I don't disagree. Not at all. Rituals are very important for society, even the small ones we don't even notice we're performing. Every Friday a number of my cow

I don't disagree. Not at all. Rituals are very important for society, even the small ones we don't even notice we're performing. Every Friday a number of my coworkers and I go out to a particular burger place for lunch. We catch up on the week past, talk about the weekend ahead. It's a milestone indicating that we're one step closer, almost to the very edge, of the weekend. That's a ritual and it's an important one. But, I think some of the examples cited by this article - and presumably by this design team - are rather silly. Do we need a ritual for how to cope with getting a parking ticket? The death of a laptop? And... frankly, I'm not even sure what they're trying to say with "How can I keep a smart car from exacerbating my loneliness and narcissism?" I'm not one of these people who likes to blame the mythical incarnate persona of "them millenials / Gen X / Gen Y / hipsters..." etc. But, if I may beg your indulgence here for a moment, this is some real millennial (or whatever straw man you chose) shit, right there! Rituals, and the social exchanges that come with them are important. I completely agree. But what this design lab is touting sounds like answers to questions no one asked. Edit: Forgot to mention, while I'm none of the religions cited further below in the article, I do think the idea of their pop up worship centres is interesting. Far more interesting than the dead-laptop-ritual idea. I'd have started the article there, if it was me writing it.