On Tuesday Apple used Mother Nature to explain and show what they do on their road becoming carbon neutral on all layers. I have seen a lot of conversation, some critical voices and some people hailing it. Honestly, I have mixed feelings about it and we also had a nice discussion in the SUX Slack yesterday with Katharina Clasen and Susu Koch, so I want to share some thoughts with you:
Let’s start with the bad side: honestly it seems quite arrogant to produce a video about how you as a company impress Mother Nature, because you over fulfill her expectations. And even more important: the video is quite good in leaving out some important things. Sustainability is more than „just“ carbon emissions. What about all the social aspects? I mean most of the stuff is still produced in places, with weak labor rights. Or, still many parts are not recycled. And most important: Apple does not allow you to easily modify your device to have it last longer. And that is one of the major major issues. An iPhone should easily be usable for 5 years (without the need to accept that many things do not work properly anymore) by upgrading it. THIS would be a real major shift.
Don’t get me wrong: I still like that Apple puts a lot of focus on the whole topic. It is much better than doing nothing. But we all must not forget that there are some major issues Apple „elegantly“ left out…
But, I always try to find positive aspects in things or how to use it for good and I also see another positive aspect here. With this video, one of the biggest corporates introduced a non-human persona to the public. People like me, who work within sustainable design, UX and product building talk about non-human personas for quite some time now (if you want to learn more about it, check out Damien Lutz’ new book „The non-human persona guide“!). And always it is something people tend to smile at — at least a bit. It was always funny to think about a persona for mother mature, a bee, etc.. Because to a bunch people it felt a little weird ala „how can a bee have a persona? it can’t talk to me..“ Having apple using a non-human personas helps us, who try to make digital products and digital product design more sustainable a lot with our narratives. Because now we can just say: „We should create non-human personas of you — like Apple did.“
So, is it a good thing, Apple produced this video with Mother Nature in my opinion? Yes it is. Because it helps a lot in our narratives and it is good to see that a big company like Apple spends a lot of effort in becoming carbon neutral on all layers. But, it is also important not to forget about all the things that do not work well and that Apple left out „elegantly“. A major issue of Apple is that its products cannot be upgraded to last longer — meaning less new products would have to be produced, which would have a huge impact!
And really important not to forget: Sustainability is so much more than carbon emissions. We all together too often fall into this carbon tunnel vision.. But what have we won if we save the world only for those of us who were lucky enough to be born on the rich side of the planet…?
🙏 Thank you for reading all to the bottom.
If you want to read more about making digital products more sustainable and about Sustainable UX and Design, I invite you to follow me here or on LinkedIn, to follow the Sustainable UX Network here or on LinkedIn or to join our Slack.
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