Volvo Amazon 122, 1956. I'm not really sure what's going on in this publicity image. In 1959 the 120 series Volvo became the first car in the world to be fitted with seat belts as standard equipment.
Umbrellas and automobiles are different. Not just because of size, function, and cost. But for a reason we seldom stop to consider. A person can use an umbrella without buying another product. An automobile, by contrast, is useless without fuel, oil, repair services, spare parts, not to mention streets and roads. The humble umbrella, therefore, is a rugged individual, so to speak, delivering value to its user irrespective of any other product.
The mighty auto, by contrast, is a team player completely dependent on other products. So is a razor blade, a tape recorder, a refrigerator, and thousands of other products that work only when combined with others. The television set would stare blankly into the living room if someone somewhere were not transmitting images to it. Even the lowly closet hanger presupposes a rack or bar to hang it on.
Each of these is part of a product system. It is precisely their systemic nature that is their main source of economic value. And just as "team players" must play by certain agreed-on rules, systemic products need standards to work. A three-pronged electrical plug doesn't help much if all the wall sockets have only two slots.
This distinction between stand-alone and systemic products throws revealing light on an issue that is widening today's information wars all around the world. The French call it la guerre des normes—“the war over standards." Battles over standards are raging in industries as diverse as medical technology, industrial pressure vessels, and cameras.
Alvin Toffler, Powershift: Knowledge, Wealth, and Power at the Edge of the 21st Century
Salvador Dali, Sewing machine with umbrella I, 1941
Man Ray, Beau comme la rencontre fortuite sur une table de dissection d'une machine à coudre et d'un parapluie, (‘Beautiful as the accidental encounter, on a dissecting table, of a sewing machine and an umbrella’.) ca. 1933 (6 photos)
Salvador Dali, Detail- Sewing machine with umbrella I, 1941