We are looking for Chinese born (mainland) industrial designers who are practicing industrial design. We want to encourage your participatiopn with forums like this. Contact me. brejcha@design-engine.com
I should explain so it does not sound weird. On Design-engine.com’s internal student talk board there is a discussion where Rebecca Who is teaching marketing at Fuda University on the mainland is speaking about her experience there. There are several young schools that are teaching ID and it does not seam like there are very many graduates yet.
Mainland China has a very different culture and should be nurtured to mature. So far our design community is not completely world wide.
I am trying to get Rebecca to join over here but it is hard enough for her to post on our internal board. Maybe I will past some of her coments over here.
"Before I moved to China I too had the misconception that all of Asia was similar. That could not be further from the truth. It is sort of like saying England is like France or better yet USA is the same as Mexico and we all know that is not accurate.
China is a young country with a long history. It is not comparable to Philippines, Japan nor even the Province of Taiwan (being PC). It has many years to catch up with other Asian nations.
So I would suggest when you read about Asian countryies look at each one individually. Plus, the word on the streets here is that India is the next ID country not China."
We want to encourage your participatiopn with forums like this. Contact > me> . > brejcha@design-engine.corm> …
On Design-engine.com’s > internal > student talk board there is a discussion where Rebecca Who is teaching marketing at Fuda University on the mainland is speaking about her experience there.
I am > trying > to get Rebecca to join over here but it is hard enough for her to post on our internal board. > Maybe > I will past some of her coments over here.
Why not just be blunt, Bart?
What you obviously want to do is get Chinese IDers to go join your “internal” forum, and Rebecca’s discussion is a carrot to get them to email you. The obvious benefit to you is that they become an audience to whom you can sell your services or through whom you can find clients in China.
There’s nothing wrong with that (even if posting it in this area of the forum seems out of place). But being obtuse gives it a shady quality that suggests there’s something underhanded going on here. After all, there’s nothing really stopping you from cross-posting her entries here, so “trying” and “maybe” really stick out as being disingenuous to me.
The best path imo to working across cultural boundaries is both clarity and transparency. I’m seeing the opposite in what appears to me to be a form of stealth spam.
What do you know. Maybe this thread does belong in this section.
I see you’ve edited your post to include some of her comments. Thank you.
I don’t think there is anything for me personally in China other than oportunity of meeting friendly people or to teach a free workshop to an ID school or something. I trully want to help. Maybe we can take on a mainland born intern or something. If anything there are alot of comapnies that don’t want us conductging trianing in China. We could make a big impact. That is not even my intention.
I bet Rebecca will get mad at me for being so loud all the time.
To me it’s not an issue of why you’re doing it. I’m okay with someone doing this to make money. But the first two posts (the second one being the unedited version) really didn’t come off to well.
That said, I think editing the second post and adding a link to the thread was cool.
I’m wondering however, considering that there is both this forum and the ProductDesignForum, why start a new forum? How does yours differ from these other two. Just curious.
[edit: re-worded first sentence to remove multiple meanings]
Whoops. Where’d the link go???
I took it off. It is really a private forum and come to think about it… I was just excited about the conversation on there and …
So much for that…
Now about my question regarding why you have that (private) forum, can you explain?
sent you a private message. you are welcome to post my private message to your fourm.
Thank you, but since I don’t run a forum, I’ll assume you mean this forum and post the message here:
the talk board is for past students. I run a post graduate school where we teach mostly engineering. name of site The forum gives a place for past students to come together to communicate and basically keep track of eachother. It would be cool if it grew into something greater in the future but for now we are happy to have past students there.
So the next question is: Why invite - specifically - Chinese designers to contact you via email(!) to participate in forums and then start talking up your own forum if it’s only for past students?
Furthermore, exactly how long has this forum been available “for past students”? From what I see there, it appears as if you set up the forum on January 31, 2006!
http://www.design-engine.com/speak/viewtopic.php?t=6&sid=d5c45daacd2aaa766bb93f79c09f925e
I certainly hope you can see how this (along with some of your other posts on the Core forum) can be seen as stealth spam to augment your business.
been up for less than a month. We are starting a contract agency and the forum will allow us to keep track of everyone. Mostly engineers on there. The only ones on our system only a few even know about core77.com
For some reason I though you ran the forum. Are you chinese? I think i read somewhere…
Ah. So this is really about finding Chinese (mainland-born) designers who are likely still in China and could work for you under an offshore/outsource contract basis. Good idea. Profitable for you. Unfortunate that it took all this effort for you to be open about your intentions for posting this thread and inviting Chinese designers to email you.
Am I Chinese??? Too funny. I am, however, flattered.
People for some reason seem to link “ykh” with Asian cultures. I’ve even received racial insults. Maybe you read one of those.
csven
No. I was thinking more about writing an article about ID in it’s infancy for mainland china. It seams to be getting a rough start. Don’t want to sound rough but I don’t think ID is at a level high enough to exploit just yet. 
I suspect anyone cool would make their way out to hong kong or england. Maybe I am wrong and it would be a reverse commute. American Born Chinese might go to China to try to make a difference.
This is now about you writing an article? Color me confused.
wrt your comment about ID not being at a high enough level to exploit, I disagree. You seem to be referring to Western ideas of Industrial Design. The innovative side. But overseas, ID is often regarded as more of an engineering discipline. So when you ask Chinese IDers to email you, you’re likely getting a different kind of person; more technical, more manufacturing sensitive. And very exploitable under the prevailing circumstances.
Ok. I see your point. I know of more than one ID school on the mainland. I wonder how different schools are administered there?
I wonder if the mainland schools are likely to be different as you said and more technical like you say, and more manufacturing sensitive. Would administrators try to bring in more western ideals of teaching? I think if I were running a program in China I would try to offer a western approach. Is that naive?
There are a few very technical ID schools in the states. Humm? It seams to me however that for an industrial designer to really pull from a more creative end of a persons perspective. The technical (where to pull parting lines etc) just takes from the design don’t you think. I wonder how they compare? My take on India schools fall in on the more technical.
SEEMS
As for information on how design schooling is being administered in Mainland China and Hong Kong, Lorraine Justice’s interview has some insights
http://www.plasticsnews.com/china/english/design/headlines2.html?id=1138293015
and in greater depth
No. Read Marissa Ann Mayer’s article about creativity in BusinessWeek. Or check Bruce Nussbaum’s comments on her.
Nice links, Infini. Thanks. (Now back to the game)
To me and correct me as I am trying to learn here. Hong Kong is not in question since design there has matured for the better part of 20 years.
It is mainland china that is in question since they are the ones who are trying to get their design sensibility higher. Like an engineering firm trying to heir all the industrial designers away from an IDEO.
For them to truly develop further it is design and free thinking that needs developing. And please try not to read all in between the lines.
I will read those articles late tonight. Thanks for the post.
Its really all about a metality. Many people think Chinese have always realised and look to the west as aspirational group or a source of information, westerners are hired only to bring the knowledge and a different point of view. The chinese are amazing in the sense that they know what they dont know and absorb things like a sponge.
I would not pull social or political context into this discussion, as personally i feel it has nothing to do with it. I have worked with many mainland trained designers, and they are just as good or if not better than many of their western counterparts that i have worked with as well… Its just that the west have been at it a lot longer. Once the schools and the system gets their act together, they will be a design power.
In an analogy just like in Kung Fu movies the master and student way of thinking and learning. And like all movies at the end the student always usurps the master.
Thats why china is going in 5 years where the west took 20.