U.S. National Design Policy Initiative

U.S. NDPI supports the launch of DIGMA, Design Industry Group of Massachusetts

On June 10, 2009,  Dori Tunstall, organizer of the U.S. National Design Policy Initiative, participated in the launch of DIGMA, the Design Industry Group of Massachusetts. DIGMA is the first of what the Initiative hopes to be more State-level design industry, government, and education collaborative policy groups. 

During the event, DIGMA launched their new website, www.digma.us, and announced their upcoming programs including the Massachusetts Design Festival in September 2009. Founding director, Beate Becker, asked Dori Tunstall along with Greg Bialecki, Secretary of Housing & Economic Development, Commonwealth of Massachusetts, to speak about the importance of design policy at the Federal and State levels.

Secretary Bialecki highlighted the importance of design to Massachusetts' economy and the State's responsiveness to designers' cries for design excellence in government design. Dori emphasized how U.S. governance operates at both the Federal and State levels. Thus, the wide adoption of design policy will only take place when their are "design councils" at both levels.  Dori's presentation is available for download. DIGMA launch prez_final (PDF 3.1. MB). It provides a great overview of what the U.S. has already been doing regarding design policy for economic competitiveness and democratic governance.

The U.S. National Design Policy Initiative is really proud of what DIGMA has accomplished since forming in 2007. They represent a model for the other 50 States.

Report on Meeting with the USPTO

On Tuesday, May 26, 2009, the U.S. National Design Policy Initiative met with the staff of the USPTO including:

• John Doll, Acting Under Secretary of IP and Acting Director USPTO;
• Jasemeen Chambers, Director of Technology Center 2900;
• Mary Critharis, Karin Ferriter, and Tom Hinckey, Advisers in Office of IP Policy and Enforcement;
• Nicole Dretar, Legal Advisor, Office of Latent Legal Administration;
• Joel Sincavage, Design Practice Specialist, Tech Center 2900;
• Elizabeth Dougherty and Brian Hanlon, Sr. Advisers to Acting the Undersecretary and Director.

The desired outcomes of the meeting were to:

1. Get a clear POV on the USPTO's willingness and feasibility of supporting an American Design Council and Assist. Secretary of Design and Innovation position
2. Develop a set of well defined next steps/conversations for the Initiative and other design policy proposals.

The outcomes of the meeting were productive and we left with the following understandings:

1. the USPTO believes that an American Design Council is a good idea
2. our mandate is broader that USPTO, thus we need to find an appropriate home for the American Design Council within Commerce but at a higher level, the Office of Science and Technology in the White House, or even a Presidential Advisory Council
3. the concept of an Assistant Secretary of Design and Innovation position within Commerce is a "heavy lift" and probably infeasible
4. the design communities need to work closer with the USPTO regarding issues of Intellectual Property. Our advice and recommendations would be welcomed and we can do more to share with the design communities the resources that the USPTO provides.

We left the meeting with a great ally in Eleanor Meltzer, Chief of Staff for the USPTO. We are now working with her to elevate our message with Secretary Locke and other incoming Under Secretaries in the Department of Commerce.

In attendance from the U.S. National Design Policy Initiative were:

• Dr. Elizabeth (Dori) Tunstall, Organizer, U.S. National Design Policy Initiative
• Mr. Paul Mendelsohn, V.P. Government and Community Relations, American Institute of Architects
• Mr. Andrew Goldberg, Senior Director of Federal Relations, American Institute of Architects
• Mr. William O. Barrett, Executive Director, Association of Independent Colleges of Art & Design
• Mr. Brian Vogel, Interim Executive Director, Industrial Designers Society of America

U.S. NDPI to meet with U.S. Dept. of Commerce

The U.S. National Design Policy Initiative will meet on May 26th with Acting Under Secretary of Commerce and Director of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office John Doll.

The purpose of the meeting will be to discuss possible USPTO "sponsorship" for an American Design Council and the establishment of an Assistant Secretary of Design and Innovation position within Dept. of Commerce.

This is an exciting first step in bringing closer to reality Policy Proposal #1 Formalize an American Design Council to partner with the U.S. Government and Policy Proposal #4 Create an Assistant Secretary for Design and Innovation position within the Department of Commerce to promote design.

Look for the report of the meeting on this website.

U.S. Design Policy's Necessity viral video campaign launches

Dori Tunstall, organizer of the U.S. National Design Policy Initiative, kicks off the viral video campaign by creating and uploading her video to the U.S. Design Policy Facebook and Youtube Groups.



Between now and April 15th, create and share your own U.S. Design Policy's Necessity videos. You'll have the opportunity to star in the Initiative's Design CEO's Design Policy Support video, which will be led by IDSA.

U.S. National Design Policy Initiative's Viral Video Campaign

The U.S. National Design Policy Initiative wants you to share a short video (less than 2 minutes) of your thoughts about the role design plays in US economic competitiveness and democratic governance, how a national design policy would help, and your personal pledge to support the efforts.

Between March 15, 2009 and April 15, 2009, the Initiative will collect videos via our YouTube group page and FaceBook Event page. Select videos will be included in our Design CEO's videos communicating the same message to be presented at national design conferences, to government officials, and other promotional venues.

HOW TO JOIN IN:

1. Art Direction
Film yourself on a plain white background (with semi-decent lighting). I've found that setting up a white board or wall behind me as I face the window during early sunrise or sunset creates beautiful light.

See Demi Moore and Ashton Kutcher’s I Pledge Video for inspiration.

2. Script
Provide your name and identifier. Your answers to the four following questions:

1. What role does design play in US economic competitiveness?
2. What role does design play in the US democratic governance?
3. In what specific ways, would a national design policy further enable design to play those roles?
4. What would you pledge to do to help design play that role?

Example script from what will be Dori’s video

NAME: I’m Dori Tunstall
IDENTIFIER: Organizer of the U.S. National Design Policy Initiative, design anthropologist, design educator, and optimistic American citizen

COMPETIVENESS:  Economic competitiveness is about providing products and services that have greater “human” value than that of your competitors for less cost to yourself.  Design is what transforms human values such as sustainability, delight, innovation, efficiency, ease of use, even sublime beauty into things and experiences that people can see, hear, touch, smell, and taste. With approximately 70–80% of the cost of a product determined in the design phase, “design twice and build once” should be the mantra for U.S. economic competitiveness.

DEMOCRACY: Through my former work with the organization Design for Democracy, I’ve seen first hand how everyday people experience democracy not as abstract laws but through designed things. A poorly designed ballot can disenfranchise citizens. Yet, the redesign of election ballots can lead to higher rates of completion. It is through designed things, communications, environments, and experiences that we, in the words of former President Jimmy Carter, “Reaffirm our concern for the human side of government.” This is the heart of American democracy.

DESIGN POLICY: There are already many grassroots and design associations’ initiatives that have used design promotion, innovation policy, design standards, and the design of policy to improve the economic competitiveness and democratic governance of towns, cities, counties, states, and regions. The challenge is to scale those efforts in a country that has 50 States, covers an area of 3.79 million square miles, and is home to 305 million people. It is through the support of a U.S. National Design Policy that the benefits of these efforts can be experienced everywhere nationally.

PLEDGE: I, Dori Tunstall, pledge to help organize and structure an American Design Council to act as a forum that brings together the heads of design organizations, design education bodies, and Federal design studios with high ranking U.S. Government officials to partner in solving the U.S.’s economic and democratic challenges of today and tomorrow. 

3. Upload
Upload your video to the U.S. National Design Policy Initiative's YouTube Group. AND to the our  Star Search Event Facebook page.

4. Share
Share your favorite videos with your friends, family, colleagues, and politicians.

Disclaimer: By participating in the event -- through uploading videos and leaving comments, you hereby grant the U.S. National Design Policy Initiative and its affiliated organizations the free use of your edited and unedited image, sounds, and words for non-commercial promotional purposes.

Strengthening the infrastructure of the Initiative

Some may be wondering why things seem quiet at the U.S. National Design Policy Initiative. One can be assured that things are anything but quiet.

The Initiative has been busy gaining official endorsements from participating organizations. Beginning with the unanimous vote of Society for Environmental Graphic Design (SEGD)'s board of directors on February 4, 2009, we have been shoring up the Initiative's organizational structure to prepare for the next level of engagement. Official organizational endorsements are agreements to:

1. Promote the U.S. National Design Policy Initiative, its specific projects, and outcomes,
2. Provide staff resources to help complete tasks,
3. Contribute financial or in-kind resources (up to $5000) for things with real costs to produce.

Ric Grefe of AIGA, the professional organization of design, had pledged the organization's endorsement earlier in January. Currently, other professional design associations such as the Usability Professional Association, the Industrial Designer's Society of America, the International Interior Design Association, Interaction Design Association; and the design education Association of Independent Colleges of Art and Design are in the process over the next few weeks of presenting to their boards of directors and/or memberships.

We have brought into the group the Cooper-Hewitt Museum and the American Architectural Foundation.

Organizations are putting together their "volunteer advocacy teams" to lead the refinement and advocacy of specific policy proposals. AIGA's team is being led by David Gibson and Ann Harakawa, of Two Twelve Associates, and Sylvia Harris, Office of Sylvia Harris. Other teams are in formation.

Thus, it is exciting times as the Initiative strengthens its infrastructures to allow you to engage and participate, while we also work on gaining Congressional and Executive support for the policy proposals.

Designpolicy.org website refresh improves accessibility of information.

Based on requests and feedback from the usability community, the U.S. National Design Policy Initiative has improved the accessibility of our website. The text is bigger and bolder.

Most importantly we have made available text-only HTML versions of Redesigning America's Future and the Final Summit Report.

Links to the text-only Redesigning America's Future are located here and on the Policy Proposals page.

Links to the text-only Summit Final Report are located here and on the Summit Report page. At the moment, it does not include a text-only version of the tables of ranked policy proposals, but they are made available in a Word document form here.

Call to Action: Endorse Redesigning America's Future

The U.S. National Design Policy Initiative needs your support in demonstrating to Congress and the incoming Obama-Biden Administration the People's support of the policy brief, Redesigning America's Future: ten design policy proposals for the U.S.'s economic competitiveness and democratic governance.

One:
We need for you to write a brief endorsement of the Initiative and the policy proposals in the Endorsement section of the site.

Two:
We need for you to write your National Congresspersons directly. Find them here. They will be receiving, Redesigning America's Future, in their mail boxes by January 20, 2009. They will only read and act upon it if you tell them to do so.

Welcome to the U.S. National Design Policy Initiative

Design is the world remade in human form.

The U.S. National Design Policy Initiative advocates for a governmental plan of action to support design in service of U.S. economic competitiveness and democratic governance.

The U.S. design communities seek to enable through a U.S. national design policy:

• design promotion to boost the demand for American goods and services,
• innovation policy to protect American intellectual property and support the People’s entrepreneurial spirit,
• design standards to guarantee inclusion, sustainability, safety, and quality in the experiences of the human remade world; and
• policy as designed to address design’s role in making American democratic values tangible to the People.

In a letter supporting the opening of the Fourth Federal Design Assembly in 1978, President Carter wrote:

Good design can help us meet our commitment to improve the efficiency of government…and reaffirm our concern for the human side of government.

Design policy enables good design.