hammer

[email protected] (Dan) wrote in
news:[email protected]:

> the pink hammer and other things like cambells soup etc is an awarness
> of cancer in women and i also think the companies that sell pink items
> like that donate a portion of the sale to the cancer society.what
> different does color mean anyway it does the same thing and is easier
> to find with ppl. who have industrial blindness.
>
>

Color tends to evoke an emotional response in humans. In the United
States at least, pink is used to represent the female gender while light
blue is used to represent the male gender. That's why the first reply
on the thread about pink hammers was along the lines of "are you secure
enough in your manliness". (I don't feel like looking it up.)

There are people who really don't care about color, or just go with
making the whole pallete fit. Then there are others who see
significance in the blue of Dorothy's dress from Wizard of Oz.

What does color mean in tools? Usually it's branding. Blue tools are
made by Kobalt, yellow's DeWalt, etc. Brands inspire trust or distrust
in people (how many have said "I'll never buy another X tool?") So it's
the combination of branding and social norm that keep pink tools out of
most men's work space. Woodworking (and engineering) is male dominated,
and until that changes we'll probably see only special editions of pink
(and lavender) tools.

I've been reading Don Norman's book /Emotional Design/ recently. It's
inspired a lot of thought about design and looking at existing designs
looking for places to improve. The length of this post might be
influenced by that.

Puckdropper
--
"The potential difference between the top and bottom of a tree is the
reason why all trees have to be grounded..." -- Bored Borg on
rec.woodworking

To email me directly, send a message to puckdropper (at) fastmail.fm

Puckdropper wrote:

> There are people who really don't care about color,

... and some of us, who colored the sky red and the grass green until we
learned to read, have no choice in the matter.

--
www.e-woodshop.net
Last update: 10/22/08
KarlC@ (the obvious)

> There are people who really don't care about color ....
>
> What does color mean in tools? =A0Usually it's branding. =A0....

I bought a cooper's shave made by Kunz. The damn thing was red and
bright green. I wouldn't have something so garish in my shop, so I
removed the paint and refinished in black. The tool now has self-
respect and even works better.

Joel