In 1985, the Innovative Design Fund placed an ad in Scientific American offering up to $10,000 to support clever prototypes for clothing, home decor, and textiles. William Freeman Ph.D., then an electrical engineer at Polaroid and now an MIT professor, saw it and submitted a novel idea: a three-sided zipper. Instead of fastening pants, it'd be like a switch that seamlessly flipped chairs, tents, and purses between soft and rigid states, making them easier to pack and put together.
  • titanicx@lemmy.zipEnglish
    17·
    2 天前

    It’s really not hard. Most people are just lazy or lack the ability to look at something for more then 30 seconds before becoming frustrated. I camp all the time, just spent a week out at a lake with 3 tents. All of them ended up back in their bags nicely, like they do at the end of every trip.

    • MagicShel@lemmy.zipEnglish
      61·
      2 天前

      I camp all the time

      I used to camp once or twice a year. You don’t develop the “muscle memory” to pack everything up nicely. So just just kinda throw it together meaning to sort it later. The next year you grab it and it’s still all fucky and it’s a huge effort to make it less so.

      You’re right insofar as for someone who does it all the time it’s easy, but not so much for occasional users. To be fair that’s sort of the opposite premise than you were responding to. They would’ve been better off suggesting you either never do it or do it all the time.

      • Drusas@fedia.io
        2·
        1 天前

        Even for people who camp regularly, it’s easy because you’ve done it so many times. That doesn’t mean the process is ideal to begin with.

      • titanicx@lemmy.zipEnglish
        1·
        2 天前

        Point is even when I first started camping this was never really an issue because I literally took the time to just look at the tent and say oh it goes back together like this it’s really not that difficult of a thing for somebody to spend an extra 2 minutes to look at their camping setup and realize how to fold everything back up.

        • MagicShel@lemmy.zipEnglish
          2·
          1 天前

          Well I would disagree there. I can’t even get a Christmas tree back in the box and that couldn’t be easier to disassemble.

    • Drusas@fedia.io
      11·
      1 天前

      No one said that it’s hard, only that the process could be improved.

      Yeah, we (mostly) all pack things up fine. That doesn’t mean the process couldn’t be made easier.