The Restart Project Podcast

Janet and Ugo talk with Estefania Suquilanda, who is introducing repair into a school in New York City. We then discuss Apple's recent claims on being zero waste and the Right to Repair movement in California. We are very interested in spreading the culture of repair from an early age, so it was great to hear about Estef's work. She is the current Tech Support Specialist at The Hewitt School, a girls' school in New York City, where she is inspiring secondary school students to gain hard skills fixing devices. Meeting once a week after school hours, her Restart students seem to be learning very rapidly. Just the other day, they impressively fixed an iPhone 7+ screen in about 45 minutes! Estef also tells us about her background, which is actually in professional electronics repair. She shares some thoughts on her experience as a female technician and about the small shop where she used to fix Apple products. We then stick to Apple to discuss their recent advert, where they state that their iPhone is assembled in facilities that send "zero waste to landfills". Going through their 2018 report on Supplier Responsibility, we find that this claim is based on their "Zero Waste to Landfill" certification by global company UL, but it is strictly limited to waste produced in its assembly facilities - that is, where all the product components get fitted together. Now, how much waste is being produced before assembly? Apple may be leading the way into a more sustainable manufacturing compared to the other big companies, however if they want to claim absolute zero waste products, they should be transparent about their whole supply chain, for instance about the manufacturing process of components, processing of raw materials and mining. Lastly, we comment on Apple's attack on DIY repairs, and whether this is incompatible with a claim of "zero waste". The US ‘Right to Repair’ campaign, which after successfully getting legislation introduced in other states now arrives in California, is pretty much at the doorstep of the big companies like Apple or Google. The Right to Repair bill is lobbying for making repair information and tools accessible to consumers. Companies may well be interested in providing repair services, however this initiative is speaking for people to have their right to repair their devices themselves.

Janet and Neil interview Goldsmiths Political Economy Lecturer Derek Wall about his new book "Elinor Ostrom's Rules for Radicals", based on the fascinating and lesser known story of Elinor Ostrom: the only woman to have won a Nobel Prize for Economics. We discuss Ostrom’s view of the "commons" and how people can organise themselves to manage community resources. Our interest in the commons comes from two places: first, a better stewarding of material resources like electronics, but secondly realising that we can only do this effectively when we have a strong "knowledge" commons in parallel, which allows for reuse and repair. Breaking with the idea of the expert in the ivory tower, Ostrom always worked in a hands-on way with communities to build a body of research. Seeking alternatives to Harding's famous “tragedy of the commons” (the idea that sharing community resources inevitably leads to disaster) - and to privatising these commons, Ostrom fought for empowering locals. Derek tells us about the time when he got to meet Ostrom in person. "The global doesn't tell you much about the local", she explained to him. Global initiatives alone, for instance when tackling climate change, are not enough to target local issues, there is a need to understand how to manage problems and resources from the community level. Ostrom called this multi-level approach "polycentrism". Most of Ostrom's work focused on the commons in a material sense - fisheries or land - but she did write about knowledge commons like the Internet. How are we managing this rather intangible commons? Interestingly, scarcity is a recurring issue with material commons, having to organise too many people sharing resources. However, immaterial or knowledge commons seem to actually grow as the number of contributors increases (think Wikipedia!), as long as there as the rules have been collaboratively designed and incorporate key principles. In our economy here in the UK and Europe, where everything seems to have an owner, can discards or waste form a commons? Janet mentions the case of the Woelab in Togo, where makers built a 3D printer from discarded materials and shared the designs. Thinking of Ostrom’s ideas on the commons, we can be inspired to rethink our relationships with community resources, and the power and potential of acting locally.

Janet and Neil interview Goldsmiths Political Economy Lecturer Derek Wall about his new book "Elinor Ostrom's Rules for Radicals", based on the fascinating and lesser known story of Elinor Ostrom: the only woman to have won a Nobel Prize for Economics. We discuss Ostrom’s view of the "commons" and how people can organise themselves to manage community resources. Our interest in the commons comes from two places: first, a better stewarding of material resources like electronics, but secondly realising that we can only do this effectively when we have a strong "knowledge" commons in parallel, which allows for reuse and repair. Breaking with the idea of the expert in the ivory tower, Ostrom always worked in a hands-on way with communities to build a body of research. Seeking alternatives to Harding's famous “tragedy of the commons” (the idea that sharing community resources inevitably leads to disaster) - and to privatising these commons, Ostrom fought for empowering locals. Derek tells us about the time when he got to meet Ostrom in person. "The global doesn't tell you much about the local", she explained to him. Global initiatives alone, for instance when tackling climate change, are not enough to target local issues, there is a need to understand how to manage problems and resources from the community level. Ostrom called this multi-level approach "polycentrism". Most of Ostrom's work focused on the commons in a material sense - fisheries or land - but she did write about knowledge commons like the Internet. How are we managing this rather intangible commons? Interestingly, scarcity is a recurring issue with material commons, having to organise too many people sharing resources. However, immaterial or knowledge commons seem to actually grow as the number of contributors increases (think Wikipedia!), as long as there as the rules have been collaboratively designed and incorporate key principles. In our economy here in the UK and Europe, where everything seems to have an owner, can discards or waste form a commons? Janet mentions the case of the Woelab in Togo, where makers built a 3D printer from discarded materials and shared the designs. Thinking of Ostrom’s ideas on the commons, we can be inspired to rethink our relationships with community resources, and the power and potential of acting locally.

In this week's episode, we talk to artists Joshua Portway and Lise Autogena about their documentary ‘Kuannersuit / Kvanefjeld’, about a small town in Greenland that is divided over plans for a large, open-pit uranium and rare earth mineral mine. The proposed mine would be the world's fifth largest uranium mine and the second largest rare earths operation. Josh and Lise, who have been working together as artists since the early 1990s, in their first experiment in film portray a town divided. Some are passionately opposed to the proposal, which would involve mining off the top of the nearby mountain and filling the adjacent lake with tailings. There are fears for how the dust from the mine may effect farming or the health of the town’s inhabitants. But others see it as the only way to save the town from depopulation, as the population has dwindled since the hey-day of fishing.  Greenland is a country with a very small population and great territory rich in mineral wealth, including rare earth minerals, which are widely used in the manufacture of electronics. Most rare earth minerals are hardly recyclable, and processes for recouping them from end-of-life electronics lag behind developments in their usage. In our increasingly globalised world, we are all connected to each other through resource use. The rate of our consumption of electronic products has ramifications far beyond what we immediately see. This is not an issue with a simple solution: mining in Greenland is widely seen as a way for the country to gain financial and political independence from Denmark. But in the words of Mariane Paviasen, a resident of the town, "we can’t become independent by giving a piece of our land to a company from another country". Even among those who might in theory agree with mining, the pace of the growth of mining is a major issue.  Kuannersuit / Kvanefjeld may be about one small town in Greenland, but its story is being played out in countless variations all over the world. Hearing these stories pushes us to think carefully about our role as global citizens and consumers.

In this week's episode, we talk to artists Joshua Portway and Lise Autogena about their documentary ‘Kuannersuit / Kvanefjeld’, about a small town in Greenland that is divided over plans for a large, open-pit uranium and rare earth mineral mine. The proposed mine would be the world's fifth largest uranium mine and the second largest rare earths operation. Josh and Lise, who have been working together as artists since the early 1990s, in their first experiment in film portray a town divided. Some are passionately opposed to the proposal, which would involve mining off the top of the nearby mountain and filling the adjacent lake with tailings. There are fears for how the dust from the mine may effect farming or the health of the town’s inhabitants. But others see it as the only way to save the town from depopulation, as the population has dwindled since the hey-day of fishing.  Greenland is a country with a very small population and great territory rich in mineral wealth, including rare earth minerals, which are widely used in the manufacture of electronics. Most rare earth minerals are hardly recyclable, and processes for recouping them from end-of-life electronics lag behind developments in their usage. In our increasingly globalised world, we are all connected to each other through resource use. The rate of our consumption of electronic products has ramifications far beyond what we immediately see. This is not an issue with a simple solution: mining in Greenland is widely seen as a way for the country to gain financial and political independence from Denmark. But in the words of Mariane Paviasen, a resident of the town, "we can’t become independent by giving a piece of our land to a company from another country". Even among those who might in theory agree with mining, the pace of the growth of mining is a major issue.  Kuannersuit / Kvanefjeld may be about one small town in Greenland, but its story is being played out in countless variations all over the world. Hearing these stories pushes us to think carefully about our role as global citizens and consumers.

We're trying something new. Our volunteers are a crucial part of our work at Restart, and frequently appear as guests on our show. This week, and once a month from this week onwards, we hand them the reins. This is a volunteer "takeover". Dave Lukes and Ben Skidmore are two passionate tinkerers and repairers who are equally fascinated by the wider ecological and community benefits of repair. They kick off the show by taking us through two noteworthy items of tech news. First, the reports that electronics retailer Maplin has faced financial troubles and is in talks with buyers, which raises questions about whether any other brick-and-mortar high street business selling electronic components would step in to take its place. Second, the news that Windows 7 and 8 are losing support for two important features: push notifications, and find my phone. Is this a definitive admission from Microsoft that they have lost the smartphone race? Next, Dave and Ben turn to wider considerations about the upgrade cycle, and the role of community repair. They muse on the pace with which technology has exploded into every corner of our lives: as Dave points out, there is now more computing power in his pocket than there was in the entire world when he was born. With a whole range of devices now becoming 'smart', the demand for things like memory chips is skyrocketing, and manufacturers simply can't keep up. This naturally leads to a healthy second-hand market: but is this growth due to the desire not to purchase new, or the desire - quite simply - to purchase? The role of repair in all this is that of a movement towards longer product lifecycles. But it also has benefits for community cohesion that are far more localised and personal than that. Finally, Dave and Ben discuss tinkering for tinkering's sake, and the value of creative hacking of hardware. Sometimes, taking apart a gadget doesn't need to have any evident benefit at all - its enough simply to remind ourselves, occasionally, that we can choose what to do with the devices we own.

We're trying something new. Our volunteers are a crucial part of our work at Restart, and frequently appear as guests on our show. This week, and once a month from this week onwards, we hand them the reins. This is a volunteer "takeover". Dave Lukes and Ben Skidmore are two passionate tinkerers and repairers who are equally fascinated by the wider ecological and community benefits of repair. They kick off the show by taking us through two noteworthy items of tech news. First, the reports that electronics retailer Maplin has faced financial troubles and is in talks with buyers, which raises questions about whether any other brick-and-mortar high street business selling electronic components would step in to take its place. Second, the news that Windows 7 and 8 are losing support for two important features: push notifications, and find my phone. Is this a definitive admission from Microsoft that they have lost the smartphone race? Next, Dave and Ben turn to wider considerations about the upgrade cycle, and the role of community repair. They muse on the pace with which technology has exploded into every corner of our lives: as Dave points out, there is now more computing power in his pocket than there was in the entire world when he was born. With a whole range of devices now becoming 'smart', the demand for things like memory chips is skyrocketing, and manufacturers simply can't keep up. This naturally leads to a healthy second-hand market: but is this growth due to the desire not to purchase new, or the desire - quite simply - to purchase? The role of repair in all this is that of a movement towards longer product lifecycles. But it also has benefits for community cohesion that are far more localised and personal than that. Finally, Dave and Ben discuss tinkering for tinkering's sake, and the value of creative hacking of hardware. Sometimes, taking apart a gadget doesn't need to have any evident benefit at all - its enough simply to remind ourselves, occasionally, that we can choose what to do with the devices we own.

On International World Radio Day, Ugo is joined by Restart volunteer Ben Skidmore to discuss the future of FM radio, and the future of electronics manufacturing more broadly in a post-Brexit world. The landscape of electronics design and manufacture is always changing, but today we discuss several developments and shifts that are particularly significant. Firstly, our friends at iFixit published a teardown of an Apple 'Homepod', the latest (and most expensive) in a wave of 'smart speakers' now flooding the market (for more on this, catch up on our Voice Controlled Assistants episode of Restart Radio in the links below). iFixit's team concluded that the Homepod quite possibly takes the prize for the least repairable device that Apple has ever made, giving it a repairability rating of 1/10. Is the fact that it is highly durable enough to offset this shortcoming? And how might we see the trade-off between durability and repairability being navigated by manufacturers in the future? Next, we confront some of the unspoken concerns surrounding current Brexit negotiations, particularly with regards to ecodesign. The European Commission Ecodesign Directive spells out a move towards products that are designed to last longer. But if the UK is left to design its own regulations, the risk is that we will not manage to keep up. We discuss a potential future in which the UK becomes a 'dumping ground' for lower quality products that are not acceptable in the EU. Luckily, there is hope to be found in the progress being made by single states to protect consumer rights and promote repair, such as the Swedish legislation that gives tax breaks for repair. Finally, on World Radio Day, we celebrate our love of Radio and the station that makes our show possible: Resonance FM. FM Radio seems to be one of the most resilient of broadcast media, but as the number of people switching to DAB (Digital radio) grows, the possibility of a digital switchover becomes more imminent. There are undoubtedly some benefits to DAB radio, even though we've often found them harder to repair. And we should always remember to ask who, and what, is being left behind in case a technology is rendered obsolete.

On International World Radio Day, Ugo is joined by Restart volunteer Ben Skidmore to discuss the future of FM radio, and the future of electronics manufacturing more broadly in a post-Brexit world. The landscape of electronics design and manufacture is always changing, but today we discuss several developments and shifts that are particularly significant. Firstly, our friends at iFixit published a teardown of an Apple 'Homepod', the latest (and most expensive) in a wave of 'smart speakers' now flooding the market (for more on this, catch up on our Voice Controlled Assistants episode of Restart Radio in the links below). iFixit's team concluded that the Homepod quite possibly takes the prize for the least repairable device that Apple has ever made, giving it a repairability rating of 1/10. Is the fact that it is highly durable enough to offset this shortcoming? And how might we see the trade-off between durability and repairability being navigated by manufacturers in the future? Next, we confront some of the unspoken concerns surrounding current Brexit negotiations, particularly with regards to ecodesign. The European Commission Ecodesign Directive spells out a move towards products that are designed to last longer. But if the UK is left to design its own regulations, the risk is that we will not manage to keep up. We discuss a potential future in which the UK becomes a 'dumping ground' for lower quality products that are not acceptable in the EU. Luckily, there is hope to be found in the progress being made by single states to protect consumer rights and promote repair, such as the Swedish legislation that gives tax breaks for repair. Finally, on World Radio Day, we celebrate our love of Radio and the station that makes our show possible: Resonance FM. FM Radio seems to be one of the most resilient of broadcast media, but as the number of people switching to DAB (Digital radio) grows, the possibility of a digital switchover becomes more imminent. There are undoubtedly some benefits to DAB radio, even though we've often found them harder to repair. And we should always remember to ask who, and what, is being left behind in case a technology is rendered obsolete.

This week we talk to Josh Lepawksy - Associate Professor in Geography at the Memorial University of Newfoundland - about his work in the field of 'Discard Studies', which examines the way in which discards (waste) move through the world at local and global scales. Josh's research is specifically focused on electronic waste — his new book 'Reassembling Rubbish' (MIT Press) contains the insights gained from a five-year investigation into the global trade and traffic of discarded electronics. He explains to us why the word 'discards' is useful in his field of study: the word 'waste' has become too familiar, conjuring up images of garbage bags and wheelie bins. These things to belong to a system that is much bigger, more expansive and more complex than what we generally imagine. Just like our sleek, sealed devices, the system is often a "black box" to us. The large-scale industrial processes by which global discards are are taken apart, destroyed, redistributed or hidden are a far-cry from our experiences of household disposal. Of course, aspects of this bigger picture do occasionally make it into the news, especially those that centre around the 'dumping' of e-waste in 'poorer countries'. But while there is certainly truth in shocking, photographic depictions of dumping and unsafe processing of electronic waste, they prevent us from understanding a more nuanced, global political economy of discards. There is so much more going on, even just out of the frame of these images. Josh unpacks some of the complex rules and conventions governing global trading of e-waste, and emphasises that recycling must be re-framed as a single part of the story, rather than the whole story. With a more holistic picture that incorporates the repair economy and other means of repurposing end-of-life products, we can begin discuss what a much more just and resource sufficient world would look like.

This week we talk to Josh Lepawksy - Associate Professor in Geography at the Memorial University of Newfoundland - about his work in the field of 'Discard Studies', which examines the way in which discards (waste) move through the world at local and global scales. Josh's research is specifically focused on electronic waste — his new book 'Reassembling Rubbish' (MIT Press) contains the insights gained from a five-year investigation into the global trade and traffic of discarded electronics. He explains to us why the word 'discards' is useful in his field of study: the word 'waste' has become too familiar, conjuring up images of garbage bags and wheelie bins. These things to belong to a system that is much bigger, more expansive and more complex than what we generally imagine. Just like our sleek, sealed devices, the system is often a "black box" to us. The large-scale industrial processes by which global discards are are taken apart, destroyed, redistributed or hidden are a far-cry from our experiences of household disposal. Of course, aspects of this bigger picture do occasionally make it into the news, especially those that centre around the 'dumping' of e-waste in 'poorer countries'. But while there is certainly truth in shocking, photographic depictions of dumping and unsafe processing of electronic waste, they prevent us from understanding a more nuanced, global political economy of discards. There is so much more going on, even just out of the frame of these images. Josh unpacks some of the complex rules and conventions governing global trading of e-waste, and emphasises that recycling must be re-framed as a single part of the story, rather than the whole story. With a more holistic picture that incorporates the repair economy and other means of repurposing end-of-life products, we can begin discuss what a much more just and resource sufficient world would look like.

Medicine has been revolutionised by technology that goes on - and in - our body. In these cases, questions of durability and reliability can become matters of life and death. From the artificial pancreas to the edible robot, we think about the role that repair and ongoing product support have in the medical technology (med-tech) industry. Today, we hear from Jon about his own 'artificial pancreas' (continuous glucose monitoring device) - a set of devices that help diabetics to more easily monitor their blood sugar levels. Jon talks to Lauren about his experiences of this relatively new technology - both positive and negative - and what it means to be truly dependent on a device. We take a brief look at some of the other new medical devices that are emerging, including a range of 'edible' pills. Experiments in building open-source platforms for these kinds of devices have got us thinking about the trust and transparency elements of medical technologies. Would you be more willing to swallow an electronic pill that you had designed yourself than one that you had bought from a manufacturer?

Medicine has been revolutionised by technology that goes on - and in - our body. In these cases, questions of durability and reliability can become matters of life and death. From the artificial pancreas to the edible robot, we think about the role that repair and ongoing product support have in the medical technology (med-tech) industry. Today, we hear from Jon about his own 'artificial pancreas' (continuous glucose monitoring device) - a set of devices that help diabetics to more easily monitor their blood sugar levels. Jon talks to Lauren about his experiences of this relatively new technology - both positive and negative - and what it means to be truly dependent on a device. We take a brief look at some of the other new medical devices that are emerging, including a range of 'edible' pills. Experiments in building open-source platforms for these kinds of devices have got us thinking about the trust and transparency elements of medical technologies. Would you be more willing to swallow an electronic pill that you had designed yourself than one that you had bought from a manufacturer?

Today on Restart Radio, Ugo and Neil talk to Charlie Bruce and Tom Putnam from Beeline: a smart compass for cycling. A simple piece of hardware that displays simply an arrow and distance, Beeline removes the hassle of interpreting an entire map while you're on the go. And it costs about the same as an average smartphone screen repair: which is often the price of badly designed smartphone brackets for cyclists. Tom and Charlie hope that their product will encourage more people to cycle. They talk about what it's like to be a small start-up within a competitive hardware ecosystem. One of the things that makes Beeline stand out is their willingness to learn from their customers. All too often, when a product fails, companies simply send out a replacement and ask that the owner recycles the previous unit. While the failure rates on their product are low, the Beeline team takes back all their broken devices, and examine each one to figure out what has gone wrong and why. They repair all faulty devices and reuse them as demo units for promotional purposes. They have learned from these failures over time, for example by redesigning the PCB (printed circuit board) in  their second batch of units, to reduce chances that the soldering would get damaged during shipping. Another area of future work they're considering is improving the design to reduce cases of water damage. Another thing that makes Beeline more future-proof than many hardware start-ups is that all firmware (the base-level software that is embedded in the hardware) and the companion app are designed in-house. This means that after you buy a Beeline compass, it can actually continue to improve over time, rather than getting worse or quickly unsupported. This means happier customers and less waste - two things that tend to go hand in hand. Software obsolescence is a growing problem in the world of hardware, but it's not likely to affect Beeline in the near future. The device connects to your smartphone via Bluetooth, a relatively simple functionality, which wouldn't be affected by lack of frequent updates to a phone's operating system. As a result, Beeline is compatible with smartphones running old versions of Android and iOS. We'd like to see more companies, small and large, take a more proactive stance in repairing their devices in-house and learn from their efforts. And we encourage those that are going the extra mile - such as Beeline - to take time to document and be more vocal and open about their approach to repairability and durability. As Tom said, it's good for the environment, for their customers and for business too.

Today on Restart Radio, Ugo and Neil talk to Charlie Bruce and Tom Putnam from Beeline: a smart compass for cycling. A simple piece of hardware that displays simply an arrow and distance, Beeline removes the hassle of interpreting an entire map while you're on the go. And it costs about the same as an average smartphone screen repair: which is often the price of badly designed smartphone brackets for cyclists. Tom and Charlie hope that their product will encourage more people to cycle. They talk about what it's like to be a small start-up within a competitive hardware ecosystem. One of the things that makes Beeline stand out is their willingness to learn from their customers. All too often, when a product fails, companies simply send out a replacement and ask that the owner recycles the previous unit. While the failure rates on their product are low, the Beeline team takes back all their broken devices, and examine each one to figure out what has gone wrong and why. They repair all faulty devices and reuse them as demo units for promotional purposes. They have learned from these failures over time, for example by redesigning the PCB (printed circuit board) in  their second batch of units, to reduce chances that the soldering would get damaged during shipping. Another area of future work they're considering is improving the design to reduce cases of water damage. Another thing that makes Beeline more future-proof than many hardware start-ups is that all firmware (the base-level software that is embedded in the hardware) and the companion app are designed in-house. This means that after you buy a Beeline compass, it can actually continue to improve over time, rather than getting worse or quickly unsupported. This means happier customers and less waste - two things that tend to go hand in hand. Software obsolescence is a growing problem in the world of hardware, but it's not likely to affect Beeline in the near future. The device connects to your smartphone via Bluetooth, a relatively simple functionality, which wouldn't be affected by lack of frequent updates to a phone's operating system. As a result, Beeline is compatible with smartphones running old versions of Android and iOS. We'd like to see more companies, small and large, take a more proactive stance in repairing their devices in-house and learn from their efforts. And we encourage those that are going the extra mile - such as Beeline - to take time to document and be more vocal and open about their approach to repairability and durability. As Tom said, it's good for the environment, for their customers and for business too.