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   [17]Home » [18]Blog » On Tools and the Aesthetics of Work

On Tools and the Aesthetics of Work

   September 4, 2023

   In the summer of 2022, an engineer named Keegan McNamara, who was at
   the time working for a fundraising technology startup, found his way to
   the [19]Arms and Armor exhibit at the Met. He was struck by the
   unapologetic mixture of extreme beauty and focused function captured in
   the antique firearms on display. As reported in [20]a recent profile of
   McNamara published in The Verge, this encounter with the past sparked a
   realization about the present:

     “That combination of craftsmanship and utility, objects that are
     both thoroughly practical and needlessly outrageously beautiful,
     doesn’t really exist anymore. ‘And it especially doesn’t exist for
     computers.'”

   Aesthetically, contemporary digitals devices have become industrial and
   impersonal: grey and black rectangles carved into generically-modern
   clean lines . Functionally, they offer the hapless user a cluttered
   explosion of potential activity, windows piling on top of windows,
   command bars thick with applications. Standing in the Arms and Armor
   exhibit McNamara began to wonder if there was a way to rethink the PC;
   to save it from a predictable maximalism.

   The result was [21]The Mythic I, a custom computer that McNamara
   handcrafted over the year or so that followed that momentous afternoon
   at the Met. The machine is housed in a swooping hardwood frame carved
   using manual tools. An eight-inch screen is mounted above a 1980’s
   IBM-style keyboard with big clacking keys that McNamara carefully
   lubricated to achieve exactly the right sound on each strike: “if you
   have dry rubbing of plastic, it doesn’t sound thock-y. It just sounds
   cheap.” Below the keyboard is an Italian leather hand rest. To turn it
   on you insert and turn a key and then flip a toggle switch.

   Equally notable is what happens once the machine is activated. McNamara
   designed the Mythic for three specific purposes: writing a novel,
   writing occasional computer code, and writing his daily journal.
   Accordingly, it runs a highly-modular version of Linux called NixOS
   that he’s customized to only offer emacs, a text-based editor popular
   among hacker types, that’s launched from a basic green command line.
   You can’t go online, or create a PowerPoint presentation, or edit a
   video. It’s a writing a machine, and like the antique arms that
   inspired it, the Mythic implements this functionality with a focused,
   beautiful utilitarianism.

   In his critical classic, [22]Amusing Ourselves to Death, Neil Postman
   argued that the form taken by the technologies we use impacts the
   fundamental nature of our cognition. When we switched media consumption
   from long newspaper articles to television soundbites, for example, our
   understanding of news lost its heft and became more superficial and
   emotionally-charged.

   When pondering Keegan McNamara and the Mythic, I can’t help but apply
   Postman’s framework to the machines that organize our professional
   activities. The modern computer, with its generic styling and
   overloaded activity, creates a cognitive environment defined by urgent,
   bland, Sisyphean widget cranking — work as endless Slack and email and
   Zoom and “jumping on” calls, in which there is always too much to do,
   but no real sense of much of importance actually being accomplished.

   In Keegan’s construction we find an alternative understanding of work,
   built now on beauty, craftsmanship, and focus. Replacing everyone’s
   MacBook with custom-carved hardwood, of course, is not enough on its
   own to transform how we think about out jobs, [23]as these issues have
   deeper roots. But the Mythic is a useful reminder that the rhythms of
   our professional lives are not pre-ordained. We craft the world in
   which we work, even if we don’t realize it.

   #####

   In other news: My longtime friend Brad Stulberg has a great new book
   out this week. It’s called, [24]Master of Change: How to Excel When
   Everything is Changing — Including You. In my cover blurb, I noted that
   this “immensely wise and timely book provides a roadmap for a
   tumultuous world.” I really mean it! The idea of preparing yourself to
   thrive, and not crumble, when faced with inevitable change is
   self-evidently important, and Brad does a great job of delivering the
   goods on this timely theme.

   Pro-tip: if you do buy the book this week, [25]go to Brad’s website to
   claim a bunch of cool pre-order bonuses that he’s offering through the
   first full week of publication.

   [26]We Don’t Need a New Twitter

7 thoughts on “On Tools and the Aesthetics of Work”

    1.
   Galia
       [27]September 4, 2023 at 9:27 am
       Too much information when few things matter: that reminds me of the
       book Essentialism. Acting like those everyday stimuli don’t exist
       is the first recipe for success.
       [28]Reply
    2.
   Alexander Lewis
       [29]September 4, 2023 at 11:57 am
       I love the idea here. People still use old typewriters as art
       pieces and coffee table decor in their homes. It’s hard to imagine
       something similar occuring with modern computers. Laptops are used
       until they’re dead, and then they’re recycled or thrown into the
       junk drawer.
       I think this craftsman/engineer might be onto something.
       [30]Reply
    3.
   Rafa Font
       [31]September 4, 2023 at 3:22 pm
       They have become Swiss knives, tools for all. Especially mobile
       phones, they’re maps, navigators, radio, compass, torch, voice
       recorder, word processor… all in one.
       I gave my kids a voice recorder the other day. So that they can
       have a one-action device to play with and understand what it is, on
       its own.
       [32]Reply
    4.
   Alex Francisco
       [33]September 4, 2023 at 8:04 pm
       What a find!
       My copies of ‘Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man’ –
       McLuhan,
       the Medium is the Massage are always in my mind.
       A good summary is that one line by Culkin in an article about
       McLuhan:
       “We become what we behold. We shape our tools, and thereafter our
       tools shape us.”
       Timeless, humbling AND empowering at once.
       [34]Reply
    5.
   rb
       [35]September 4, 2023 at 9:47 pm
       WordStar was more fun than WordPerfect, which was quite a bit more
       fun than Microsoft Word. There has not been a professional writing
       application since WordStar and its pale descendants including
       EMACS. Everybody writes – there is opportunity here.
       [36]Reply
    6.
   Garrett
       [37]September 6, 2023 at 1:46 pm
       In my opinion, another huge value of this is that it has a distinct
       physical location. There’s a lot of power (at least for me) in
       having a physical place to do things. When I’m in my woodshop for
       instance, I am not engaging with distractions. I’m there to create
       things and I’m limited (or, empowered) by the tools around me.
       [38]Reply
    7.
   Judy
       [39]September 6, 2023 at 6:23 pm
       As someone who formerly worked in IT but transitioned to become a
       classical fine art painter, I love the concept of objects that are
       both utilitarian and beautiful. Many craftspeople of the past took
       great pride in creating all manner of objects that were more than
       simply useful, as Keegan McNamara discovered. Owners of these
       well-crafted objects also loved them for their beauty. Beauty is
       important in life.
       [40]Reply

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   Cal launched the "Study Hacks" blog at calnewport.com in 2007, and has
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