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DIY

From CT4CT: Creative Tools for Critical Times

DIY (Do-It-Yourself) describes a form of grassroots political activism with a commitment to an economy of mutual aid, co-operation, non-commodification of art, appropriation of digital and communication technologies, and alternative technologies. See also DIY Education.

Contents

Artistic Projects

4th Street Bikeway Project

4th Street Bikeway Project, 2008

The 4th Street Bikeway Project is a bike signage experiment in Los Angeles, where local cyclists and graphic designers have collaborated to create high-impact signs for the city's bike paths and roads. The website provides downloadable stencils and instructions allowing cyclists to create their own signs.

According to the 4th Street Bikeway Project:

The goal of The 4th Street Bikeway Project is to improve bike route signage in Los Angeles and beyond. It is our belief that comprehensive wide-spread signage can be a powerful tool in convincing people to take up cycling as a mode of transportation.... The project consists of both a proposed scheme of permanent bike route signage and a set of DIY signage templates & stencils which make it easy for cyclist to create their own bike route signage anywhere.

See also:

Critical Mass

Critical Mass (Image by ibcbulk)

Critical Mass is a bicycling event held on the last Friday of every month in which bicyclists gather to ride collectively through the streets of a city or town. Critical Mass bike rides are regularly held in over 300 cities around the world. In larger cities, rides have attracted thousands of participants. Critical Mass is known for its leaderless structure and has been described by participants as an "organized coincidence." Riders meet at a set time and place but routes are not worked out in advance and instead are created spontaneously during the ride according to the desires of the group.

According to TIME'S UP!:

Critical Mass is an event that began in San Francisco in the early 1990s and has since spread to hundreds of cities around the world. It usually occurs monthly (sometimes weekly). as bicyclists spontaneously come together to ride the ordinarily car-clogged streets of their cities. Critical Mass focuses on the rights of bicyclists and the rights of pedestrians on our own streets. It also brings attention to the deteriorating quality of life -- starting with the toxic levels of air and noise pollution -- that cars create for cities. It is a leaderless ride, free and open to all, where bicyclists take to the streets to promote bicycling as the best means of urban transit. Bicyclists are just as much traffic and have just as much right to be on the roads and travel at their own speed as anyone else.

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DIY: How to Kill Yourself Anywhere in the World for Under $399

DIY: How to Kill Yourself Anywhere in the World for Under $399, 2002

Joe Scanlan's DIY: How to Kill Yourself Anywhere in the World for Under $399 (2002) is a DIY guide for building a coffin using standard IKEA furniture parts.

According to Scanlan:

DIY presents in extremely dry and methodical detail a plan for how to go into any IKEA store in the world and buy materials with which to build your own coffin. As is the case with all Do-It-Yourself projects, some basic skills and tools are required. Essentially, then, DIY is a shopping guide, a manifesto for how to get what you want from the world of commerce rather than accepting what it wants you to have, an epic tale about the transformation of mundane merchandise into a transcendental escape vehicle.

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PARK(ing) Day

PARK(ing) Day Perth, 2008

REBAR's PARK(ing) Day is an annual and open event in which citizens transform urban street parking spots into temporary public parks. The event was created in 2005 and has grown to become a global event with over 150 public parking spots transformed in 2007. It is co-sponsored by the Trust for Public Land. REBAR has created a PARK(ing) Day Assembly Manual and Streetscape Intervention Toolkit that can be freely downloaded and used.

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SomeRightsReserved

SomeRightsReserved, 2008

SomeRightsReserved is an online marketplace created by the London-based design cooperative KithKin that allows designers to distribute their designs and ideas directly to the public. Consumers can thus buy the digital blueprints to build products themselves or hire skilled professionals to do it for them.

According to SomeRightsReserved:

Mp3s, file sharing and piracy revolutionised the music industry. Now it’s time for the design industry. Imagine being able to buy the digital blueprints to any object, being able to take it to a skilled professional and have it produced directly. Imagine instant access to quality design ideas and the means to manufacture products on demand. Imagine completely removing the middleman. Some Rights Reserved lets designers get ideas out directly to the public, on their terms. Designers have greater creative freedom, flexibility, spontaneity, and control over licensing. Consumers are given the chance to purchase design instantly, either printing it out on their own printer or taking the file to a listed supplier for production.

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See Also

External Links

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