few minutes improve your skills in make-up, hair styling, Photoshop, movie editing and even in drag queen transformation.

The interactivity of the Internet user, then, seems to reach new levels. Starting from the blogs, the shared knowledge of the entries of Wikipedia, today it is even possible to download your house and build it by yourself! The Wikihouse has been presented at the last Salone Internazionale del Mobile in Milan – the mandatory event in the furnishing international landscape. Basically, it is the first concept of the house that you can download from Internet and build it by yourself without the necessity of particular skills or tools.

How it works exactly? You design your project or download the designs of the structure from the website database. The project then is ‘print’ and cut out of plywood panels. Lastly you assemble them easily as you can do with your Ikea wardrobe. And if you still think that it is not easy as it sounds to build your own house, I am sure you will find a lot of tutorials on YouTube that will help you. We live in the digital era of the user’s power!

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