Blog Task week 8
Posted by vyf693 on May 13, 2010
Filed under Uncategorized
Interview with Graham Fleet (my dad) in regards to his e-waste habits – without using the terminology “e-waste“
(He’s a professor at UNSW, so he’s pretty up-to-date with what we’re studying at the moment)
Q. May I please have your consent to publish any answers or statements you may make throughout this interview on my online blog, and possibly elsewhere?
A. Yes, you can have my consent
Q. Thank you. How many TVs do you currently own?
A. Three
Q. When was the last time you purchased a TV?
A. End of last year
Q. What was your reason for purchasing?
A. Present for myself! Updating old TV
Q. And what did you do with the old TV?
A. Put it in another room.. it will probably break soon though
Q. How many, if any, computers / laptops do you own?
A. Too many! 2 work computers.. 2 laptops… just got rid of 2 desktops
Q. What did you do with the 2 desktops?
A. Dropped them off at a council ewaste cleanup. They have been sitting in storage for over 2 years
Q. How did you find out about this event?
A. It was advertised in the leader, remember I showed you?
Q. Yes, shh. Do you believe this is an effective measure of depositing broken or unwanted technologies?
A. Not really… I had to drive out to bloody Kurnell! …It has potential. Its an effective idea, but not a lot of people are aware of programs like that or the proper disposal methods of electronics… most people wont want to go to any effort. You see them outside they just dump it on the street. There really needs to be a better system put into place
Q. Do you know of any other programs that you can take these electronics?
A. I’m sure there are places available, the shop up at Taren Point I think it is takes our empty ink cartridges and printers. You see the problem with this is people aren’t aware of the chemicals used to create these things. Lots of chemicals go into just inks, you know to make them separate.. come out in certain colours, and to not dry up, tones of chemicals! If you stiff that stuff, or it gets onto your skin it can cause serious damage! The mixtures can be very toxic. Its very dangerous to just put them in the trash, but people don’t know you see.
Q. Have you ever had to get rid of any other devices?
A. A few … mainly computers. There was a council clean up a few years back that was good… My university “apparently” recycles our computers
Q. Do you know where they take them?
A. No, no. They just get someone to come in, they replace the monitor and screen, transfer all my stuff over and then take it out all in a day. I don’t see what happens to it after. I might look into that…
Q. How often would you say your electronics, such as TVs & computers, fail on you? I.e. die.
A. Lately very often! All the devices we’ve bought have been really good up until about 4-5 years ago.. That TV downstairs has lasted over 15 years! Longer than the Sony one we bought that died last year! And computers don’t last more than 2-3 years now.. Its ridiculous, but that’s the world we live in today … 15 years ago things were made to last. That fridge we haven’t had to replace since before your mother and I lived here. Its probably going to break soon, but I’ve been really happy the way its lasted. Things were of really good quality back then. Now things break down before its even out of warranty
Q. Do you get them fixed or replace it?
A. Generally I try to get things fixed, but they’ve made it such an inconvenience these days, and its generally cheaper just to replace it. I spent 4 hours on the phone to some guy in the Phillipines yesterday trying to work out what was wrong with that printer, and its still not fixed!
Summary
The interview was face-to-face, informal and semi-structured. It took place in our kitchen, with the use of an iPhone voice recorder.
As the interview unravelled, I scrapped my pre-planned interview and began to improvise questions in response to the answers Graham was giving. It was obvious he was aware of the subject of e-waste, and the importance in recycling it. Being a scientist, he is also knowledgeable and therefore concerned about the impact and harm that toxic chemicals produce when ineffectively disposing of electronic goods (particularly printer inks haha). It helped that the interviewee was concerned about the disposal of electronic waste, as this allowed me to steer from my prepared questions and gage follow up questions, probing further into the subjects mind in search for more informative answers and a “hooking point” (Moore, 2010).
From the information gathered, I can conclude that Graham is conservative in his technological purchases, only buying or updating when necessary, if things are broken and cannot be fixed. Graham is someone who will go to some effort to properly recycle e-waste. He contributes by taking printers and inks to a local disposal shop, and is moderately aware of e-waste clean up programs around his residential area. Graham raises the issue of the lack of awareness of e-waste and its dangers, saying that perhaps if more people knew about the dangers to them personally, it could impact the way people dispose of their electronics. This links in with my groups research question, and as a result we can use this inverview as a primary source of data.
Graham strikes a valid point; If technology was made of better quality and didn’t frequently break / die, would this reduce the levels of e-waste? Or would people still contribute through upgrading their products before the current life span was over? This too could have been an interesting research question.
Reference
Fleet, V, 2010, “Blog task week 7″, weblog, DIGC Field Notes Journal, 9 May, accessed 13/05/2010,http://uowblogs.com/digcvyf693/2010/05/09/week-7-blog-task/
Moore, C, 2010, “Interview Methods”, lecture, DIGC102, Methods in Digital Research, University of Wollongong, delivered 27th April
Dictionary, 2010, accessed 13/05/2010, http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/e-waste
UNSW, 2010, accessed 13/05/2010, http://www.science.unsw.edu.au/
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