Adventures on Studio Shared 2.0 Part III

1st-2nd May 2018 – May as well get off the fence

Up until this point – everyone started to evolve their opinion towards the sharing economy however, we were unable to articulate it in our designs or at least, in our presentation.

Which brought us to the fateful night in Fitzroy, hangry and nervous for our debate.

Being someone who hasn’t debated (or even dare I say properly debated) for more than five years I didn’t know how I would react or respond as a second speaker – let alone, being on the negative team I didn’t know whether I would come up with any rebuttals against the second speaker on the affirmative team.

Our given topic was ‘AirBnb has an overall positive impact on the city and its citizens”, naturally from being in Studioshared for quite some time now in addition, having being exposed to the dark sides of Airbnb (or really the catalyst of money-hungry people and also the loopholes we have in our housing regulations and laws) it was very quick to jump into the political arguments. Whether it’d be from racism to racial biasness – somehow it all felt too simple to define these arguments as bullet-proof.

As suspected – we completely forgotten that we can argue with social implications.

How? Simple, AirBnb branched out into the humanitarian aspects. From being able to provides spaces to the creative minds to catering for the homelessness of course they have an overall impact on the city and citizens.

That was until we start question the sincerity of these organisatios, whether using this kind of helping those in need is a way to disguise their darker intentions. Moreover our debate erupted a large discussion about whether by branching out to other services which Airbnb provides is also impacting negatively on other associations.

Thinking about it – while this is a society where competitive marketing forces business to perform future practices, it catalyses a chain of companies being consumed by one another and eventually we will be facing a huge umbrella that is potentially governed by one overarching company. On top of that, while it may be beneficial for some companies who have someone to rely on and act as their mentor to enhance their potential, it poses a problem at the same time. Considering that we all fall under someone’s care, our own independence can become limited should we have to comply to their many rules. Moreover, upon close inspection,  this limitation can also mean cutting back on jobs. (I think I am going off a tangent so I shall stop here)

But looking back on the debate, lately I am starting to see a lot of “sharing” companies collaborating with big corporations (namely Commbank and Airtasker) to support small businesses to come into fruition. While we only see that these business start-ups are indeed being given a helping hand, I can’t help to question what would become of these business in the future. Are there any indebtments to pay? Will they have their own independence once they are able to properly support themselves? The questions are all disguised within the murky waters.

Having said though, the debate has switched something within us albeit it has also made us become very weary of the topic as a whole.

So much that I believe that it has partially affected everyone’s project the next day.

As my friend and I were diving deeper into our project – we realised that mass production may not be the right solution or argument towards our project. To put it better, we’re starting to question how can we make this even more dystopic. Following on the idea of ‘live, work, play’ we agreed to morph the three ideas into one living condition – that is, work for your stay or living.

It sounds quite awful really, however it never really occurred to me that we were proposing having servant headquarters in our backyard. In addition, it hit home quite hard when our tutor mentioned about certain Asian countries having maids – who are performing exactly what we proposed. Coming from Hong Kong myself, I know all too well about the realities of having someone living and working for you under the same roof.

Albeit, at the same time, we are proposing this strategy to exacerbate the issues of those who work for the big ‘sharing’ companies that was brought to light during the debate we had on the night before.

Overall, it comes down to how we would present it and the architectural language that has to be put in place at the same time.

9th May & 16th May 2018 – Who are We Benefiting Truly?

Maybe this is illogical to say this but, I remember watching an awards acceptance speech by Ashton Kutcher “I was always just lucky to have a job. And every job that I had was a stepping stone to my next job and I never quit my job until I had my next job. And so opportunities look a lot like work.”

As we looked deeper into the situation of our project – there were many questions that challenged the potentials of our project. From questioning what were the benefits for this program towards the social housing residents to its relationship with the sharing economy. We saw our project as a criticism to the risks and assets people pay with their abilities as seen in Uber and Uber Eats (something that came to light during our debate night). In addition, we had to decide on how to market our proposal in a satirical manner.

Considering that our project premise was focused on the idea of exploiting someone’s own potential for their own personal gain – it really breaks my heart that this kind of system doesn’t only happen within this kind of economy, but it happens in every single kind of economy. We always put our talents on the line and sometimes – when there are desperate measures we can over exert ourselves, and this is not just only money issues, but there is our reputation and pride on the line that makes us work ourselves so hard.

Looking back at our project, we are aware that sometimes an act of kindness really is a wolf in sheep’s clothing. Our project really is giving benefits for the property owners who essentially are relying on the hard work of those who would be living in the module to build up the reputation of their property profile.

Here’s a question that I’ve partially asked myself and others a few weeks ago. If you decide to put your reputation and pride on the line via these sharing apps, do you trust the feedback about you? Would you trust the feedback people provide about you whether it is good or not? Considering there is a saturation of five star rated people, how much further would you push yourself to become highly sorted?

A sadder thought? Even us as architects are possibly qualified to apply for social housing – I wonder if my opinion about this would change if I was living in the Vienna Model?