Fair IT – an increasing demand from IT purchasers

Tags: csr, fair IT, IT products, makeITfair, purchaser, social responsibility, sr, sustainable IT, TCO Certified

 Last Saturday May 7th, people all over Europe and around the world joined the European organization makeITFair’s international Make IT fair action day. The goal of the action day was to improve the lives of workers around the globe who are working long hours for poor pay to satisfy our constant demands for the latest electronic gadgets.

makeITfair is a European project focusing on the electronics industry, especially on consumer electronics like mobile phones, laptops and MP3 players. They want to let young people across Europe know about the labor abuses and environmental problems that are going on right now around the world – just to satisfy our demand for all the latest electronic gadgets. 

Fair IT – a key factor for competitive advantage
It’s a very urgent issue that makeITfair is raising. But this is an issue that are relevant to all purchasers of IT products – not only young consumers. At TCO Development we daily discuss this issue with IT purchasers from private as well as public sector. Many organizations have understand that one of the key factors for their competitive advantage  is to have ambitious goals on social responsibility which also includes good working conditions for the labor in the manufacturing process. The company’s policy on CSR is often reflected in their purchase specifications also for IT equipment, hence Fair IT is on the agenda for professional purchasers!

Certifications a way to  influence the industry towards sustainabile IT
TCO Certified – a certification for ICT products designed for both usability and the environment, introduced in 2009 a criteria on proven commitment in social responsibility in the manufacturing process. The criteria was a first step and wasn’t particularly strict, but 1 in 4 IT brands didn’t work with these issues before and they had to start working on improving the working conditions in the manufacturing process in order to qualify for the TCO Certified certification. So by asking for TCO Certified products you can influence the industry towards sustainable IT. Next time the criteria document will be updated the  SR criteria will be stricter.  On TCO Development’s website you can read more about the criteria on social responsibility.

Passive vs Active: A match on 3DTV

Tags: 3D, 3DTV, active eyeglasses, auto-steroscopic 3D, passive eyeglasses, visual ergonomics

TCO Development together with research partner Acreo has conducted the first comparison study under test laboratory conditions of the 2 major 3DTV techniques available to consumers today: Active and Passive eyeglasses 3DTV. In a few years from now we will likely be watching 3DTV without the need of glasses (Auto-steroscopic 3D), but today we need glasses and there is a divided opinion as to which of these 2 techniques delivers the best overall 3D experience. Therefore, TCO Development used its unique position to evaluate each of these technologies from the viewpoint of the user experience. The study confirms some important visual ergonomic differences and although it is an impartial study conducted during the ongoing TV brand conflict, we hope that the findings may guide you in your 3DTV choice. Read the findings from the study on TCO Development’s website.