

The European advantage: product design - yters
http://www.maximise.dk/blog/2007/01/engineers-of-west-engineers-of-east.html

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xirium
From the article: European cities have a calm and tranquil atmosphere, Asian
and American cities have a hectic and confused atmosphere.

This is the same sentiment as <http://www.paulgraham.com/usa.html>

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ardit33
Partially Wrong. It all depends where you go in europe. I know plenty of
European cities, that are pretty lively and almost chaotic. They seem to be in
places where there is warmer weather. These quiter places, are more in north
europe.

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ovi256
Oh, BTW, Apple's lead designer is a brit, Jonathan Paul Ive CBE. Good Old
Europe, bloody yes. And his main inspiration? Old Braun designs.

"So European electronic companies should not be pursuing the faster-quicker-
cheaper road, but the beautiful-elegant-simple road". I finally found the
words to express well what I was thinking.

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mtts
Hopefully this racist drivel won't make it to the front page. The only merit
in this piece is that it illustrates the current fashion in Europe for taking
pride in narrowmindedness and bigotry (a trend that is, according to a
sociologist friend of mine, strongest in the author's country - Denmark - and
my own - the Netherlands)

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mixmax
I'm the guy that wrote this, and I'm sorry if I offended you. I never meant it
to be racist in any way, and I hope it doesn't come through that way - if it
does I am to blame.

The point of the article is that we must all try to look at what we do best
and focus on that. It seems that Europeans are unable to compete in the
better-faster-cheaper hardware market, and thus have to try to find another
advantage to exploit in order to become competitive.

I'm not in any way trying to degrade Asian countries. On the contrary I am
saying that they have a distinct advantage in hardware production, and try to
come up with a model for European competitiveness. Because we are behind Asia
in this market.

And yes, I have a certain affection for my home country - but don't we all?

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mtts
It seems to me you're suggesting that Asians are less capable of producing
elegant design than Europeans. Which seems to me fairly racist.

It's also not true. Most European companies are not Bang & Olufsen. The
products of Philips (a Dutch company), for example, are fairly mediocre as far
as their design is concerned. That does not prevent Philips from being a major
international electronics manufacturer. The Japanese electronics manufacturer
Sony, on the other hand, does in fact do design reasonably well.

So I don't think elegant design is a distinctly European virtue. Instead, the
reason a lot of cheap Chinese crap is ugly is simply that it's just that -
cheap crap. The fact that it's Chinese doesn't have anything to do with it.

It's also not true that Asian companies merely copy. At a certain stage during
their development they do - that's how the aforementioned Sony started out,
for example - but at a certain point they will start engineering their own
products, like Sony did in the late 1970s or like Samsung started doing in the
1990s. It stands to reason Chinese companies will also, at some point in the
future, begin to create their own products and start to compete with Bang &
Olufsen, Philips and Sony.

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mixmax
I believe that there are cultural differences that make certain countries and
regions better at different things than others. I like my sushi done by the
Japanese, my Pizza done by the Italians, and my burger done by the Americans.
Not because any one of the countries is superior, but because chances are that
the Italian will make the best pizza. This does not imply that Italians are
better at anything other than making pizza. Just look at their politics...

Also note that I'm talking about general trends, so of course you can find
companies that contradict the pattern - but overall I stick to my point of
view.

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yters
At any rate, you all should post more stories from your side of the world. We
Americans need some enculturatin';)

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mixmax
Actually I find it rather flattering that someone found this good enough to
post to YC news, I haven't updated my blog for years and I mainly kept it as
an exercise in writing. I never made an effort of promoting it.

But I like the discussion here, including the users that don't agree with me.
It means that I have to think about my standpoints, and defend them
intelligently if I am not convinced that I'm wrong.

So maybe I should start updating...

