8 ms·

What coronavirus will do to our offices and homes

43 points by karimford 6y ago

karimford 6y ago
“One day, the virus will subside. It could be eradicated. But even then, life will not simply return to the way it was before Covid-19. Spurred on by the coronavirus crisis, architects have been rethinking the buildings we inhabit.“
mikehollinger 6y ago
So I’ve been wondering about this. In the states at least the trend in home design recently seems to have been toward big open floor plans with a couple of large spaces, a kitchen, and bedrooms. We have no such concept as “breakout” rooms at home for studying or work, or other things that might demand privacy or focus. I certainly don’t want to go back to the “old” 70’s style home with a bunch of similarly sized partitioned rooms, but I’d like to have some small “focus” spaces or something more cleverly named, similar in concept to the breakout rooms that run along the edge off most shared professional office spaces. Some homes have a library or home office, but I’ve yet to see a place that has two offices of equal size. Some people have converted a spare bedroom into an office - but - what if you actually need the bedroom, or in our case, what if you need two offices? I’m sort of waiting for that to become a thing. It’d be pretty sweet.
ahelwer 6y ago
I've certainly made the jump to a fully-thought-out home office[0], but masks are conspicuously absent from this article - facial recognition? Good luck when I continue wearing my nice face covering in public long after this specific virus is under control. Things like the virus-killing HVAC system are interesting. Makes you consider our current buildings from a future perspective, like in what ways they'll think we're hilariously backwards, hygiene-wise. [0] https://ahelwer.ca/post/2020-08-09-home-ergonomics/ https://ahelwer.ca/post/2020-08-09-home-ergonomics/
- jjeaff 6y ago
  There are already quite a few biometric detection options in production out there that can ID you just fine with a mask on. Just your eyes and forehead are probably enough for a lot of facial recognition and then there is gait detection that can identify you by how you walk or even heart beat rythmn detection that I believe requires a laser sensor of some type.
hn_throwaway_99 6y ago
Ugh, I certainly hope not. In one sense, yes, covid has accelerated some things that were already in transition, like greater work from home. But why would we think this increased isolation, sanitization, and separation would be a good thing outside of a pandemic? There is no need for wide hallways, limiting people to 2 per elevator, copious hand sanitizer use, or touchless everything to avoid "grubby" buttons when we're not in a pandemic. Yes, germs are a risk, but there are also risks in thinking for some reason it is healthy to live in a sterile, and separated, environment.
- jjeaff 6y ago
  I don't know, why would we continue to subject ourselves to useless TSA security theater rubdowns and millimeter wave scanners that can see your naked body under your clothes adding hours to the onboarding process when most experts agree it is ineffective and most logical beings understand that another 9/11 can never really happen again the way it did? I suspect what will drive a lot of changes like these will be insurance. Companies will want pandemic insurance and insurance companies will not offer reasonable premiums without certain precautions in place because the cost of payouts is too high.
  - alphabettsy 6y ago
    I thought what we’ve learned about TSA security theater is that another 9/11 could happen and what we’re doing wouldn’t prevent it.
    - jjeaff 6y ago
      The possibility of another 9/11 became non-viable about 10 minutes after a second plane hit the WTC. It's the reason Flight 915 didn't make it to Washington DC. The passengers on 915 received the news of what was happening in NYC and the Pentagon and rushed the cockpit and the terrorists. You can't hold a plane hostage if the occupants know you are taking them on a suicide mission.
    - riffic 6y ago
      now would be the time to do it too, with less people riding planes to potentially fight back like flight 93.
riffic 6y ago
This is an overly fantastic crystal-ball piece and I don't expect things will be as far changed as this article is trying to sell us. It reminds me of those old AT&T "You Will" commercials, which did eventually come true but in a vastly different way than first envisioned (newspapers by fax? come on.) Also, most people (baristas, truck drivers, all those invisible service people and laborers in between) don't have jobs that look like this. This completely dismisses their experiences.
- Trasmatta 6y ago
  Yeah, this is pretty ridiculous. I'm putting a reminder for 2025 to reread this piece to see if literally any of it came true.
- ImaCake 6y ago
  Lots of educated professionals also work jobs that cannot be done at home. I think this BBC article is ridiculous. I can't do wetlab biology at home. And my university is busy firing people, not installing copper benchtops in the kitchenettes.
ericmcer 6y ago
This seems insanely over engineered, we are in the midst of the pandemic and people are already acting like it’s over. I think things start going back to normal the second corona runs it’s course or a vaccine appears. I live in the Bay Area and was initially planning on joining the droves of people going fully remote. On second thought I am going to stay, I would rather have the bargaining chip of being one of the remaining local devs instead of one of the growing army of fully remote programmers.
- lr4444lr 6y ago
  With all due respect, what kind of bargaining chip is that gonna be if U.S. dev work starts shifting to remote as the norm? Your higher cost of living in the Bay Area would count against you.
  - SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
    Many of the bigger companies are continuing to expand their office footprint even though they have nobody in offices right now, and it’s very much conventional wisdom among the people signing checks that in-person collaboration makes a big difference. More companies are certainly getting more friendly to it, but a near future where remote work is the default seems very implausible.
  - ericmcer 6y ago
    I don't think remote will be the norm in 5ish years, I could be totally wrong, but I think in person work offers things that remote cannot, and things will go back to the way they were in a few years. In that case companies looking for in person will be pulling from a smaller pool of engineers who stayed in the bay area during this time of exodus, hence more bargaining power.
peterwwillis 6y ago
> Laila makes a coffee in the kitchen area Seriously? You're worried about viruses and yet you're still gonna allow the "coffee petri dish," where hundreds of grubby dirty hands fondle communal cups, bowls, coffee machine buttons, creamer, sugar, stirrers? To say nothing of the giant "catered lunch" buffets with no sneeze guards. > The air conditioning system uses UV light to kill pathogens. It also reduces the humidity to help prevent germs multiplying, responding to a stream of data from sensors fixed around the building, and wearable sensors used by staff. Yet it's still got 50-year-old unmaintained fiberglass insulation inside the ducts, which, because the overlayment breaks down over time, streams tiny particles of glass throughout the office to be inhaled. (this has probably been happening in your office for some time if it's an older building) > The staff got fed up with plastic everywhere a couple of years ago. They said it made the office feel like a hospital. Laila prefers the plants. The plants are plastic now. Too many finicky potential problems like mold/mildew, they're hard to clean, not maintenance-free. > It's face-to-face with colleagues - but all at a safe distance. We don't even practice social distancing now. It's not gonna happen at work with people who feel comfortable around each other. And honestly, what's the point indoors? You cough and the overhead A/C pushes microscopic water particles way farther than 6 feet. > It's 16:00 and time to go home. Laila moved to the suburbs with a friend after the lockdown in 2020. It's a longer commute, but she doesn't mind as it's only once a week. There a lot of roommates in the suburbs? Most middle-class young people working in offices like this will still need several roommates to afford rent, what with cost of living constantly increasing but pay not adjusting as much (news flash: covid-19 has not fixed income inequality). The suburbs aren't actually much cheaper in most parts, because people who work in cities live in them. People will continue to live in cities because there's still more access to everything in them. > she knew she would need a home office [..] There's a new standing desk, a properly adjustable office chair and storage for documents I work from home now and I don't need a home office. All you need is a table and a chair in a corner of a room. With kids, I get it, but otherwise, what's all that extra space going toward? Every "document" I own fits in a single box. If anything, apartments will just become "Tokyo-ified". > She never realised, before, how important it was to have good lighting, so she had spotlights installed in the ceiling and bought a proper desk lamp. Ok, now you're jumping the shark. Nobody's installing track lighting just to do computer work. One good desk lamp is all you need. > She's near a big road and she needs to concentrate hard when she's working - sound-proofing is an issue she hadn't anticipated. Headphones worked for the office, they work at home too.
thewhitetulip 6y ago
I don't think this will happen. People are affected by Corona, yes, but that is because corona is a thing today. Once corona goes away, only the paranoid will follow these guidelines. Pretty much majority of the population will go back to normal way of life unaffected. Climate crisis is irreversible and nobody gives a shit about it. How can we think that corona will change everything? That being said, if it does change people then it os a very good thing
- downandout 6y ago
  Climate is seen by most people as something that might kill future generations hundreds of years from now. Carona is seen as something that can kill us today. So there is a big difference in perceived urgency between the two. I think it would be naive to think that there won’t be some permanent changes to society as a result of this virus, the explosive rise in remote work being the biggest one. Companies have been forced into it, and now realize that it works very well and saves them a fortune. We will see far more remote-only teams, etc. We may also see a large reduction in live events going forward, or at least significant changes to them, which makes me sad. However, I believe you are correct that many of the precautions taken in this article will not stand the test of time and would be viewed as paranoid. I don’t think thermal cameras and masks will be a thing forever, and I doubt voice-activated elevators are going to be in widespread use anytime soon.
- tempsolution 6y ago
  > Once corona goes away, only the paranoid will follow these guidelines. The social distancing guidelines? Sure. A lot of people don't give a fuck already, if it wasn't for appearances. Working from home, skipping the 1-2 hour commute, sitting in a depressing office all day? Oh you bet you can kiss that one goodbye. I for one, will not return to the office and my employer (a large software company) seems to expect that as well. The day of people going to do office will be numbered. There still are reasons to go, socialize with your peers, etc. but that's pretty much it. And we have excellent offices and I had literally zero commute time before I moved one hour out of town in wise foresight of corona impacts. I never felt as good as living in the nature, working from home, getting away from it all. Now I hate cities (completely unimaginable before, I was always a city person, or so I thought. Corona changed that completely, and I bet I am not alone)
asveikau 6y ago
I don't think social distancing will be big in 2025, just as it wasn't in 1923, the same distance away from 1918. I really hope we don't see a late 20th century style flee of cities either. The problems with that from last time are well documented.
- blinkengus 6y ago
  But how many of those problems stemmed from the external requirement that those fleeing would have to commute back in 5 days per week, and for the most part all on the same 9-5 schedule? There's a version of moving away from dense urban cores that still accommodates community, transportation, public space, local necessities, commerce and small businesses, etc.
  - asveikau 6y ago
    Many of those issues had nothing to do with how crappy commuting is for affluent people (a significant problem) but what happens to the people without the means to escape. Local tax base diminishes, concentration of low incomes leads to a sort of ghettoization, etc. Personally I think density and varied income levels within that are good for a number of reasons.
orliesaurus 6y ago
Reading this article one thing shocked me: Do a lot of homes not have double glazing in the UK? I thought it was a standard, because it's so much more efficient at keeping cool/warmth inside/outside (depending on season)
- mattlondon 6y ago
  I would say it would be unusual not to have double glazing these days. It has been a thing for decades and there are grants available to make your property more energy efficient. That said there are a lot of a) old buildings that are protected and so can't have the windows replaced easily/in an economically viable way (e.g. each window needing to be hand-crafted in wood to non-standard sizes to look identical bto what was there before), b) a lot of just properties nrented out to single people who rent a single room etc and the landlord simply doesn't care/bother, c) houses that were lived in by someone for the last 30/40/50 years where basically no maintenance or decoration had been done - they've died and someone else had moved in.
- meitham 6y ago
  My house in Surrey and several others around me were built in the Edwardian era 1900-1910 and they are all single glazed. The windows are made of timber with very attractive moulding around it. Most double glazed windows are made of PVC (plastics) and they look very plain. Double glazed timbers windows are extremely expensive. All the previous homes I lived in had mould fungus growth on walls and behind wall papers. The double glazing ensured air-tight house but lack of air circulation. Single glazed windows seem to be really good at preventing mould growth, of course at the extra cost of heating bills.
- din-9 6y ago
  Modern homes are built with it, but we have a lot of old houses here too.
- zmk_ 6y ago
  I used to live in the UK 10 years ago and back then it seemed like double glazing was some sort of luxury while where I moved from it was the standard and people were converting old houses to it as well. Where I live now people use triple glazed windows...
Oricle 6y ago
The Jews off BBC! Its always been Jews vs gentiles. For over 2000 years! Wake the fuck up you dumb shits!
smabie 6y ago
Ah yes, like the geodesic domes erected over major cities that filter the toxic air, contaminated by the bioviruses released during the Great War. The mud-girls and mud-boys of the Sprawl fight over the scraps of obselete tech left behind by the chrome plated gods of New Eden; watching over the condemned above the gravity well.
- drewcoo 6y ago
  Are start times for once-a-week work staggered in the Sprawl, too? I've never been there. I'm told the people there are happy and cared for!
- chongli 6y ago
  What is this a reference to? “Chrome-plated gods” reminds me of Caves of Qud, but the other bits are unfamiliar.
  - smabie 6y ago
    A little of every cyberpunk novel, I suppose.
cringepirate 6y ago
Personally I find this disturbing (I am a UK Citizen) for quite a few reasons. The first is that I suspect that this is an attempt at normalising such invasive measures into everyday life. The second is that I am extremely suspicious of whatever the BBC presents anything in this artwork style. Many of these pieces appear to me as propaganda pieces and are not news (even though they are listed under news). The third is sanitising the whole world I doubt believe is good for people's well being (mentally and physically). My mother suffers from compulsive cleanliness obsession, I am sure it is a form of OCD but I am not a psychologist. When I still lived at home everything must be cleaned excessively and there are many arbitrary rules my siblings and I had to follow. It also caused significant friction in my family to the point where there was constant arguments and upsets due to her compulsive problem. I would wager that what is suggested in the article would also cause a lot of friction between people. I also have a number of allergies which I suspect is due to my mother's compulsive cleanliness in my childhood. The fourth reason is that this might be a gateway of your employer monitoring you in the home. I was recently talking to a friend of mine who owns an off-license. He was telling me that his girlfriend is required to have a laptop camera on while working to verify she is working. I really do hope things in the UK don't end up like this. However we are probably one of the most watched societies outside of China.
cameldrv 6y ago
The article asserts that a bunch of things will change in the future, but it doesn't say why. We'll live in more expensive houses, further from work, renovate all of our offices and homes, and change all of our daily and weekly routines, because of a virus that everyone is vaccinated against?
- tirpen 6y ago
  No, because because of the next virus.
  - Hamuko 6y ago
    In what, 100 years? How many global pandemics have we had?
    - meitham 6y ago
      Regulations usually kick in shortly to mitigate crisis like this happening, just like the 2008 financial crisis regulation. Without regulation no economy in the world can sustain another similar hit within the next decade.
      - cameldrv 6y ago
        That's true. There is always a tendency to fight the last war, especially when it comes to bureaucrats. That said, of all of the things that could really knock us out, I'd still put viruses among the smaller threats. Societies that are able to accurately assess risk and their ability and cost/benefit to mitigate it will tend to outperform societies that don't.
    - tirpen 6y ago
      Well, we seem to averaging on one every 20 years or so. Spanish Flu, 1918-1920 Asian Flu, 1957–58 Cholera pandemic, 1961–1975 Hong Kong Flu, 1968-1969 H1N1, 2009-2010, Covid-91, 2019-????
zachware 6y ago
This is honestly the most ridiculous article/amazing visual journalism possible. Bear with me here....This article assumes that we either a) have no path around COVID-19 via a vaccine and/or b) we spend five years failing to follow the data on infection morbidity risk as high for those with established co-morbitities or old age and/or c) that even if we succeed at a and/or b that future pathogens are detected by body temp or mitigated by hand washing. And even if I'm completely wrong about all of the above, this article relies on zero empirical data to predict 2025. This is a sign of our media times. It's a movie script, not journalism. And each click and scroll reinforces to the creators that they should create more of this empirically hollow print.
kingkawn 6y ago
The antimicrobial obsession on full view here is recognized as being the cause of maladaptive immune development https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/12/health/immune-system-allergies.html https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/12/health/immune-system-alle...
legulere 6y ago
> It also reduces the humidity to help prevent germs multiplying Too low humidity is also bad: https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0266/9493/files/Humidity-Health-Floors.jpg?370 https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0266/9493/files/Humidity-H...
cpr 6y ago
More fear porn from the Beeb. Please don’t post this noise on HN.
mattlondon 6y ago
Hmm. I think as soon as we get a vaccine, or even just a test that will tell you if you will end up in ICU or not, 95% of people will head back to the office. Even among the people who at first found WFH a huge productivity gain, I've noticed a recent trend of people fatiguing of it. The initial boon to concentration (assuming you have a quiet home which not everyone does) and not having to commute etc was great, but it seems like for a lot of people it is starting to wear a bit thin now. Pre-lockdown I used to work from home quite frequently and would happily put up with video calls, but I am growing to hate WFH now. Video meetings are increasingly grating due to their latency and people's patchy wifi. Ad-hoc informal collaboration/chats are down to zero - everything now has to be formally scheduled and arranged vs when you'd just bump into someone in the corridor/getting coffee etc. Getting a feel for what the team is working on is hard, even with regular stand-ups etc there is no "overhearing" people talking about stuff around you. Personally I do not have the space for a dedicated office set up where I live - I have a desk in the corner of my living room which is the same room that the rest of my family use while I am trying to work. I do not like the idea that I will have that there forever now - if my job wants me to work from my house forever, they can increase my salary 200% so I can stand a chance of buying somewhere in/around London with space for an office. As soon as we have a vaccine, or a test to know if I will end up in ICU vs being asymptomatic, or there is just some pill you can take if you test positive that means you get a bad fever and not a near-death coma etc, I will be right back there in the office a usual no questions asked.
yosito 6y ago
Realistically, the changes will be the ones that have a minimum cost to implement: downsizing offices, working from home, movement out of expensive cities and back into suburbs, and offices retrofitted with cheap solutions like hand sanitizer dispensers, plexiglass dividers, and spaced out desks. Things that require a huge investment like copper surfaces, plant dividers, fewer people per square meter, simply won't be worth it when the alternative is not to invest in office space at all.

43 points by karimford 6y ago

“One day, the virus will subside. It could be eradicated. But even then, life will not simply return to the way it was before Covid-19. Spurred on by the coronavirus crisis, architects have been rethinking the buildings we inhabit.“

mikehollinger 6y ago

So I’ve been wondering about this. In the states at least the trend in home design recently seems to have been toward big open floor plans with a couple of large spaces, a kitchen, and bedrooms. We have no such concept as “breakout” rooms at home for studying or work, or other things that might demand privacy or focus. I certainly don’t want to go back to the “old” 70’s style home with a bunch of similarly sized partitioned rooms, but I’d like to have some small “focus” spaces or something more cleverly named, similar in concept to the breakout rooms that run along the edge off most shared professional office spaces. Some homes have a library or home office, but I’ve yet to see a place that has two offices of equal size. Some people have converted a spare bedroom into an office - but - what if you actually need the bedroom, or in our case, what if you need two offices? I’m sort of waiting for that to become a thing. It’d be pretty sweet.

ahelwer 6y ago

I've certainly made the jump to a fully-thought-out home office[0], but masks are conspicuously absent from this article - facial recognition? Good luck when I continue wearing my nice face covering in public long after this specific virus is under control. Things like the virus-killing HVAC system are interesting. Makes you consider our current buildings from a future perspective, like in what ways they'll think we're hilariously backwards, hygiene-wise. [0] https://ahelwer.ca/post/2020-08-09-home-ergonomics/ https://ahelwer.ca/post/2020-08-09-home-ergonomics/

jjeaff 6y ago
There are already quite a few biometric detection options in production out there that can ID you just fine with a mask on. Just your eyes and forehead are probably enough for a lot of facial recognition and then there is gait detection that can identify you by how you walk or even heart beat rythmn detection that I believe requires a laser sensor of some type.

hn_throwaway_99 6y ago

Ugh, I certainly hope not. In one sense, yes, covid has accelerated some things that were already in transition, like greater work from home. But why would we think this increased isolation, sanitization, and separation would be a good thing outside of a pandemic? There is no need for wide hallways, limiting people to 2 per elevator, copious hand sanitizer use, or touchless everything to avoid "grubby" buttons when we're not in a pandemic. Yes, germs are a risk, but there are also risks in thinking for some reason it is healthy to live in a sterile, and separated, environment.

jjeaff 6y ago
I don't know, why would we continue to subject ourselves to useless TSA security theater rubdowns and millimeter wave scanners that can see your naked body under your clothes adding hours to the onboarding process when most experts agree it is ineffective and most logical beings understand that another 9/11 can never really happen again the way it did? I suspect what will drive a lot of changes like these will be insurance. Companies will want pandemic insurance and insurance companies will not offer reasonable premiums without certain precautions in place because the cost of payouts is too high.
- alphabettsy 6y ago
  I thought what we’ve learned about TSA security theater is that another 9/11 could happen and what we’re doing wouldn’t prevent it.
  - jjeaff 6y ago
    The possibility of another 9/11 became non-viable about 10 minutes after a second plane hit the WTC. It's the reason Flight 915 didn't make it to Washington DC. The passengers on 915 received the news of what was happening in NYC and the Pentagon and rushed the cockpit and the terrorists. You can't hold a plane hostage if the occupants know you are taking them on a suicide mission.
  - riffic 6y ago
    now would be the time to do it too, with less people riding planes to potentially fight back like flight 93.

riffic 6y ago

This is an overly fantastic crystal-ball piece and I don't expect things will be as far changed as this article is trying to sell us. It reminds me of those old AT&T "You Will" commercials, which did eventually come true but in a vastly different way than first envisioned (newspapers by fax? come on.) Also, most people (baristas, truck drivers, all those invisible service people and laborers in between) don't have jobs that look like this. This completely dismisses their experiences.

Trasmatta 6y ago
Yeah, this is pretty ridiculous. I'm putting a reminder for 2025 to reread this piece to see if literally any of it came true.
ImaCake 6y ago
Lots of educated professionals also work jobs that cannot be done at home. I think this BBC article is ridiculous. I can't do wetlab biology at home. And my university is busy firing people, not installing copper benchtops in the kitchenettes.

ericmcer 6y ago

This seems insanely over engineered, we are in the midst of the pandemic and people are already acting like it’s over. I think things start going back to normal the second corona runs it’s course or a vaccine appears. I live in the Bay Area and was initially planning on joining the droves of people going fully remote. On second thought I am going to stay, I would rather have the bargaining chip of being one of the remaining local devs instead of one of the growing army of fully remote programmers.

lr4444lr 6y ago
With all due respect, what kind of bargaining chip is that gonna be if U.S. dev work starts shifting to remote as the norm? Your higher cost of living in the Bay Area would count against you.
- SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
  Many of the bigger companies are continuing to expand their office footprint even though they have nobody in offices right now, and it’s very much conventional wisdom among the people signing checks that in-person collaboration makes a big difference. More companies are certainly getting more friendly to it, but a near future where remote work is the default seems very implausible.
- ericmcer 6y ago
  I don't think remote will be the norm in 5ish years, I could be totally wrong, but I think in person work offers things that remote cannot, and things will go back to the way they were in a few years. In that case companies looking for in person will be pulling from a smaller pool of engineers who stayed in the bay area during this time of exodus, hence more bargaining power.

peterwwillis 6y ago

> Laila makes a coffee in the kitchen area Seriously? You're worried about viruses and yet you're still gonna allow the "coffee petri dish," where hundreds of grubby dirty hands fondle communal cups, bowls, coffee machine buttons, creamer, sugar, stirrers? To say nothing of the giant "catered lunch" buffets with no sneeze guards. > The air conditioning system uses UV light to kill pathogens. It also reduces the humidity to help prevent germs multiplying, responding to a stream of data from sensors fixed around the building, and wearable sensors used by staff. Yet it's still got 50-year-old unmaintained fiberglass insulation inside the ducts, which, because the overlayment breaks down over time, streams tiny particles of glass throughout the office to be inhaled. (this has probably been happening in your office for some time if it's an older building) > The staff got fed up with plastic everywhere a couple of years ago. They said it made the office feel like a hospital. Laila prefers the plants. The plants are plastic now. Too many finicky potential problems like mold/mildew, they're hard to clean, not maintenance-free. > It's face-to-face with colleagues - but all at a safe distance. We don't even practice social distancing now. It's not gonna happen at work with people who feel comfortable around each other. And honestly, what's the point indoors? You cough and the overhead A/C pushes microscopic water particles way farther than 6 feet. > It's 16:00 and time to go home. Laila moved to the suburbs with a friend after the lockdown in 2020. It's a longer commute, but she doesn't mind as it's only once a week. There a lot of roommates in the suburbs? Most middle-class young people working in offices like this will still need several roommates to afford rent, what with cost of living constantly increasing but pay not adjusting as much (news flash: covid-19 has not fixed income inequality). The suburbs aren't actually much cheaper in most parts, because people who work in cities live in them. People will continue to live in cities because there's still more access to everything in them. > she knew she would need a home office [..] There's a new standing desk, a properly adjustable office chair and storage for documents I work from home now and I don't need a home office. All you need is a table and a chair in a corner of a room. With kids, I get it, but otherwise, what's all that extra space going toward? Every "document" I own fits in a single box. If anything, apartments will just become "Tokyo-ified". > She never realised, before, how important it was to have good lighting, so she had spotlights installed in the ceiling and bought a proper desk lamp. Ok, now you're jumping the shark. Nobody's installing track lighting just to do computer work. One good desk lamp is all you need. > She's near a big road and she needs to concentrate hard when she's working - sound-proofing is an issue she hadn't anticipated. Headphones worked for the office, they work at home too.

thewhitetulip 6y ago

I don't think this will happen. People are affected by Corona, yes, but that is because corona is a thing today. Once corona goes away, only the paranoid will follow these guidelines. Pretty much majority of the population will go back to normal way of life unaffected. Climate crisis is irreversible and nobody gives a shit about it. How can we think that corona will change everything? That being said, if it does change people then it os a very good thing

downandout 6y ago
Climate is seen by most people as something that might kill future generations hundreds of years from now. Carona is seen as something that can kill us today. So there is a big difference in perceived urgency between the two. I think it would be naive to think that there won’t be some permanent changes to society as a result of this virus, the explosive rise in remote work being the biggest one. Companies have been forced into it, and now realize that it works very well and saves them a fortune. We will see far more remote-only teams, etc. We may also see a large reduction in live events going forward, or at least significant changes to them, which makes me sad. However, I believe you are correct that many of the precautions taken in this article will not stand the test of time and would be viewed as paranoid. I don’t think thermal cameras and masks will be a thing forever, and I doubt voice-activated elevators are going to be in widespread use anytime soon.
tempsolution 6y ago
> Once corona goes away, only the paranoid will follow these guidelines. The social distancing guidelines? Sure. A lot of people don't give a fuck already, if it wasn't for appearances. Working from home, skipping the 1-2 hour commute, sitting in a depressing office all day? Oh you bet you can kiss that one goodbye. I for one, will not return to the office and my employer (a large software company) seems to expect that as well. The day of people going to do office will be numbered. There still are reasons to go, socialize with your peers, etc. but that's pretty much it. And we have excellent offices and I had literally zero commute time before I moved one hour out of town in wise foresight of corona impacts. I never felt as good as living in the nature, working from home, getting away from it all. Now I hate cities (completely unimaginable before, I was always a city person, or so I thought. Corona changed that completely, and I bet I am not alone)

asveikau 6y ago

I don't think social distancing will be big in 2025, just as it wasn't in 1923, the same distance away from 1918. I really hope we don't see a late 20th century style flee of cities either. The problems with that from last time are well documented.

blinkengus 6y ago
But how many of those problems stemmed from the external requirement that those fleeing would have to commute back in 5 days per week, and for the most part all on the same 9-5 schedule? There's a version of moving away from dense urban cores that still accommodates community, transportation, public space, local necessities, commerce and small businesses, etc.
- asveikau 6y ago
  Many of those issues had nothing to do with how crappy commuting is for affluent people (a significant problem) but what happens to the people without the means to escape. Local tax base diminishes, concentration of low incomes leads to a sort of ghettoization, etc. Personally I think density and varied income levels within that are good for a number of reasons.

orliesaurus 6y ago

Reading this article one thing shocked me: Do a lot of homes not have double glazing in the UK? I thought it was a standard, because it's so much more efficient at keeping cool/warmth inside/outside (depending on season)

mattlondon 6y ago
I would say it would be unusual not to have double glazing these days. It has been a thing for decades and there are grants available to make your property more energy efficient. That said there are a lot of a) old buildings that are protected and so can't have the windows replaced easily/in an economically viable way (e.g. each window needing to be hand-crafted in wood to non-standard sizes to look identical bto what was there before), b) a lot of just properties nrented out to single people who rent a single room etc and the landlord simply doesn't care/bother, c) houses that were lived in by someone for the last 30/40/50 years where basically no maintenance or decoration had been done - they've died and someone else had moved in.
meitham 6y ago
My house in Surrey and several others around me were built in the Edwardian era 1900-1910 and they are all single glazed. The windows are made of timber with very attractive moulding around it. Most double glazed windows are made of PVC (plastics) and they look very plain. Double glazed timbers windows are extremely expensive. All the previous homes I lived in had mould fungus growth on walls and behind wall papers. The double glazing ensured air-tight house but lack of air circulation. Single glazed windows seem to be really good at preventing mould growth, of course at the extra cost of heating bills.
din-9 6y ago
Modern homes are built with it, but we have a lot of old houses here too.
zmk_ 6y ago
I used to live in the UK 10 years ago and back then it seemed like double glazing was some sort of luxury while where I moved from it was the standard and people were converting old houses to it as well. Where I live now people use triple glazed windows...

Oricle 6y ago

The Jews off BBC! Its always been Jews vs gentiles. For over 2000 years! Wake the fuck up you dumb shits!

smabie 6y ago

Ah yes, like the geodesic domes erected over major cities that filter the toxic air, contaminated by the bioviruses released during the Great War. The mud-girls and mud-boys of the Sprawl fight over the scraps of obselete tech left behind by the chrome plated gods of New Eden; watching over the condemned above the gravity well.

drewcoo 6y ago
Are start times for once-a-week work staggered in the Sprawl, too? I've never been there. I'm told the people there are happy and cared for!
chongli 6y ago
What is this a reference to? “Chrome-plated gods” reminds me of Caves of Qud, but the other bits are unfamiliar.
- smabie 6y ago
  A little of every cyberpunk novel, I suppose.

cringepirate 6y ago

Personally I find this disturbing (I am a UK Citizen) for quite a few reasons. The first is that I suspect that this is an attempt at normalising such invasive measures into everyday life. The second is that I am extremely suspicious of whatever the BBC presents anything in this artwork style. Many of these pieces appear to me as propaganda pieces and are not news (even though they are listed under news). The third is sanitising the whole world I doubt believe is good for people's well being (mentally and physically). My mother suffers from compulsive cleanliness obsession, I am sure it is a form of OCD but I am not a psychologist. When I still lived at home everything must be cleaned excessively and there are many arbitrary rules my siblings and I had to follow. It also caused significant friction in my family to the point where there was constant arguments and upsets due to her compulsive problem. I would wager that what is suggested in the article would also cause a lot of friction between people. I also have a number of allergies which I suspect is due to my mother's compulsive cleanliness in my childhood. The fourth reason is that this might be a gateway of your employer monitoring you in the home. I was recently talking to a friend of mine who owns an off-license. He was telling me that his girlfriend is required to have a laptop camera on while working to verify she is working. I really do hope things in the UK don't end up like this. However we are probably one of the most watched societies outside of China.

cameldrv 6y ago

The article asserts that a bunch of things will change in the future, but it doesn't say why. We'll live in more expensive houses, further from work, renovate all of our offices and homes, and change all of our daily and weekly routines, because of a virus that everyone is vaccinated against?

tirpen 6y ago
No, because because of the next virus.
- Hamuko 6y ago
  In what, 100 years? How many global pandemics have we had?
  - meitham 6y ago
    Regulations usually kick in shortly to mitigate crisis like this happening, just like the 2008 financial crisis regulation. Without regulation no economy in the world can sustain another similar hit within the next decade.
    - cameldrv 6y ago
      That's true. There is always a tendency to fight the last war, especially when it comes to bureaucrats. That said, of all of the things that could really knock us out, I'd still put viruses among the smaller threats. Societies that are able to accurately assess risk and their ability and cost/benefit to mitigate it will tend to outperform societies that don't.
  - tirpen 6y ago
    Well, we seem to averaging on one every 20 years or so. Spanish Flu, 1918-1920 Asian Flu, 1957–58 Cholera pandemic, 1961–1975 Hong Kong Flu, 1968-1969 H1N1, 2009-2010, Covid-91, 2019-????

zachware 6y ago

This is honestly the most ridiculous article/amazing visual journalism possible. Bear with me here....This article assumes that we either a) have no path around COVID-19 via a vaccine and/or b) we spend five years failing to follow the data on infection morbidity risk as high for those with established co-morbitities or old age and/or c) that even if we succeed at a and/or b that future pathogens are detected by body temp or mitigated by hand washing. And even if I'm completely wrong about all of the above, this article relies on zero empirical data to predict 2025. This is a sign of our media times. It's a movie script, not journalism. And each click and scroll reinforces to the creators that they should create more of this empirically hollow print.

kingkawn 6y ago

The antimicrobial obsession on full view here is recognized as being the cause of maladaptive immune development https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/12/health/immune-system-allergies.html https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/12/health/immune-system-alle...

legulere 6y ago

> It also reduces the humidity to help prevent germs multiplying Too low humidity is also bad: https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0266/9493/files/Humidity-Health-Floors.jpg?370 https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0266/9493/files/Humidity-H...

cpr 6y ago

More fear porn from the Beeb. Please don’t post this noise on HN.

mattlondon 6y ago

Hmm. I think as soon as we get a vaccine, or even just a test that will tell you if you will end up in ICU or not, 95% of people will head back to the office. Even among the people who at first found WFH a huge productivity gain, I've noticed a recent trend of people fatiguing of it. The initial boon to concentration (assuming you have a quiet home which not everyone does) and not having to commute etc was great, but it seems like for a lot of people it is starting to wear a bit thin now. Pre-lockdown I used to work from home quite frequently and would happily put up with video calls, but I am growing to hate WFH now. Video meetings are increasingly grating due to their latency and people's patchy wifi. Ad-hoc informal collaboration/chats are down to zero - everything now has to be formally scheduled and arranged vs when you'd just bump into someone in the corridor/getting coffee etc. Getting a feel for what the team is working on is hard, even with regular stand-ups etc there is no "overhearing" people talking about stuff around you. Personally I do not have the space for a dedicated office set up where I live - I have a desk in the corner of my living room which is the same room that the rest of my family use while I am trying to work. I do not like the idea that I will have that there forever now - if my job wants me to work from my house forever, they can increase my salary 200% so I can stand a chance of buying somewhere in/around London with space for an office. As soon as we have a vaccine, or a test to know if I will end up in ICU vs being asymptomatic, or there is just some pill you can take if you test positive that means you get a bad fever and not a near-death coma etc, I will be right back there in the office a usual no questions asked.

yosito 6y ago

Realistically, the changes will be the ones that have a minimum cost to implement: downsizing offices, working from home, movement out of expensive cities and back into suburbs, and offices retrofitted with cheap solutions like hand sanitizer dispensers, plexiglass dividers, and spaced out desks. Things that require a huge investment like copper surfaces, plant dividers, fewer people per square meter, simply won't be worth it when the alternative is not to invest in office space at all.