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Ben got an email:

Occasionally someone gets in contact with me about my blog. This is usually to say something encouraging – how they’ve stumbled across it and found it useful. Early this year a designer I respect got in touch along these lines to say something similar. He also challenged me – I had recently written about what might be lost when we fall for the promise of convenience. He made the point that defaulting to Medium for publishing fell squarely into that category.

I’ve thought about this a lot, and I now think he’s right.

Hmm, that designer sounds like an intelligent chap! Joking aside, I’m so glad Ben decided to return to blogging on his own site. As I’ve been redesigning this site, I’ve been thinking about what an immense privilege that is. Not only to build something bespoke to your own needs, but also to be less dependant on third-party services – who don’t have a great track record when it comes to looking after their customer’s best interests. As Ben notes:

…creativity is born from experience and a blog is a great place to document ideas, and your thinking as you continue to experience the world around you.

Ben Holliday:

Buying your fresh fruit and veg at local market is a valuable social connection. When I take my daughters to our local food market on Saturday’s they get to interact with our local community. The market sellers always chat to them. They often count the money (cash) when we pay, and help work out the change. One lady that serves us asks them what they’re doing for the rest of the weekend, and they learn to interact with other adults that aren’t their family or school teachers.

I can get supermarket fruit and veg delivered to my door (probably more cheaply), but this convenience comes at a cost of social value.

There is always a cost to convenience. As a business, the question is where you offset your costs. It’s 2017, and Amazon have just bought Whole Foods Market. What does that really say about our interactions with our local shops and markets?

My question for companies like Amazon is how will they think about the social value of what they sell in the future? Or, how will they think about offsetting the social cost of the speed and convenience they’re prepared to offer? My expectation is that they won’t think about these things at all.

Amazon’s answer appears to be unmanned stores where your every move is tracked, all for the supposed convenience of not having to use a checkout.

The real potential of emerging technology should be how it helps us to design for increased social value. I don’t want to live in a world where everything is so seamless and so fast that most moments pass me by.

Amen to that.