October 6, 2014
"The 1st FabLab Asia Network Conference," for which Associate Professor Hiroya Tanaka of the Faculty of Environment and Information Studies was involved as a director and Mr. Yasushi Tokushima, a Japan Overseas Cooperation Volunteer (JOCV) of JICA, served as the executive committee chairman, has won the 2014 Good Design Award.
Additionally, the COI-T "Creation of a Personalized and Circulatory Society Based on KANSEI," a research project led by Professor Jun Murai (Research Leader) and Associate Professor Hiroya Tanaka (Satellite Leader) of the Faculty of Environment and Information Studies, which co-hosted "The 1st FabLab Asia Network Conference," also received the Good Design Award at the same time.
The Good Design Award is Japan's only comprehensive design evaluation and promotion system, originating from the Good Design Product Selection System established in 1957. For over 55 years, it has been a movement to improve Japanese industry and culture through design, with the total number of awards exceeding 39,000. Today, it is a global design award in which many companies and organizations from Japan and abroad participate. The "G Mark," the symbol of the Good Design Award, is widely recognized as a symbol of excellent design.
Comments from Associate Professor Tanaka on the "1st FabLab Asia Network Conference"
The plan for the "1st FabLab Asia Network Conference," organized with Mr. Yasushi Tokushima, a JOCV of JICA, as the executive committee chairman, came up at the beginning of this year. Faculty and students from Bohol Island State University in the Philippines, passionate about establishing the first FabLab on Bohol Island, came all the way to SFC. They spent a week intensively learning everything from FabLab equipment to operational know-how before returning.
This conference was planned on that occasion with the aim of taking action to open up more broadly to other Asian countries, starting from the relationship between Japan and the Philippines that was just beginning to form through FabLab.
As a result, the conference was a great success, with over 200 participants from eight Asian countries. President Aquino of the Philippines also visited and promised future support. The enthusiastic atmosphere is captured in this video .
The bonds formed in this way have already begun to lead to new developments since the conference. In collaboration with FabLab Bohol, the Hiroto Kobayashi Laboratory at the Graduate School of Media and Governance built a nursery school on-site using plywood.
At SFC, research projects on recycling and reuse in collaboration with the Philippines are being planned for the future. It is SFC's mission to solve global problems by connecting the internet, digital fabrication, and social design.
We intend to further promote collaboration with FabLabs in the Philippines and other parts of Asia.
About the COI-T "Creation of a Personalized and Circulatory Society Based on KANSEI" Project
The COI-T "Creation of a Personalized and Circulatory Society Based on KANSEI" project is a research project promoted in collaboration by four universities: Meiji University, Keio University, Kwansei Gakuin University, and Yamagata University. It was selected in fiscal year 2013 as a trial site (COI-T) for the Center of Innovation (COI) STREAM program, an industry-academia collaboration project by the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) and the Japan Science and Technology Agency (JST).
It promotes research activities aimed at realizing a "society where individuals can visualize, design, and create what they want and need," rather than a passive consumer society that simply accepts mass-produced items for everyone. As a result, it was highly praised, particularly for being "wonderful that leading Japanese universities and companies with high technological capabilities are collaborating to build a foundation for business areas expected to see significant future growth, such as the development of high-speed 3D printers and research on information-sharing platforms and interfaces that expand creativity."
Taking this award as an opportunity, the project plans to promote research on the foundational technologies and social systems needed to realize a society that enables the co-creation, distribution, and use of goods centered on creative consumers.
【Project Overview】
Project Name: Creation of a Personalized and Circulatory Society Based on KANSEI
Project Leader: Kenji Matsubara (President and CEO, Longfellow Inc.)
Research Leader: Jun Murai (Dean and Professor, Faculty of Environment and Information Studies, Keio University)
Management Leader: Kaoru Arakawa (Professor, School of Interdisciplinary Mathematical Sciences, Meiji University)
Project Introduction Page http://www.fms.meiji.ac.jp/create/