388 EAAE no 35 Teaching and Experimenting with Architectural Design: Advances in Technology and Changes in Pedagogy
Device 2: Use-value
In a study of a shantytown in Brazil, I have described a process in which urban dwell-
ers create footpath networks on a ground covered by natural vegetation, through
the performance of daily activities such as going to work, doing their laundry, play-
ing, etc. After a number of years the consolidated urban spaces follow the outlines
determined by the footpaths and carry meanings (such as the hierarchy of spaces or
their degree of privacy) which are linked with the process of formation of the set-
tlement. A central theme in that study is how a process of collective, uncoordinated
action by individuals in time leads to the emergence of a form of unplanned urban
order. (Ribeiro, 1997)
With the consolidation of the interdisciplinary field of emergence attention has
been drawn to systems that display that type of bottom-up order, especially in con-
nection with information technology and the Internet. Of special interest here is
how the act of using a programme, a site, an application or a system can lead to
an increase in their value. The case of Alexa, described below by Rheingold is an
example of that:
“Bewster Khale and Bruce Gilliat created a Web surfers’ collaborative filtering
system, Alexa Internet, in 1996. Alexa is an implicit filtering system: when a person
using it visits a Web site, the person’s Web browser provides a menu of Web sites that
have been visited by other surfers who have visited the same page. Alexa requires
users to install additional software that records their choices as they navigate through
the Web and adds data about their choices to the database. Alexa is an instance of
a “cornucopia of the commons,” which provisions the resource it consumes; users
contribute to the database in the act of using it.” (Rheingold, 2002, p.118) emphasis
added.
Other, better-know examples are those of Web sites such as “eBay (auctions),
Epinions (consumer advice), Amazon (books, CDs, electronics), Slashdot (publishing
and conversation) [which are] built around the contributions of millions of customers,
[and are] enhanced by reputation systems that police the quality of the content and
transactions exchanged through the sites. In each of these businesses, the consum-
ers are also the producers of what they consume, the value of the market increases as
more people use it, and the aggregate opinions of the users provide the measure of
trust necessary for transactions and markets to flourish in cyberspace.” (Rheingold,
2002 p.xix) emphasis added.
David Reed, author of Reed’s Law (which “shows that the value of the network
grows proportionately not to the square of the users, but exponentially,” Rheingold,
2002, p.60) has drawn our attention to group-forming networks (GFNs). GFNs (chat
rooms, message boards, listservs, buddy lists, auction markets, etc.) are essentially
about jointly constructed value through use. (Rheingold, 2002 p. 60)
Device use-value is about a study programme conceived as a collective space with
a focus on how the use of the programme’s resources or applications can lead to an
increase in the value and usability of those very resources (data, methods, etc.). Use-
value is especially relevant in the elaboration of architectural and urban programmes
as collective processes.
The way use-value distinguishes itself from conventional group work is in the