Maeda's SIMPLICITY

Staying Cool

Fans aren't treated well in the middle of winter.

I don't like my laptop because it is a point of embarassment for me. It's a little iBook so it is cute and all, but I might be sitting down in a quiet meeting, and then suddenly it's fan will come on. Although the fan is quiet, I must admit it's something of an embarrassment. Something to do with the whole expulsion of air bit makes me equate the whole thing as similar to passing gas. Only it really doesn't seem to stop, no matter how carefully you might try to unobtrusively squirm while you use your computer.

We know that fans are important because we demand the highest level of technology always, and speed never comes for free. In order to achieve a grand degree of performance, we have to make our computers work extra hard. They become something like teeny tiny sweatshops that are extremely uncomfortable for the electrons inside. Without some degree of air conditioning, the overworked components would literally melt into slag. So we turn the air conditioning on to give the computer a fighting chance to live. Meanwhile, insensitive computer users like me simply complain about the noise associated with the computer's self-preservation ritual. I must stop.

Cell phones will ultimately be equipped with fans. I see it happening any day now. You will be talking on the phone, and then the fan will automatically come on and your caller won't be able to hear you because of the noise from the fan. We now demand photo-realistic performance 3D graphics, high-fidelity sound, and really a host of things that really don't make the phone part of the gadget any better. But we must pay the price in heat. Where there is excessive heat, there must be an opposite source of excessive cool living in counterbalance. Kind of like in the old TV show (my age shows) Happy Days. For every Fonzie, there must be a Pottsie. Cold and hot are the central physical battle fought inside the computer where most of our minds never really have to dwell. That is, until we use our laptops atop our own laps. I think I smell my thighs burning ...

Posted by maeda at March 11, 2005 04:20 PM