More dConstruct ramifications.
A couple of the presentations (from Nathan & Chris and from Brian) made the very plausible point that there's some sort of dialogue between the visions of the future offered in science fiction and those which get designed by designers. It's a conversation that's been going on in some quarters for years, my favourite exposition being this from Julian Bleeker.
Reasonably enough, Brian talked about the cultural influences he'd felt growing up - including the flying-car visions of The Jetsons. Which led Matt Jones to point out on twitter that many of us hadn't grown up with The Jetsons, we'd grown-up with Thunderbirds. I'll confess to pouncing on this a bit, because I thought it'd make a good gag in my presentation. But the more I thought about it the more it seemed worth thinking about it.
If it's reasonable to suppose that the fiction and images you absorb as a child influence the design choices you make as an adult (and I think it is) then it's also reasonable to think about how different cultural stuff might influence those choices.
And if you're a designer who grew up in the UK in the 70s or 80s then you were probably more infected by the 3D models and greebbled textures of Gerry Anderson's crew than the flat 2D and bright colours of Hanna Barbera. Maybe that's reflected in the stuff that gets built. Little Jonny Ives was probably glued to Thunderbirds and Space 1999, maybe that meant something.
I certainly think that might make a certain generation of British designer more inclined towards the ambition and tinkering of post-digital thinking, rather than the shininess and surface of screens. Thunderbirds was, above all, Engineering Fiction. (Though Warren Ellis makes a very convincing case that it was also morally uplifting Rescue Fiction.) We've already discussed how deeply the model-makers of Slough influenced movie-visions, perhaps we should give them credit beyond that.