# Why you should make useless things

- Institution: TED
- Department: TED2018
- Speaker: Simone Giertz
- Year: 2018
- Level: For everyone
- Language: English
- Subjects: Art, architecture and design
- Source: [TED](https://www.ted.com/talks/simone_giertz_why_you_should_make_useless_things)
- Licence: [CC BY-NC-ND 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/) (Non-commercial use only, and no changed versions.)
- Who can watch: Tweens profiles and older (sources give no ratings; placed by Invisible Network from the source's own words)

In this joyful, heartfelt talk featuring demos of her wonderfully wacky creations, Simone Giertz shares her craft: making useless robots. Her inventions -- designed to chop vegetables, cut hair, apply lipstick and more -- rarely (if ever) succeed, and that's the point. "The true beauty of making useless things \[is\] this acknowledgment that you don't always know what the best answer is," Giertz says. "It turns off that voice in your head that tells you that you know exactly how the world works. Maybe a toothbrush helmet isn't the answer, but at least you're asking the question."

## Lectures

1. [Why you should make useless things](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/learn/ted/simone_giertz_why_you_should_make_useless_things/7d27171ed6a6), 12 min (TED's player)